Where have you been

     I used to really like Rihanna. Not that I don't now, but my distaste for her has grown considerably recently.  Her vocals haven't changed much but the themes in her songs have. Her songs used to be about dancing and love and what not. Now they are all about sex. Whether it be oral, BDSM, or spontaneous, sex seems to be a recurrent, and irritating theme.
     Sex sells. Its that plain and simple. That's why it's in the media. Nothing gets a person's attention (good or bad) better than sex. That's why songs about it are almost always popular. For Rihanna, I guess it started with "S&M." The songs extols the joys of S&M, also known as sadomasochism, (a subset of BDSM) which is the receiving of pleasure by giving or receiving pain. I don't have a problem with S&M or BDSM. They are different types of erotic tastes that many people privately have. I think its perfectly fine to have those tastes, as long as it's safe and consensual. With that being said, I don't think it's okay to write some raunchy song about it just to sell albums.Since it was a major hit,  I would assume that afterwards, Rihanna caught on and decided that she would make an album solely devoted to sex. Which she did. To be honest, Talk that Talk should have been named "Talk Some Sex."   Most of the songs on the album refers to sex in some way, shape or form. I'd be lying if I said that I hated every song. I do like "We Found Love" and "Where Have You Been" (in addition to "Take Care" on Drake's album) which were not that overtly sexual at all (thank god!) The worst atrocity on this album has got to be "Birthday Cake." Even without the remix with Chris Brown, (remember him? the guy who beat her up and sent her to the hospital? obviously Rihanna doesn't) the song was disgusting. The song probably ranks amongst the most sexual songs that I have heard on the radio, even though at final length it is only 1:18 seconds long. Most of the lyrics include Rihanna chanting "Cake Cake Cake... (15 times)" To end with a hoorah, the songs fades out with her saying "I wanna fuck you right now." I mean, she didn't have to say that. If a person listened to the first minute of the "song" they would have already inferred that line. Before listening to this song, I didn't know cake could mean anything other than a dessert I eat on my birthday. Kudos to Rihanna for making it mean something more perverted.
    I hope the  old Rihanna comes back. I like the old music much better than the new. Sex sells, but it won't take her far. After a while, people are gonna get tired like me and want to listen to something else.