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No Money, No Honey
Humpin' Around
This piece brings together two things that sit on opposite ends of my personal love spectrum: R&B music (love it!) and lady cooch (Hated it!). From the beginning of time—or at least since wax records—Black music has obsessed over two things: love and sex. But let’s keep it a buck—half the time, “love” is just code for “fuck.” Jackie Wilson wasn’t lifted by some woman’s spirit. “Your Love (Pussy) Keeps Lifting Me Higher” is what he really meant. Same with Whitney crooning about how “You Give Good Love”—we know she meant good dick.
For men, it’s easy. They “wanna love you down” and “love you all night long,” but we know that’s just lyrical lube for “I’m tryna smash.” When women sing about love, though, they’re usually talking about holding hands at the park and fighting over one of their dumbass kids who got suspended again. But don’t get it twisted—there are plenty of R&B divas who threw romance out the window and go straight for the meat.
The ’70s was prime coochie season. Black women on wax were tossing the box with zero shame. Girl group Musique gave us “Push in the Bush.” Donna Summer practically wore out the studio phone line begging for dick in “Hot Stuff.” "Cerrone’s Paradise” opens with a bunch of women arguing over who gets to ride the “banana” in his pants. Sylvia Robinson moaned like she was getting her pussy ate live in-studio on 1973’s “Pillow Talk.” And in 1975, Minnie Riperton—R&B’s sweetheart of sweet soprano—got nasty as hell on “Inside My Love,” asking some man she barely knew: “Do you wanna ride inside my love?” and “Will you come inside me?” Minnie!!
Fast-forward to the ‘80s, and Prince was basically the pimp of pervy R&B. He gave us classics like “Nasty Girl” (“I need seven inches or more!”), “Sugar Walls” [“Your body’s on fire, admit it! Come inside (my sugar walls)”], and “Sex Shooter,” which could be mistaken for a gun-rights anthem until you realize Apollonia’s just looking to ride cock.
And then there’s Janet. Ms. Jackson if you’re nasty—and she was. Real life seems to back it up too. In both Bobby Brown and Bobby DeBarge’s biopics, Janet comes across as a delightful Loosey Goosey who didn’t mind taking a boy on a sexcapade. On her "janet." album she would have given a man a juicy blowjob “If” he didn’t already have a girlfriend and on "All For You"'s icky “Would You Mind”, she’s up for a rawdawgging session, demanding her lover to “come inside of me”, “letting your juices flow deep in my passion.” (I’m not sure about this, but I get the feeling that Janet used “passion” as a stand-in for “pussy”). Outside of hip hop, no other Black female artist has carried the coochie crown quite like Janet. I’d argue she laid the groundwork for Lil Kim and Cardi B. to later say things for which they should have gotten their mouths washed out with soap.
White girls weren’t exactly sitting this one out either. ABBA had one of their vocalists literally stick her head out the window desperately searching for any cock that might randomly pass by in “Gimme Gimme Gimme (A Man After Midnight).” Cher went to the bar and moaned “Take Me Home” into the ear of the first stranger that crossed her path. Porn-actress-turned-temporary-pop-diva Andrea True demanded “More, More, More” while cameras filmed the whole thing. And in the 90s, 20 Fingers gave us the hilarious “Short Dick Man,” a diss track against the pencil-dicked dudes of the world.
So yeah—whether it’s soulful or synth-heavy, disco or dirty talk, female artists has always known what time it is. Call it love, call it lust, call it “passion,” but let’s not pretend: pussy and dick been running the charts since forever.
A Woman’s Work
Yes, there are women who love free sex and want to sing about it, but what about those artists who sing about monetizing their vaginas? Those brave women who unabashedly inform a dude that they will only give him some stank in exchange for some bank? I love and admire those women! I’m not a fan of woman’s lib-related songs because they sometimes come across as disingenuous and completely lacking in legitimacy, like Tristan Thompson’s children. But a woman who lays her cards on the table from Jump Street and says “oh, no luv-mekkin will there be here tonight if your finances aren’t right” are a special group of artists we need to explore!
Black Gaddy's Top 5 Pussy for Pay Anthems
5. Madame X “Just That Type of Girl”
I can’t imagine that many people remember—or even know—this slinky funk jam from Madame X, protégés of the inimitable Bernadette Cooper. While Klymaxx got all dolled up, hit the club, watched the boners rise in all the men’s pants, and then sped off in Cooper’s limousine before any man could make a move, Madame X was far more direct. These women made it crystal clear: their legs would only open for oil barons and tycoons.
The lead singer spells it out: “I like a guy who lends a hand, don’t mind a sugar daddy if he’s handy,” and “I’m into furs, expensive cars—it does matter who you are. No Mastercard, just Platinum American Express card!” She even confesses that she’s never invited to her boyfriend’s mother’s house, for fear she’ll steal her man!
