man on man action

the male singer duet in pop music is nearly extinct. it was abundant during the 1980’s with great collaborations between singers like kenny loggins and el debarge (“i’ll be there”), michael mcdonald and james ingram (“yah moh b there”), mick jagger and david bowie (“dancing in the street”), rod stewart and ron isley (“this old heart of mine”) and luther vandross and gregory hines (“there’s nothing better than love”).

when the 1990’s arrived, rap grew in popularity and the singer/rapper duet was born. the singer now represents the soft side of masculinity--the feminine side, if you will, while the rapper represents the hard side of masculinity. that pairing has remained even into the 21st century and has a fraternal twin called the rapper/rapper duet. can it get any harder than that? it’s as if two men singing together has become forbidden, making it imperative to get rid of any possibility that two men could be attracted to each other.

that was never really an issue during the 1980’s when rappers stayed to themselves and men sang together without a cloud of homophobia hanging over them. perhaps that suggests the 1980’s in the u.s. was more progressive than the reagan administration that governed most of the decade.

if you look at all these harder groupings, the suggested homoeroticism is rampant. no matter how many half-clad women are in a video, the men they’re playing up to aren’t even paying any attention to them! often, the men are being more affectionate with each other, giving each other dap, getting in a huddle and pushing each other, doing an improvised dance together, or hugging as they greet (this is often displayed in slow motion).

look at the video for timbaland’s “give it to me.” the song features justin timberlake and nelly furtado, but in the video, we see shots of timbaland and timberlake chumming it up backstage (even taking a photo with will.i.am during which timbaland vigorously shakes him) while furtado walks around by herself; timbaland and timberlake on what appears to be a tour bus while furtado does her part from a balcony...by herself; and the most telling is the performance scene during which timbaland and timberlake are never less than a foot away from each other dancing onstage, while furtado is about 10 feet away from them singing the hook and dancing by herself.

men aren’t singing together anymore, and they’re not singing love songs to women the way they used to, but they sure have a lot a love for each other.