1. The CARTER FAMILY

Chewing gum

(A.P. Carter?)

INTRO: Mama sent me to the spring

She told me not to stay

I fell in love with a pretty little girl

Could not get away

CHORUS: Chawin’ chewin’ gum, chewin’ chawin’ gum (x2)

First she give me peaches

Then she give me pears

Then she give me fifty cents

Kissed me on the stairs

CHORUS:

Mama don’t ‘low me to whistle

Papa don’t ‘low me to sing

They don’t want me to marry

I’ll marry just the same

CHORUS:

I wouldn’t have a lawyer

I’ll tell you the reason why

Every time he opens his mouth

He tells a great big lie

CHORUS:

I wouldn’t have a doctor

I’ll tell you the reason why

He rides all over the country

Makes the people die

CHORUS:

I wouldn’t have a farmer

I’ll tell you the reason why

Because he has so plenty to eat

Specially pumpkin pie

CHORUS:

I took my girl to church last night

How do you reckon she done

She walked right up to the preacher’s face

And chewed her chewing gum

CHORUS:

 

Everyone’s favourite Virginia hillbilly country clan, steeped in religion, traditional values and sobriety, nevertheless managed, in the early 1930s, to produce a song that raises a queer eyebrow or two to this day among those who know it.

This song has very strong lesbian overtones, delivered as it was by Sarah Carter, who I must confess I have no evidence about to conclude that she was a dyke – that is not what I am saying. I am addressing the COMPOSITION and the NARRATOR.

From the outset, the narrator, whose mama sent her to the spring and told her not to stay, falls in love with a ‘pretty little girl’ and ‘could not get away’. The ‘pretty little girl’ in question gives the narrator fresh fruit, money and kisses on the stairs. Who wouldn’t love a girl like that? Notice, by the way, that the ‘pretty little girl’ has taken the initiative – proof that femmes are really in control…

The next verse is where the argument could be seen to falter. The narrator makes it clear that she is going to marry…although her parents do not want her to. WHY would they not want her to, though? Is it because she intends to marry the pretty little girl? It is not as though the verse and song structure/contents give no hint that the narrator disobeys her parents.

The next few verses make it clear that she has rejected several fine male suitors with a savage wit. The farmer may get to eat someone’s pumpkin pie (innuendo?) – but not hers, we think.

And then there is that astonishing final verse. The narrator takes the pretty little girl to church with her, and the vixen actually chews her chewing gum in the preacher’s face, after walking right up to him. How naughty…

By the way – dare we play Freud and assume that something ELSE is being munched on in that chorus? The song certainly has oral fixation all over it, anyway.

2. Joan Jett

(Joan Jett/Kenny Laguna)

Same old story life is so unfair

It’s a burden we just have to bear

But I’m with him and you’re with her

There’s nothing else to do

Have to hide my secret love for you

Keep the secret people are so unkind

Sneakin’ around you could lose your mind

Never free to let ‘em see

All that I go thru

Trying to hide my secret love for you

I looked into your eyes

Without sayin’ a word

I told you what I am

And I hoped that you heard

Oh yeah

Society won’t let me be

The way I want it to

Hard to hide my secret love for you

OUTRO: Oh yeah don’t wanna secret love

Can’t keep a secret love

I wanna open love

Now, Joan Jett is far less difficult to make an argument for. A cursory read of books such as We Got the Neutron Bomb or Lexicon Devil make it clear that her sexuality was no secret from just about day one of her involvement with the rock scene.

However, she has TECHNICALLY never directly come out as a public statement – she has preferred to play it coy, for whatever reason. It is no secret to those in the know, but it can be frustrating. Some of my peers derive strength from knowing that artists they admire like the same gender. I cannot say that Elton John or George Michael are my comrades-in-arms, so I don’t much accept the argument, but it was nice to know about Bob Mould and Michael Stipe.

Joan has said she’d be proud to be thought of as a lesbian, which I figured was a pretty good line, myself. In that light, let’s look at this ditty from 1983’s Album, shall we?

First and second verse has the narrator speaking about the burden of knowing "I’m with him" and "YOU’RE with her" (for a million dollars, prove the ‘you’ is male) and feeling that she has to hide her secret love, with the attending stress and the feeling of insanity and secrecy eating away at her integrity.

The third verse speaks of a phenomenon addressed in American literature by as weighty a Bear eminence as Walt Whitman, and in queer culture as ‘gaydar’ and ‘the glance held too long’ – indirect signs of one’s true (same-sex-oriented) nature.

As the song draws to its conclusion, the narrator has switched from HAVING to hide her secret love to finding it HARD to hide her secret love.

The outro cries out for the desire to have an open love, and refusing to keep a secret love.

What could be more ‘out’ than that? J