Madame X had no problem giving up the skins—but only for limousines, diamond rings, and caviar. Without those things? A man had better move on.
4. Madonna “Material Girl”
Throughout the song, Madonna made it clear that boys can kiss and hug, beg and plead, romance and slow dance, try and lie—but if they’re bankrupt, then the panties are staying up. Speaking from experience, Madge proved that you can absolutely fuck your way into financial stability if you just apply a little common sense and some selective boning. By giving up the skins only to men with decent credit, Madonna showed that hard work does pay off—singing, “experience has made me rich and now they’re after me.” The word experience is, of course, a euphemism for “my very busy pussy.”
Now that she’s on Medicare and sitting on about a billion dollars in earnings, I read somewhere that Madonna has tried to distance herself from her own biographical anthem, refusing to perform "Material Girl" in concert. If she needs to distance herself from anything, it’s her plastic surgeon. Madonna, you are and will always be THE Material Girl—so own it, bitch!
3. Reba McIntyre “Fancy”
I had to throw a country jam in because it’s one of my favorite Pussy for Pay anthems—an unapologetic ode to the vulva as a viable down payment option for that new Volvo. On "The Voice", they call Reba the Queen of Country, and since I know almost nothing about that genre, I can neither confirm nor dispute the title. But if she is the Queen, I’d wager a good part of that crown sits firmly atop her red hair thanks to “Fancy”—a magnificent piece of storytelling told from the perspective of a woman who literally fucked her way to the top.
What surely made the song controversial in some circles is the fact that the main character, Fancy, was placed into sex work by her own dying mother. Freshly turned eighteen, Fancy was gifted a red satin dress paid for with her mama’s last few dimes. She wasn’t quite sure what was expected of her until her mother clarified: “Be nice to the gentlemen, Fancy, and they’ll be nice to you.” That was all the instruction she needed. Mama died, the welfare folks came and took her baby (Fancy’s younger sibling, presumably), and Fancy hit the streets and the sheets. From there, she strategically boned her way into a Georgia mansion and a sleek townhouse flat in New York City. And listen—can you imagine how many boots you gotta knock to afford a townhouse in New York?!
What makes “Fancy” so compelling isn’t just the plotline, but the attitude. It’s sung with zero shame and not a speck of regret. Reba doesn’t moan or moralize; she belts this thing out with triumphant defiance. This isn’t a cautionary tale—it’s a country-glam redemption arc. She might have been born poor white trash, but with a strategic deployment of pussy and perseverance, she made those red heels work for her. Dreams do come true, y’all.
2. Donna Summer “Bad Girls”
If Donna is talkin’ ‘bout the sad girls in criticism of the women who use their punnanies for pay, why did she make the song so damn fun to sing and dance along to? She included that iconic toot-toot, hey, beep-beep as a last-second addition, but it’s become the focal point of the song—because you can actually visualize the johns driving by, trying to get the girls’ attention from their cars.
A devout Christian and self-proclaimed prude, Donna continued with the mixed signals by taking on the role of a "Bad Girl" on the album sleeve. She looks absolutely stunning and in total control. I had the poster of that record cover on the wall in my room when I was a kid. I’m sure I didn’t catch the prostitution angle back then; all I knew was that I used to stare at that poster, dreaming of being a slutty Bad Girl like Donna when I grew up.
It warms my heart to report that, again, some dreams really do come true.
The Reagan years were hard for Black folks, and that turmoil and economic desperation have never been better illustrated than in Gwen Guthrie’s 1986 anthem “Ain’t Nothin’ Goin’ On But the Rent.” The song is bursting with clever lines and instantly quotable catchphrases that come at you one after another, all driving home a single, unmistakable message: No cashy, no coochie.
“I've got lots of love to give, but I will have to avoid you if you’re unemployed.”
“No romance without finance.”
“Boy, your silky words are sweet / But we’re only wasting time if your pockets are empty.”
“I’m looking for a man who’s got some money in his hand.”
What Guthrie was laying down was clear: don’t even think about pulling out your dick until the check made out to “Cash” has cleared. Classic pussy power talk—so iconic that even Eddie Murphy had to reference it in his hit concert movie "Raw".
I especially love the way Gwen opens the song, because it’s the only time she raises her voice. She bursts in like she’s genuinely panicked, exclaiming, “Bill collectors at my door! What can you do for me?!” It’s as if she just peeked through the blinds and saw the Con Edison man marching up the front porch. So she does what she knows will generate some instant income: she puts her pussy on the payroll. “You got to have a J-O-B if you wanna be with me,” she insists—meaning don’t even try to cop a feel or sneak a dry hump until she’s reviewed the last six months of your bank statements.
Genius!
