Even Lehrer himself couldn’t have gotten away with this back in the 1950s.
Tom Lehrer recorded “The Masochism Tango” clear back in 1959, believe it or not. Given that this was when the government was stomping on Irving Klaw and Bettie Page for lingerie bondage photos, it’s almost unbelievable that he got away with it. Not only that, the song was recorded and published again that same year — a live version this time.
Nevertheless it was the 1950s, and even Tom Lehrer couldn’t get as risqué as he might have liked. And while “The Masochism Tango” has been covered many times, I know of only one artist who has tried to improve on it — or at least rewrite it the way Lehrer might have if he could have gotten away with it.
An Evening Wasted With Tom Lehrer
If you’ve never heard “The Masochism Tango,” shame on you. Here it is in all its glory from 1959’s An Evening Wasted With Tom Lehrer:
Stand up straight. You’re in the presence of greatness.
I ache for the touch of your lips, dear,
But much more for the touch of your whips, dear.
You can raise welts
Like nobody else
As we dance to the masochism tango!
Let our love be a flame, not an ember,
Say it’s me that you want to dismember.
Blacken my eye,
Set fire to my tie
As we dance to the masochism tango!
At your command
Before you here I stand,
My heart is in my hand… (yecch!)
It’s here that I must be!
My heart entreats,
Just hear those savage beats,
And go put on your cleats
And come and trample me!
Your heart is hard as stone or mahogany,
That’s why I’m in such exquisite agony.
My soul is on fire,
It’s aflame with desire,
Which is why I perspire
When we tango!
You caught my nose
In your left castanet, love,
I can feel the pain yet, love,
Every time I hear drums.
And I envy the rose
That you held in your teeth, love,
With the thorns underneath, love,
Sticking into your gums.
Your eyes cast a spell that bewitches.
The last time I needed twenty stitches
To sew up the gash
That you made with your lash,
As we danced to the masochism tango!
Bash in my brain,
And make me scream with pain,
Then kick me once again,
And say we’ll never part.
I know too well
I’m underneath your spell,
So, darling, if you smell
Something burning, it’s my heart.
(Hic! ‘Scuse me!)
Take your cigarette from its holder,
And burn your initials in my shoulder.
Fracture my spine,
And swear that you’re mine
As we dance to the masochism tango!
Unfit to Practise
And here’s the never-before-dared rewrite of “The Masocism Tango,” from Amateur Transplants’ Unfit to Practise:
Better put on your headphones for this. Especially if you’re at work.
Oh I’ll never forget how we met, dear,
On that specialist site on the ‘Net, dear.
Where you taught me the uses
Of handcuffs and nooses
We danced to the masochism tango!
Oh you used to bring home those pipecleaners,
And stick half a dozen down my penis,
Then wrapped me in chains
Plugged you into the mains
And we danced to the masochism tango!
Each summer’s day
We’d go outside and play
A morning of croquet
And you’d brain me with the mallet.
I cooked you meals
Of freshly-slaughtered veals
And shards of stainless steels
That got lodged in your palette.
Oh the weight that you hung from my foreskin,
And the places you inserted corks in.
And the time that your trainers
Got lodged in my anus
We danced to the masochism tango!
You wore that dress
Made from barbed-wire mesh
That tore into your flesh
Whichever way you moved
It left me scarred
It made me bleed so hard
The late Marquis de Sade
Would surely have approved
Oh we drank from the cup of depravity
Then you shoved the cup into my cavity.
Wedged a fork in my head
Wanked me off till I bled
And we danced to the masochism tango!
You sang me love songs so tender
Stuck my cock in the blender
And we danced to the masochism tango!