# Songs about the Oldest Profession **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 2, 2013, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312 "2013-05-02T15:07:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2013, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/61 "2013-05-02T23:29:11Z")
> [@Dallas\_Jones](#): > > No one has mentioned the best one. “Sweet Cream Ladies” by the Boxtops. I feel suitably ashamed at not having thought of “Sweet Cream Ladies,” because you’re right, it is the best one. Amazing that it got on the radio in 1969. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2013, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/62 "2013-05-02T23:48:18Z")
There was an exchange at a Beatles press conference once when a reporter repeated the claims by anti-Beatles conservatives that _Day Tripper_ was about a prostitute and _Norwegian Wood_ was about a lesbian. He asked Lennon and McCartney what their intention was when they wrote those songs, and Paul responded “We were just trying to write songs about prostitutes and lesbians was all”. While it was almost certainly a joke, there’s been a standing rumor for almost 50 years that _Day Tripper_ is about a prostitute. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_Draper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Don\_Draper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_Draper)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/63 "2013-05-03T03:19:20Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > While it was almost certainly a joke, there’s been a standing rumor for almost 50 years that _Day Tripper_ is about a prostitute. I had always heard that “She’s Leaving Home” was supposed to be the prostitution song. The line “meeting a man from the motor trade” was (according to religious wing-nuts) OBVIOUSLY a reference to a pimp luring that nice young girl into a life of prostitution. (How could she do that to her mother??) “The Girl with the Holiday Smile” by Lyle Lovett: “I met a hooker at the grocery store / Wasn’t bad lookin’, she was a pretty little whore…” What about “I Don’t Know How to Love Him” from Jesus Christ Superstar? It’s sung by the character Mary Magdalene, who (at least in the context of the musical) is a reformed hooker. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/64 "2013-05-03T03:44:38Z")
I was going to say _Suite Madame Blue_, but it looks like there may be an unrelated underlying message ---
**Author:** ![Barking\_Dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Barking\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barking_Dog)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/65 "2013-05-03T03:45:26Z")
[The Baltimore Whores](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vL-iOj4JJQU) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/66 "2013-05-03T03:45:43Z")
“St. Teresa” by Joan Osborne At least it’s 99% likely. The song doesn’t explicitly say Teresa is a prostitute but it says she’s a good-looking woman who’s out working on the street in order to make enough money to buy drugs. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/67 "2013-05-03T03:49:04Z")
> [@StGermain](#): > > Two pages and no one’s mentioned _She Works Hard For the Money_ by Donna Summer? > > ETA - Just looked at Wikipedia about the song and apparently it _isn’t_ about prostitution. Who knew? > > StG You’re probably confusing this song with “Bad Girls” (which is about prostitutes). It’s pretty clear the woman in “She Works Hard For the Money” is a waitress. ---
**Author:** ![Rhiannon8404](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rhiannon8404/32/17929_2.png) [@Rhiannon8404](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhiannon8404)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/68 "2013-05-03T05:26:37Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > _Maggie Mae_, Rod Stewart is supposedly about a prostitute. Actually, I believe it is about a young man in a relationship with a much older woman, based on his own experiences. ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/69 "2013-05-03T06:50:11Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > I’ve been listening to Broadway a lot on my SiriusXM, and started noting there are quite a few songs about prostitutes. Some include: > > The triumphant [“My Body”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-ckNG_hyTY) from **The Life** Also “The Oldest Profession” and “Don’t Take Much” from the same musical “At the House of Marcus Lycus” from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum ---
**Author:** ![the\_diego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/70 "2013-05-03T06:53:51Z")
“Black Bird” by Lennon-Macarthney “Lying Eyes” by The Eagles “I don’t know how to love him” by Loyd-Webber “I dreamed a dream” by C. Mackintosh ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/71 "2013-05-03T07:32:28Z")
> [@Dallas\_Jones](#): > > No one has mentioned the best one. “Sweet Cream Ladies” by the Boxtops. I must be retarded. I can’t believe how many songs I grew up listening to, and could tell you the title and artist after hearing just a couple seconds of any part of them, but I never had a clue about the lyrics. I either got them completely wrong, or just mumbled noises that sort of resembled them phonetically. When I hear this song in my head, believe it or not, I hear the lyrics to _MacArthur Park_. The part of _Sweet Cream Ladies_ that begins “They will love you in the darkness,” which I swear on a stack of Bibles I never knew was in the song before tonight, scans identically with the part of _MacArthur Park_ that begins, “I don’t think that I can take it.” ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/72 "2013-05-03T08:02:10Z")
Here is song from old country. [Maxine](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MiXEruBEwQ), by kiwi singer Sharon O’Neill. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/73 "2013-05-03T09:11:41Z")
From “Sweet Charity”: \* You Should See Yourself Big Spender Charity’s Soliloquy Rich Man’s Frug There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This The Rhythm of Life \* And probably a few more. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/74 "2013-05-03T10:19:11Z")
The 40s tune Drinking Rum and Coca Cola? ---
**Author:** ![Noel\_Prosequi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b19c9b/32.png) [@Noel\_Prosequi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noel_Prosequi)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/75 "2013-05-03T13:14:43Z")
Candy’s Room by Bruce. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John (“I’m not a present for your friends to open…”) Girls on the Avenue by Richard Clapton. For mine, Candy’s Room is the best. It captures that weird stalker quality of the John who thinks _he’s_ the one she _really_ loves. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/76 "2013-05-03T13:39:36Z")
_Something Fast_ by the _Sisters of Mercy_ (heh) is probably about a prostitute: You can stand all night, at a red light anywhere in town hailing marys left and right, none of them slow down I’ve seen the best of men go past, I don’t want to be the last But there’s a chance that the singer is saying that the woman in question is like a prostitute due to her sleeping with many men. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/77 "2013-05-03T13:47:04Z")
[Broke Down Girl](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPEJPt-EOeo), Buffy Sainte Marie It has one of the best lines in a song: > [@](#): > > A soulless solace for a sailor ashore; a broke down girl, that’s all. ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/78 "2013-05-03T13:57:49Z")
[Edweena](http://www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858559176/) by [The Residents](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEmbwAwH08c). ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/79 "2013-05-03T13:59:10Z")
“When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?” by John Ball ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2013, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312/80 "2013-05-03T14:16:51Z")
For perhaps the oldest and most widely recorded “Lili Marlene” (also known as “Lily, Lilly, Lilli” for the first name and “Marleen” and “Marlane” for the last name. I have also seen it listed as “Lilly of the Lamppost”) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/songs-about-the-oldest-profession/657312.md?page=5)