Line #30 ValuesDissonance/Music


1	* A ''lot'' of HeavyMetal and HardRock and ShockRock and VisualKei and similar, in that the high drama and desire to shock and offend to make a point often runs counter to the mainstream societies it originates within. There's too many examples, but they go both ways with this trope: from Visual Kei bands using being out about bisexuality to make a point about sexual freedom and equality that was ''way'' beyond FairForItsDay and bands singing passionate anti-war and anti-violence songs (even if they gained a MisaimedFandom because TruffautWasRight) all the way to the other side of the spectrum -- bands and songs irresponsibly glorifying rape and murder and pedophilia and whatever else solely for shock value or for being edgy.
2	* Finnish military march "Sotilaspoika" ("Soldier Boy"). Originally a poem by J.L. Runeberg, the lyrics are about a boy of perhaps 10 or 11, whose father [[ChildSoldier was drafted in the army when he was 15]]. The boy himself can't wait till his 15th birthday and is eligible to get drafted [[spoiler:like his father, grandfather and great-grandfather]]. While in the 19th century the lyrics implied PatrioticFervor, in the 21st century they are easily interpreted as gung-ho militarism and use of child soldiers.
3	* Music/Blink182 released the album "Cheshire Cat" in 1995. Track 8, "Does My Breath Smell?" contains the word "retarded" in the first verse. Use of the word in the [=21st=] century is very much frowned upon.
4	* Music/EmersonLakeAndPalmer's last album, ''Love Beach'' generally considered to be their worst, had one short song, recorded as a possible single, "Taste Of My Love", about a groupie giving the singer a BJ in his hotel room. The singer comes off as arrogant and entitled, and there is even the faintest hint that it's not completely consensual.
5	* Not even Music/{{KISS}} is immune to this. Listen to "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-PuYU7OKdc Deuce]]." Just a wee bit sexist, isn't it? Plus, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiSB7G732Eg Domino]]" and "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMlVZ6RDets Christine Sixteen]]" might be seen badly in today's PaedoHunt world (especially "Domino," which never gives the girl's age but it can easily be taken as less teenager and more paedophilia). In fact, a lot of Kiss songs fall into this. Seeing as some Kiss albums contain nothing but songs about sex (Gene Simmons has claimed to had sex with over a thousand women; and for crying out loud, this is the band that has a song called "Let's Put The X In Sex"), the opportunity for sexism pops up quite often.
6	** If you think that's bad, check Music/LoveHate's song [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sku2Him53TM "Rock Queen"]] -- "met a little girl, just thirteen, she's a knock-down blue-eyed slut psycho-virgin tease. Rock queen, thirteen, buxom blonde, bad dream, let me touch your cookies -- let me eat your cookies -- now".
7	* The song "Same Old Lang Syne" by Dan Fogelberg (not the same as "Auld Lang Syne," a Creator/RobertBurns song) is about a chance meeting between former lovers who have since gone their separate ways. They talk with each other about their life, buy a six-pack of beer (admittedly, American beer is relatively low in alcohol compared to most places) at a liquor store after failing to find an open bar, split it, reminisce, and drive away to go on living their lives as they had been doing. The offhand reference to driving after drinking alcohol introduces an element of {{Squick}} into what is otherwise a heartfelt romantic ballad. The song was released as a single in 1980 and included on Fogelberg's 1981 album ''The Innocent Age'', which was before all the "Don't Drink and Drive" {{Public Service Announcement}}s began to appear. Values Dissonance can be NewerThanTheyThink.
8	* In Music/WolfgangAmadeusMozart's opera ''Theatre/DonGiovanni'', Zerlina wins back her fiancé's good graces by singing him an aria inviting him to beat her. However, if you listen to the music, it is obvious that she's actually suggesting something much more pleasant for both of them.
9	* Mungo Jerry's 1970 hit "In the Summertime", which reached #1 in the UK and Canada and #3 in the US, says, "Have a drink, have a drive, go out and see what you can find". Even the edgiest rock today doesn't advocate drinking and driving. It was presumably for this reason that the song was used in a famous PIF for the British advertising campaign Advertising/DrinkingAndDrivingWrecksLives, wherein it begins with many people enjoying themselves at a pub garden and drinking; two of those people drive off in a car, and the song slows down to a disturbing stop before we cut to the car inevitably wrecked and bloodied. The next verse includes the lyrics "If her daddy's rich, take her out for a meal. If her daddy's poor, just do what you feel," which could easily be interpreted to mean that if you're dating the daughter of a poor father, you can be a cheapskate, and/or that if your date's poor, you can take advantage of her and get away with it.
