This summer has had a third theme: pop music.

The children have become addicted to the local hit station, Sonic Hits. All today’s hits, all the time. You know this station, even if not biblically. It plays the same fourteen songs all day every day and there is a morning show with features like “I read it on the Internet!” and “celebrity babies are so cute!”

I like pop music. I have liked it since I was a kid and listened to LG73 (Morning show: The LG Morning Zoo!). I won’t get into a dissertation on Today’s Pop Hits and How Shitty They Are because do you remember the Payolas? Falco? but there are some recent Pop Hits that when they come on the radio in the car I stab at the preset buttons so fast my finger goes right through the dashboard and I burn myself on the engine and it’s WORTH IT because I just can’t hear [that piece of poo] one more time.

They’re not the songs you think, though! I mean, yes I am not a fan of Blurred Lines though I acknowledge how catchy the tune, and yes, the Miley Cyrus song was very puzzling because I had no idea who it was singing it and was sure I had to be wrong when I heard the DJ say Miley Cyrus and then I looked up the video for the song, like an idiot, and now I’m blind (touch typing for the winnnnnz!).

But! My least favourite pop song of the summer is actually The Other Side by Jason Derulo.

The Other Side is a really embarrassing song about a guy and a girl who are friends and he wants something more and so does she. The song takes place on their SEX DATE WHEN THE SEX IS GOING TO HAPPEN. Right there. We’re right there with Jason and his date, as he gives her the step by step:

1. We’ll just get drunk. Disturb the peace (for the longest, I thought that line was “disrupt the bass”)
2. You’ll run your hands all over me
3. And then you’ll bite your lip, whisper and say, “we’re going all the way.”
4. Tonight! Kiss me like it’s do or die! Sparks fly like the fourth of July! I see that sexy look in your eye! Take me to the OTHER SIDE!

Fine. It’s a fine sentiment, I guess. But he’s got this crazy falsetto and he’s just so damned excited about this date and the sex he’s going to be having REAL SOON NOW and listening to him trill up the scale and down again makes me just want to take him aside (not to “the other side,” but aside) and say, “Jason. Be cool. You’re going to scare her.” Like, how long has it BEEN, Jason? I’m thinking years.

Also, the following line: “I know you’re nervous / so just sit back and let me drive”? Ick, and reminds me of my least favourite song of the spring, which I thought was also by Jason Derulo but is in fact by Hedley. “Kiss You Inside Out.”

I became aware of this song when my kids were walking around on the playground saying “shut your mouth and close your eyes” and I thought, what a rude thing to say! and then I heard the song where the line came from. This one is less embarrassing and more about questionable seduction techniques. Observe:

I don’t know if you´re ready to go
Where I’m willing to take you girl
I will feel every inch of your skin
And you know I can rock your world
Imma be the calm in the storm you´re looking for
I’ll be the shipwreck that takes you down
I don´t mind if you lie in my bed
We can stay here forever now.

Ouuu oohhh
Turn off the lights
Take off your clothes
Turn on the stereo
Ouuu oohhh
Give up the fight
I´m in control
Why don´t you let it go.

Maybe I don’t WANT TO let it go, Mr. Hedley, Sirs. Maybe you referring to yourself as a shipwreck is all the information I need to make my decision re: doing you, which is NO, which means NO by the way.

On the bright side, listening to bad pop music in the car means lots of great conversations with the kids about sex, partying, and consent. Talk early, talk frankly, talk often, right? And as a bonus, because so much of today’s pop music is total shite, when you hear a good song it’s REALLY GOOD.