Do Ya Think I’m Sexy - I Mean Clever?

“If you’re a serious musician or songwriter and wish to be treated as such, your chiseled features and smokin’ bod could prove problematic.”  So says 10 Rockers Too Sexy For Their Own Good.

Got it.  Some musicians have flaunted their attractiveness to the point where their musicianship became secondary, and that’s a sad thing.  Even worse, though, is the legion of entertainers who have road their looks to undeserved stardom – especially true in these days of Broadway dance production, monotone melodies and Autotune.

But the real thing that jumps out at me about this article is its total randomness.  Critics don’t take Marnie Stern seriously, and comment on her looks even though she doesn’t dress to exploit those looks?  Liz Phair chose the wrong song?  Rod Stewart was, what, hugely successful with his music and with the ladies?  Ann and Nancy Wilson were bullied and exploited by the chauvinist suits at their record company (and fought back)? 

And listen:  Robert Plant did not write the lyric “squeeze my lemon ‘til the juice runs down my leg.”  It came from Robert Johnson’s Travelling Riverside Blues.  And Johnson borrowed it from Arthur McKay, who we can be sure borrowed it from someone else.  The lyric is probably 300 years old.

Few females I know like Robert Plant, and they do cite his appearance (“acts like he’s sexy but he’s not”) as the reason.  Most males I know have the same attitude towards Rod Stewart, but they disguise it with criticism of his somewhat juvenile choice of songs.  But Plant, Stewart and the Wilsons have sold a gazillion records and are in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

So what exactly does “too sexy for their own good” mean?  Nothing, as far as I can tell, except maybe an eye-catching title (sexy) that lures you into reading an article that has no regard for facts, context or logic.

Guess it worked.