10	* The music video for the Music/TheyMightBeGiants song "The Statue Got Me High" featured a couple of brief scenes depicting fire, one of which had band member John Linnell covered in flames. The scene aired on US music video stations without complaints, but an edited version was made for air in the UK, showing the same scenes but without the fire. According to John Flansburgh, this was done because fire and ninjas are not allowed on British television, but in the commentary for the video, they indicated that the Brits objected to fire because it may result in imitative behavior, which led to the joke to the effect that "It's like how you can't say the word 'ninja' or kids will want to go become ninjas."
11	* The music video for Creator/MelBrooks' "To Be Or Not To Be (The Hitler Rap)" was shocking to many Europeans, since it was not widely known that Brooks is Jewish.
12	* "Judy's Turn to Cry", the sequel to "It's My Party (and I'll Cry if I Want To)" by Music/LesleyGore. Our heroine, jilted by her boyfriend, kisses another guy -- whereupon the jealous Johnny [[DisproportionateRetribution hits this interloper]] and takes her back. This is presented as a triumph over rival Judy. Lesson learned, girls -- don't expect your boyfriend to be faithful to you, but you had sure better be faithful to him.
13	** Another popular Gore hit, "Maybe I Know", has its own dissonance, with a chorus like, "Maybe I know that he's been a cheat/Maybe I know that he's been untrue/But what can I do?" In more enlightened times, as AllMusicGuide [[http://www.allmusic.com/song/maybe-i-know-mt0048596557 pointed out in its contemporary review of the song]], maybe the girl would think to confront her boyfriend over the matter, or find someone more faithful to her. It may be no wonder that she took to "You Don't Own Me" later, with its more defiant, independent lyrics.
14	* The original version of Kentucky's state song, "My Old Kentucky Home," written in 1853, featured lines that referred to black people as "darkies." In 1986, after the term was deemed offensive, the word was replaced with "people."
15	* Many [[TheSixties '60s]] songs were written and/or sung while high. But back then, drugs were used for "expanding your mind" rather than trying to be cool. (We're lookin' at you, [[Music/TheGratefulDead Jerry Garcia]]!) These days, though, singers who do drugs get a lot of flak from fans and bandmates, or at least more than '60s singers would.
16	** Garcia, Music/TheBeatles, Music/{{The Rolling Stones\|Band}}, etc. most certainly were criticized and served time in jail for their substance abuse and rock excesses in TheSixties as well; Music/MickJagger and Music/KeithRichards' drug bust in 1967 was very controversial.
17	** It really depends on the singer. Music/MarilynManson (and for that matter, his band) have been joked to have been single-handedly funding the cocaine industry throughout TheNineties.
18	** Music/SteelyDan's "The Boston Rag" from ''Katy Lied'' is based on a real incident that happened to a friend of Donald Fagen's at Bard College in 1965:
19	-->''Lonnie swept the playroom\
20	Then he swallowed up all he found\
21	It was forty-eight hours till Lonnie came around''
22	** While it may have been a suicide attempt on Lonnie's part, the song, ten years later, seems to treat it as just another crazy college thing. Today that behavior looks ''extremely'' reckless, and Lonnie's friends would take him to the hospital.
23	* Some older rock songs, such as Music/TheBeatles' "Run for Your Life" and Music/{{The Rolling Stones\|Band}}' "Under My Thumb", can be a little problematic for post-feminist ears. "Run for Your Life" is a good example of something that led to values dissonance within years; shortly before his death, Music/JohnLennon said that [[CreatorBacklash he was himself embarrassed by the message contained in the song]]. He later wrote the song "Jealous Guy", which seemed to be an AuthorsSavingThrow.
24	* Music/NeilDiamond's "Cracklin' Rosie" is not about a woman named Rosie; it's about a group of First Nations men in Ontario getting drunk on red wine (the "Rosie") because all the women are gone. This may seem benign, perhaps, to an American, but it's unimaginably ''horrifically'' racist in Western Canada, not just because of the awful "drunken Indian" stereotype but also because of the actual plight of the women, who were being sexually exploited and murdered. The equivalent would be a fluffy pop song about lynching.
25	* Not even ''WesternAnimation/SchoolhouseRock'' is immune. It's a lot more mild than most of the examples on these pages, to be sure, but their song "The Great American Melting Pot" doesn't exactly fit with today's era of multiculturalism. Another one of their songs from the America Rock compilation, "Elbow Room" (on the subject of manifest destiny), is either this or PoliticallyCorrectHistory.
26	* Music/TheCrystals' "[[DomesticAbuse He Hit Me (and It Felt Like a Kiss)]]", which is about a woman who believes her abusive boyfriend only hits her because he loves her, is more likely to raise hackles now than it was back in TheSixties. What's interesting is that contemporary reactions may be more in line with [[LyricalDissonance songwriter intent]]. Goffin and King wrote the song in shocked reaction to learning that Little Eva was getting beaten up by her boyfriend and didn't object.
