Tone Loc Has Problems

Tone Loc has problems. He's been arrested for DUI and has collapsed, twice, on stage. But most notably, he was arrested for domestic assault on the mother of his child last year. Tone Loc has problems, women problems, and the root of them can be found in his music. You see, Tone Loc sees himself as a person who is always being tricked, sexually.

1. In "Wild Thing," Tone Loc is doing a show at a discotheque. (Did discotheques still exist and operate in 1988? If so, I doubt they would call themselves "discotheques". I don't think Tone Loc is from Germany.) He sees a woman in the audience he is sexually attracted to. She indicates that she would like to join him onstage, he tells her to save it for later. Later comes, and he escorts the woman to a private area where they begin to get physical, and then comes the kick in the shorts: the woman tells him she is a prostitute and requires money if they are to proceed. I think Tone Loc is taking poetic license here. Just because a person is a prostitute doesn't mean they "get paid to do the Wild Thing" every time! Especially with a star of stage and screen they are obviously attracted to.

2. In "Funky Cold Medina", the first verse already sets up Tone Loc as a romantic failure: he's out having a drink and although he is a huge celebrity, all the available women are flocking to some feeb at the end of the bar. As it turns out, the fellow is using an updated version of Spanish Fly, so Tone Loc procures some of his own, and that's where it all goes downhill. His dog won't stop humping him; the girl he meets on Love Connection has an obsession with marriage. And of course, Tone Loc gets tricked again: he meets a desirable woman, Sheena, who turns out to have a penis. Tone Loc is not interested in "no Oscar Meyer Wiener" so he turns the lady out on her ear. The line "this is the 80s and I'm down with the ladies" is telling. Was he down with more than just ladies in the freewheeling '70s? No judgments. He blames the aphrodisiac, but he really needs to look inside his soul.

This is probably why he carefully places the horizontal bar above the "o" in his last name. Tone Loc has risked so much; he doesn't want to risk mispronunciation.

"Wild Thing" and "Funky Cold Medina" mash-up