8 November 2003
I’ve waded through enough of the Outhere Brothers, Eminem and Shaggy at number one to know that any single which comes in a ‘clean’ and a ‘dirty’ version will attract a certain clientele. ‘Be Faithful’ in dirty mode makes liberal use, in one of its many exuberant chant-along refrains, of the world’s favourite four-letter f-word.
The thing is, the clean version of ‘Be Faithful’ still includes another refrain uncensored, featuring a derogatory sexual slang term for women. Granted, I only know this because I took the precaution of googling the lyrics and checking a word I didn’t recognise. I doubt the casual radio listener or CD single buyer on our side of the Atlantic in 2003 knew it either. Still, there it is, it’s despicable, and neither the Chic sample nor the other hype-man catchphrases can make me un-hear it. I’m so fed up with this stuff.