27	* The holiday standard "Baby, It's Cold Outside" is ''notorious'' for not aging well since its release. The wintertime duet (it technically has nothing to do with Christmas) is about a man using a snowstorm to convince his girlfriend to spend the night with him, while she repeats that she should go home and worries what people would think if she stayed. When the song was first released in 1944, her resistance was meant to sound flirty and coy (especially since she decides to stay after all). At the time, it wasn't socially acceptable for an unmarried woman to spend the night with a man, while the boyfriend is saying that the weather makes a perfect cover story. But listening to the song with more modern sensibilities makes it sound like he isn't respecting her wishes and is [[DateRape forcing himself on her]], especially given her more insistent lines like "The answer is ''no''". In addition, the line "Say, what's in this drink?" sounds ''way'' more sinister nowadays than originally intended, as she was simply commenting on the alcoholic strength of her beverage rather than [[SlippingAMickey the presence of an illicit substance]]. [[note]] If you see comedy films or hear radio plays of the era "What's in this drink?" was a stock joke - the punchline being that the beverage was lemonade or milk - something completely harmless [[/note]] Even the song's intended meaning--a girl feigning resistance and using a snowstorm as an excuse to sleep with her boyfriend so that her family won't call her a floozy--isn't much of an improvement when women can now be straightforward about wanting sex.
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29	* "Kung Fu Fighting" was a big hit for Carl Douglas in 1974 and is still commonly heard on the radio in the United States, but it's been banned from airplay in Canada and a man was arrested for "racial harassment" in 2011 for covering it with his band in the UK. (This, it should be pointed out, is not the typical reaction to the song in the UK, where it's not generally considered offensive, just very ''very'' cheesy. The charge was dropped, and the singer in question ended up releasing a cover version.) This also seems to depend on how close you're paying attention to the lyrics. While some of it can be interpreted as racist by today's standards, and "Chinamen" is no longer the [[Film/TheBigLebowski preferred nomenclature]], it's pretty obvious that the song is a reference to {{Wuxia}} movies, rather than Chinese people in and of themselves.
30	** Though the song was still iconic enough for a CoverVersion to play over the end credits of ''[[WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda1 Kung Fu Panda]]'' in 2008, the lyrics were substantially rewritten to avoid any mention of race whatsoever - instead it's turned into a PepTalkSong, telling the listener that they can learn Kung Fu if they develop their self-confidence and discipline.
31	* Even cerebral ProgressiveRock band Music/KingCrimson couldn't avoid this. The 1971 album ''Islands'' includes a tribute to "Ladies of the Road" (read: groupies). Granted, this was 1971. Still, there's a cringe-worthy verse about seducing a school reporter, not to mention this passage: [[AsianSpeekeeEngrish "High diving Chinese trender/Black hair and black suspender/Said, 'Please me no surrender'/'Just love to feel your Fender'"]]
32	** Even more hair-raising are the infamous lyrics to the live version of their song "Easy Money":
33	--->Well I argued with the judge\
34	But the [[SexIsEvil bastard wouldn't budge]]\
35	Cause [[InterruptedIntimacy they caught me licking fudge]]\
36	And they never told me that you were a [[JailbaitTaboo minor]]
37	* Music/TenCc's hit single "Dreadlock Holiday" passed without comment in the 1970s. It was based on a real life incident in which Graham Gouldman was mugged for his (minimal) bling in the West Indies -- the mugger made it look like an agreed, if not unforced, sale by deliberately paying Gouldman a dollar for jewellery worth many times that. The song has since been criticised for its implication that all dreadlocked Jamaicans are violent robbers and all Jamaican women are hookers. The "dark voices" in the song have also been described as stereotypical, and the fact it was done to a (quite good) reggae beat has also been criticised as reinforcing the "all blacks are criminals" message perceived by some in the song. The Jamaican Tourist Board wasn't exactly inclined to use it in adverts, either.[[note]]''Come to sunny Jamaica and be mugged!''[[/note]] It was alleged that two white British Jews (Goldman and Creme) were mis-using West Indian culture (reggae) to reinforce prejudice.
38	** However, many reggae stars had actually spoken of the violence in Jamaica (a notable example being "Johnny Too Bad" by The Slickers), which was (and continues to be) very real. A lot of dreads were poor and had the choice of becoming reggae musicians or resorting to crime (sometimes both). It appears that the criticism of "Dreadlock Holiday" has more to do with the appropriation of black music and accents for white musicians. The senseless gun deaths of Peter Tosh, Carlton Barrett and Junior Braithwaite proved that the famous continued to be a target for criminals in Jamaica years after "Dreadlock Holiday" was released.
