LimeWire Music Blog

If you’ve ever listened to Arab Strap, you know the Scottish band had a knack for the perverse. (And in case you’re wondering, the chiming, pulsating track “Cherubs,” off 1999’s Elephant Shoe, would definitely find a place on my “Sexiest Tracks Ever” mix tape.) The boys called it quits in 2006, but their fin-de-siecle sex-booze-drugs decadence lives on in the memories of those of us who discovered them as high schoolers looking for trouble. Oh, and did I mention that, as Belle and Sebastian fans may already know, the band is named for a fairly ouchy-sounding male bondage device?

Now that Arab Strap is over, singer Aidan Moffat has found another outlet for his naughty mumblings. British music site “The Quietus” has hired him to give sex advice. The column, I’m No Expert with Aidan Moffatt, has already been around for a bit, but The Daily Swarm just tipped us off to it today. And you know what? It’s pretty entertaining. My favorite question comes from a feminist who is disturbed by the realization that she may also be a masochist. Moffatt’s impressively helpful, humorous, personal response seems right on the money:

Crikey. I’m no psychologist (obviously), but I don’t see how you liking a bit of the rough stuff in bed should affect your views on the right to social, sexual, political and economic equality for women everywhere. Now, I’m not saying that the two aren’t connected – it doesn’t take Freud to see that your feminist views have informed your sexual subconscious in some way – but I really don’t think that there’s any need to worry about reconciliation. We are often erotically charged by things that would normally repulse us. Just the other day, I found myself looking at a clip of Gwyneth Paltrow fondling her breast on the internet, and I hate Gwyneth Paltrow… yet still I found the footage oddly alluring. Interestingly, I have only ever (briefly) been with one girl who asked me to slap her, and she considered herself quite the feminist too. It wasn’t you, was it? I must confess that I wasn’t particularly adept at the aforementioned rough stuff and it made me feel quite uncomfortable, so be sure and discuss this with any potential boyfriends first. Some of us are quite delicate, you know, and I think I can confidently say that most men don’t want to hit their lovers at all.

Will Aidan Moffatt be the (straight) Dan Savage of the U.K.? Entirely possible! In the meantime, if you want to ask him an anonymous question, send your query to aidan@thequietus.com.