39	* Similarly, the remake of '70s feelgood summer hit "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QQW4twgWts I'm Going To Barbados]]" by [[OneHitWonder long-forgotten band]] Typically Tropical, when it was reworked in the early 2000s as "We're Going to Ibiza" by the Music/{{Vengaboys}}, omitted the introduction by the pilot, spoken in a thick West Indian accent, and the [[PrettyFlyForAWhiteGuy cod-West Indian singing voice]] used for the song....
40	-->''Ladies and gentlemen, this is Captain Tobias Willcock, welcoming you aboard Coconut Airways Flight three-seven-two to Bridgetown, Barbados. We will be flying at an 'eight of 32.000 feet and at an air speed of approximately 600 miles per hour. Refreshments will be served after take-off. Kindly fasten your safety belts and refrain from smoking until de aircraft is airborne.''
41	* The song "That Doggie in the Window" by Patti Page was just a light-hearted song in its day but nowadays brings to mind puppy mills. Shelters and animal welfare organizations have satirically used the song in promotions. Patti was well-aware of this and prior to her death revamped the song as "[[http://www.humanesociety.org/news/profile/2009/10/old_song_new_tune_103009.html That Doggie in the Shelter]]".
42	* Julie Brown's "The Homecoming Queen's Got A Gun", which depicts [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin a homecoming queen with a gun]] [[BallroomBlitz shooting absolutely everyone]] [[AxesAtSchool at her high school]]. Except, [[RefugeInAudacity it's a parody of]] TeenageDeathSongs. It was made in the '80s as a novelty song, but is rarely played today even on novelty song stations since the rise of school shootings. Brown has admitted that she [[OldShame no longer feels comfortable performing the song in today's climate]].
43	* The music video for Music/{{NSYNC}}'s "I Drive Myself Crazy" was seen as a rather silly and literal interpretation of LoveMakesYouCrazy when it was released in 1999. If it aired today, it would have been extremely controversial, as the video implies that mental illness is a choice, an opinion that is considered extremely offensive in regards to mental illness today.
44	* K.T. Oslin's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EA-TqZuuEA4 You Can't Do That]]" {{deconstruct\|ion}}s the [[CantGetAwayWithNuthin zero tolerance]] social climate of the [[TheEighties late '80s]] and [[TheNineties '90s]].
45	* Dancehall reggae has this problem. Most dancehall artists are from the Caribbean (most commonly Jamaica or Trinidad and Tobago), where extreme homophobia is widespread and this is reflected in the music. For example, Buju Banton's 1992 song "Boom Bye Bye" is about how wrong gay men (or "batty bwoy" in Jamaican patois) are and how they all deserve to be shot. This has led to problems in Buju Banton's career in the U.S. and gay rights organizations have campaigned against his American performances.
46	* What is socially acceptable to say in Spanish might not be in other languages. For example Music/CeliaCruz's "La Negra Tiene Tumbao" is a popular song, but referring to someone casually by their skintone like that in English would be considered offensive or even racist. Similarly, the Dominican-American artist Amara La Negra's stage name is acceptable in Spanish, but you would never see an English-speaking artist named "Amara the Black Woman".
47	* Jimmy Soul's 1963 single "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qh9ZZgDqzAg If You Wanna Be Happy]]," which hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100, proudly extolls the virtues of getting an "ugly woman" to marry you. Try playing this song today post-fourth-wave feminism and see what happens.
48	** Also, the late-'80s Filipino rap song based on it, "Humanap Ka ng Pangit" (translation -- "Look for Someone Ugly") by Andrew E.
49	** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6F2HU4JAIU A French singer did a song like that]] in 2011. "J'aime les moche" ("I love the ugly ones"). It's played for laughs and is a well-liked song.
50	* Music/DorisDay's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOUd-dD7u7w A Guy Is A Guy]]" is about a strange man following the narrator home and into her house, and it's played like a cute puppy-love story, rather than, say, an obsessed stalker. The innocence of TheFifties, indeed.
51	** "Teacher's Pet" is about a MayDecemberRomance between a middle-aged male teacher and a young female student. Regardless of the grade, a song with that kind of subject won't fly these days [[PaedoHunt for obvious reasons]].
52	* Rap music from the '80s to early 2000s was extremely homophobic. A lot of rappers now regarded as legends (Music/GrandmasterFlash, Music/TheBeastieBoys, Music/PublicEnemy, even Music/WillSmith) had songs casually insulting and demeaning members of the LGBT community (usually gay men, but occasionally lesbians and transgender women). Nowadays, any rapper who wants a chance of mainstream success avoids making homo/transphobic statements, not only in their music but also in interviews and on social media (and if they do, a public apology is quick to follow). Additionally, many older rap songs are extremely sexist. While rap today has a problem with sexism, it was even more pronounced in the early days. For example, in 2013 Music/RickRoss got in hot water for a lyric that implied he was going to DateRape a woman; in the '90s nobody would have batted an eye at that. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, many rappers would say "no homo" whenever they said anything vaguely gay sounding. Radio stations began censoring it due to homophobia, and the practice as a whole fell out of style in the early 2010s.
53	* "Seven Little Girls Sitting in the Backseat", with its lyrics about a driver trying to shy the girls away from another man in the backseat, has aged horribly. Nowadays, the driver would be accused of being a pedophile or at the very least a stalker.
54	* The eponymous character in "The Little Old Lady (from Pasadena)" is a drag racer who challenges any driver she sees. Decades later, such behavior by elderly drivers in particular don't make the song seem so innocent anymore.
55	* Humane groups, animal rights activists in particular, would have a field day with the traditional echo song "Bill Grogan's Goat". For eating shirts off a clothesline, Bill hits his goat with a stick and [[ChainedToARailway ties him to railroad tracks]]. Had it come out in a more recent year, Bill would be seen as abusive and remorseless over attempting to kill his goat[[note]]Don't worry, the goat throws the shirts up and uses them to flag the train[[/note]].
56	** And that's nothing compared to the attempted animal abuse in Harry S. Miller's "The Cat Came Back" and its many variants. While milder versions aimed at children merely have the unwilling cat-owner attempt to give the animal away, the original song featured such delights as a neighbor trying to kill it with a ''nail and explosive-loaded shotgun''.
57	* Music/{{Squeeze\|Band}}'s 1978 song "Cool for Cats" has the protagonist picking up a girl at a disco for sex and asking her "lots of questions as she hangs on to the wall", implying she's so intoxicated she can't stand up without support. Par for the course in TheSeventies but these days having sex with someone too drunk to properly consent is rightly classified as rape.
58	* A lot of songs from the mid-20th century written from the perspective of an older man lusting for a teenage girl ("You're Sixteen", for instance) rub 21st century audiences the wrong way (see [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9awpv5BnSc this SNL ad parody]]); it should be remembered that in the '50s and '60s at least it was not uncommon for women to be married by the age of 19, and arousing the interest of an older male was seen as a sign that a girl was doing something right.
59	** However, some later songs, like The Knack's "My Sharona" (about Doug Fieger's real-life girlfriend at the time, who ''was'' in her teens when they began dating) and, especially, Benny Mardones' "Into the Night", ''are'' more deserving of this trope even in their own times, since they were released around 1980, by which time that had changed significantly with a lot more young women putting off marriage until at least after college.
60	** Also from 1980, Steely Dan's "Hey Nineteen", in which the man singing the song is implied to be at least in his 30s (since he reminisces about his college days "in '67") manages to avert this trope, probably because the song's entire point is about how this age gap forecloses any possibility of a relationship beyond getting drunk and stoned together.[[note]]It was inspired by one of the assistant engineers, who had just reached the age of 30, coming in and relating with astonishment how the 19-year-old he'd dated the night before didn't know who Music/ArethaFranklin was ...despite having several hits in the '70s).[[/note]]
61	* Several R&B/soul songs in the 1970s and '80s were about a woman being okay with dating someone who already had a girlfriend/wife. Examples include "Sweet Thing" by Chaka Khan, "Call Me" by Skyy ("Though your girlfriend's a friend of mine/Here's my number and a dime, call me anytime"), "Just Be Good to Me" by SOS Band ("I don't care about your other girls/Just be good to me"), "Saving All My Love for You" by Music/WhitneyHouston and "As We Lay" by Shirley Murdock.
62	* While Music/GunsNRoses' "One in a Million" was deemed offensive back when it was first released in 1988 for its bigoted lyrics that included potshots towards African-Americans, homosexuals, and immigrants, it's absolutely ''nothing'' compared to today where such lyrics would've completely destroyed Axl Rose's career overnight.
63	* Music/WeirdAlYankovic:
64	** "Trigger Happy" was written in 1990 as part of his ''Off the Deep End'' album released two years later. The song itself is a [[LyricalDissonance happy, upbeat sounding song about a man with an abundance of firearms who follows the "shoot first, ask questions later" rule]]. Shootings, mass or not, that have happened since the song's release, and the demand for tighter gun control laws in subsequent years have also made the song's reckless depiction of firearm usage come off as tasteless.
65	*** Of course, the point is BlackComedy and the song's subject is obviously presented as incredibly deranged.
66	** "Gonna Buy Me a Condo", a song about a Jamaican man adapting to American lifestyles, has Al using stereotypes that would be seen as racist in this day and age.
67	** ''Running With Scissors'':
68	*** "Jerry Springer" from this album has several knocks against transgender people, using terms now considered slurs such as "hermaphrodite" and "shemale" (although [[Series/TheJerrySpringerShow the show it was based on]] did exactly that on a weekly basis). It doesn't end there: "hermaphrodite" is also used to describe a person who steals Al's snorkel in "Albuquerque" and a WholesomeCrossdresser is the subject of "Truck Drivin' Song".
69	*** Al also uses the term "midget" in the final chorus of "Jerry Springer".
70	*** Al also uses the term "gypped" in both versions of "The Night Santa Went Crazy".
71	** "Cable TV" from ''Dare to Be Stupid'' has a line about watching television while driving. Electronic devices have been responsible for distracted driving being on the rise since the TurnOfTheMillennium, so that would be a huge problem to sing about these days.
72	** A regional example is his use of the word "spastic" in 2014's "Word Crimes". In the USA, this is akin to "jerky and erratic" or "manic". In the UK, it's an offensive slur for a disabled person which carries the same connotations as the word "retard" in the USA or worse. Al apologised for using it, having not realised the difference between the American and British use of the word, and didn't sing the word whenever he toured in the UK.
73	* While the whole song is satirical, the line "we got a lot of little teenage blue-eyed groupies that'll do anything we say" in Dr. Hook's 1973 hit "Cover of the Rolling Stone" feels incredibly jarring these days.
74	* The Colombian cumbia song "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOjuL8WxnE0 La Colegiala]]" ("The Schoolgirl") is about a man of indeterminate age -- but clearly an adult -- who tells how much he is suffering when he is in love with a teenager, to whom he asks that when she goes to school with her school uniform "Do not be so coquette". Nowadays this song would be clearly considered {{ephebophil\|e}}ia, although it is still very popular among a certain audience, the same type of audience that considers most modern reggaetón songs too sexual or misogynistic.
75	** On the same vein, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y22w9ObONtQ 17 años]]," another very popular cumbia song by Los Ángeles Azules, has the singer gushing about his [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin 17-year-old girlfriend]] and how "innocent", "shy" and "young" she is. The singer does NOT look or sound anywhere near 17, either. And just like the song above, it is quite popular with a certain kind of crowd. It should be noted, though, that in its country of origin you become a legal adult at 18, so it is not as eyebrow-raising -- however, going to quinceañeras to watch a bunch of 40-year-old uncles dancing happily to a song praising teenage girlfriends can be...jarring.
76	* A lot of Europeans were scratching their heads over why Americans were so outraged at Music/MilliVanilli's lip-synching, since it had long been common and accepted practice in Europe for producers to find someone, like the two band members, who could perform parts others with less stage presence had sung (of course, the fact that Milli Vanilli wasn't just represented as singing what they didn't sing, but accepted the music industry's major award for that purported singing, may have had ''something'' to do with that outrage).
77	* Inverted with Gloria Jones' "Tainted Love". In 1964, it was too risque a song for the era and was rarely heard on radio. Over the decades it's stopped being so scandalous and, as the CoveredUp Music/SoftCell and Music/MarilynManson versions show, people enjoy it specifically for its dark nature.
78	* Music/JoanieSommers' "Johnny Get Angry" is a 1962 song where a woman begs her boyfriend to get pissed at her. She doesn't like how demure her boyfriend is, so she is pretending to break up with him in hopes that he'll react negatively and try to get her back. The song receives dissonance for two things: the singer is emotionally manipulating her boyfriend and the singer telling her boyfriend to get angry as a sign that he cares for her rings too close to RomanticizedAbuse. She also tells him that she wishes he would be the "boss" of her and says that all girls want a guy to look up to.
79	* Henry Hall's 1932 recording of "Hush, Hush, Hush, Here Comes the Boogeyman" is a song about the many ways a child can ward off the [[ThingsThatGoBumpInTheNight Boogeyman]]. This trope comes into play when the singer instructs the listening child, "Tell him you've got soldiers in your bed / For he will never guess that they are only made of lead." With the modern understanding of lead's toxicity and the harm it can cause to children, the real horror of the song for contemporary listeners may be the idea of a child sleeping with a potentially poisonous substance in their bed every night.
80	* The music video to Music/BizMarkie's "Just A Friend" contains the YourMom joke "Your momma's hair so nappy that she needs to take pain killers to comb her hair".
81	* Music/{{Sting}}'s "We Work the Black Seam", is a rare example which doesn't involve changing sexual mores. Recorded for his 1985 solo debut ''The Dream of the Blue Turtles'', it was a protest song supporting Britain's coal miners in their recent strike against Margaret Thatcher's government. While the miners themselves still come across as sympathetic ("''It's hard for us to understand / We can't give up our jobs the way we should ... We matter more than pounds and pence / Your economic theory makes no sense''"), the song's glorification of coal mining ("''Our blood has stained the coal / We tunneled deep inside the nation's soul'' ... ''We walk through ancient forest lands / And light a thousand cities with our hands''") is a little jarring in the 2020s, when coal-fired power has come to be seen as a major source of atmospheric carbon and cause of climate change, and indeed [[https://www.ecowatch.com/britain-coal-renewable-energy-2638695868.html Britain itself has gone for longer and longer periods without having to burn any coal from its few remaining pits]].[[note]]raising the uncomfortable question of whether Thatcher, for all the lasting hate her handling of the strike earned her from the nation generally and the miners in particular, may actually have done the UK a long-term favor (that, granted, was not quite the favor she was trying to do).[[/note]]
82	** Speaking of Sting, back in his days with Music/ThePolice:
83	*** They recorded "On Any Other Day" for ''Regatta de Blanc''. In it, the singer details all the horrible things that had happened to him on that day, i.e., his wife burned the scrambled eggs and let him know she was having multiple affairs. One of them is his discovery that "my fine young son has turned out gay". In 1979 that was a generally unremarkable sentiment; in 2020 it is decidedly at odds with large portions of society.
84	*** Also from his Police days, "Roxanne", a song about wanting to "save" a prostitute from having to work in the industry, hasn't aged very well. While significant issues remain for women who work in the sex industry, the idea that what they need is a man to come along and "rescue" them from what for many is a chosen career comes across as incredibly chauvinist and patronising.
85	* Music/MichaelJackson's 1987 music video for "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzZ_urpj4As The Way You Make Me Feel]]" is full of what today would be considered acts of sexual harassment but at the time nobody raised a brow. The video even got nominated for the MTV Video Music Awards.
86	* A couple of classic-rock faves from the 1970s come across today as glorifying the singer's aversion to commitment:
87	** "Free Bird" by Music/LynyrdSkynyrd: "''For I must be traveling on, now / Cause there's too many places I've got to see ... I'm as free as a bird now / And this bird you cannot change''"[[note]]Ironically, it was another bandmember's girlfriend saying "if I left here tomorrow, would you still remember me?" during an argument that inspired the song originally[[/note]]
88	** "Goodbye Stranger" by Music/{{Supertramp}} actually seems to embrace immaturity: "''I have to have things my own way / To keep me in my youth''"; the singer doesn't care what people think of him: "''You can laugh at my behavior / That'll never bother me.''"[[note]]The chorus, the woman's part, ''does'' sound faintly sarcastic about this, in the same way as Cat Stevens' "Wild World": "''Goodbye stranger; it's been nice / Hope you find your paradise / Tried to see your point of view / Hope your dreams will all come true'' ..."[[/note]] This song also has the analogy "''[[MistakenForRacist Like a slave without a chain]]''" which would sound problematic to modern ears.
89	* The clip for the Israeli song ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKO2LLqL58I Sir Mayor]]''. Two men smoking cigars, surrounded by kids holding unlit ones as part of them "looking adult". Acceptable in 1985, would get one run out of town in 2020.
90	* Creator/ToneLoc's 1989 song "Funky Cold Medina" has become this over time with the increasing awareness of date rape. Despite the comedic nature of the song, several of the lyrics come off as encouraging date rape ("Put a little Medina in your glass and the girls'll come real quick"). There is also a portion where the singer has an encounter with a woman named Sheena. [[UnsettlingGenderReveal Sheena turns out to be transgender and is promptly kicked out as he refuses to "fool around with [an] Oscar-Meyer weiner"]]. Considering the humorous nature of the song, this would have been a common joke in the 1980s. Nowadays, it comes off as very transphobic. Not helping is the line "And you must be sure that your girl is pure for the Funky Cold Medina", which implies that transgender women are unworthy of sexual relationships.
91	* The Music/{{Megadeth}} song "Liar" was written as a TakeThat against former guitarist Chris Poland, who had been stealing from the band in order to fund his heroin addiction. The song lists a number of moral failings of the titular liar, including that his brother is "a gay singer in a stud leather band."
92	* The 1957 song "You Are My Destiny" by Paul Anka is supposed to be a love song, but the narrator sounds desperate and obsessive towards their lover to modern ears. Sing the song to somebody you love, and they would be more likely to interpret the song as AccidentalNightmareFuel than romantic.
93	* The 1987 Christmas song "Fairytale of New York" by Music/ThePogues and Music/KirstyMacColl has a section where Shane [=McGowan=] and [=MacColl=] argue, resulting in the latter calling [=McGowan=] a "cheap lousy faggot". [=McGowan=] has stated that [=MacColl=]'s character is supposed to be a bigoted LowerClassLout, hence her use of the word, but that hasn't stopped the song from receiving criticism for the lyrics. Creator/TheBBC has allowed the song to air uncensored on Radio 2, while other stations would decide for themselves whether or not to censor the song.
94	* In ''The Four Seasons'' by Music/AntonioVivaldi, the joyful dance-like finale of ''L'autunno (Autumn)'' can be very uncomfortable to listen to when you realize that the music's accompanying sonnet reveals it's about hunting wildlife for pleasure. In Vivaldi's time[[note]](March 4, 1678–July 28, 1741)[[/note]], many people saw nothing wrong with hunting and killing wildlife for pleasure and the activity was popular, but nowadays increased awareness of endangered species means hunting for pleasure instead of survival would be seen as immoral at best and illegal at worst.
95	* The Bobbettes followed up the success of their hit "Mr. Lee" by recording the song "I Shot Mr. Lee". A song about taking pride in shooting someone would be unthinkable with gun violence so prevalent in today's society. It's even more uncomfortable considering "Mr. Lee" was based on a real person.
96	* Music/DefLeppard have generally avoided this for the most part, but "Personal Property" from 1992's ''Adrenalize'' album has some pretty sexist lyrics about a woman being the singer's titular "Personal Property" and he has exclusive rights to her, suggesting she has zero agency of her own or choice about who she associates with.
97	* Music/VinceGill's 1988 hit "Everybody's Sweetheart", clearly written about his ex-wife Janis Oliver (one-half of the duo Sweethearts of the Rodeo), contains the line "Shoulda kept her barefoot / Barefoot and pregnant all the time". This line likely would have been seen as extremely sexist even then, and only becomes more so in the 21st century.
98	* "All Things Bright and Beautiful" used to have a verse that states the lives of the poor and the rich are ordained by God. It is usually omitted nowadays. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Things_Bright_and_Beautiful#History Wikipedia goes into a bit more detail]].
99	* Music/{{Queen\|Band}}'s video for [[Music/TheWorks "I Want to Break Free"]] was beloved in the UK, but was met with significant backlash in the US when it first premiered in 1984, as it features the entire band in drag. While that is a common trope in British comedy, in the US in the '80s, drag was mostly seen as promoting homosexuality or cross-dressing, not helped by the huge backslide in LGBT+ acceptance in the wake of the AIDS crisis. It also didn't help that the video was a spoof of ''Series/CoronationStreet'', a show that most Americans at the time were unfamiliar with. In the UK, the song reached number 3 in the charts, but only reached 45th place in the US. Four decades later, the song was used in US commercials for a cruise line. The difference in reception between countries is commented on in ''Film/BohemianRhapsody'', where Music/FreddieMercury (acknowledged as bisexual in the film) notes that the homophobic response to the video in America turned a lot of people there against him specifically.
100	* The lyrics to "Red Barchetta" by [[Music/RushBand Rush]] describe a world where combustion-powered vehicles have been outlawed in favor of bulky, two-lane-wide "air cars". This is portrayed as strict and oppressive, and we're meant to sympathize with the protagonist who borrows the titular CoolCar from their uncle and drives it around while outsmarting the police. However, a listener from a few decades after the song's release is likely to interpret the "Motor Law" as having been created to fight pollution and climate change, which can make it harder to sympathize with the protagonist as it makes their actions feel much more selfish.
101	* The 1960 song "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini" by Brian Hyland is about a girl afraid to let people see her in the new swimsuit, so she sits in the water until she turns blue. Back then, wearing bikinis was on the verge of acceptable; in fact, the song did a lot to change that. On the other hand, when ''The Creator/DickClark Show'' had Brian perform the song, they didn't dare put a teenager or adult in a bikini on TV, so instead they had an elementary school girl... which today, [[PaedoHunt would be considered the worse option]].
102	* Halloween classic "Monster Mash," by Bobby Pickett, was banned from radio airplay by the BBC in the year it released (1962) for being "too morbid," and the song itself never took off in the UK until ten full years after its release. These days, it's considered a completely innocent, all-ages song [[DefangedHorrors about monsters dancing]], and the modern BBC has been [[https://www.bbc.co.uk/music/articles/46f837da-9ffa-494d-94e7-c7ffb0781bea unafraid to poke fun at themselves]] for getting so up-in-arms over such a silly song.
103	* "Stay away from my man/woman" songs like "Jolene" by Music/DollyParton, "The Boy is Mine" by Music/{{Brandy}} and Music/{{Monica}}, "Gettin' in the Way" by Music/JillScott, and so on, had been a staple of popular music for decades, but they've fallen out of favor since the 2010's. Nowadays it's widely agreed that if your partner's affections are wandering elsewhere, it's ''your partner'' you should confront, as the other person isn't stealing what's being freely offered. Perhaps the best example of this change in perspective is the 2022 song "You Can Have Him Jolene" by country trio Music/ChapelHart.

Context ValuesDissonance / Music