It’s a universal truth that people who live in cities know that walls are thin and that other people surround them. In exchange for our cramped living space, we get buffalo wings at 2:00 a.m. and 24–7 access to luxury cocktails. There’s a sort of unspoken agreement in city living: you try to be a good neighbor by not getting drunk in your apartment and singing the songs in Hamilton at 2:00 a.m., and your neighbor tries not to use their loud juicer at 5:30 a.m.
But sometimes you have that neighbor who keeps a different schedule. Someone who has loud acrobatic sex while you’re trying to have a nice dinner with your roommates or entertain your mother, who is visiting from out of town. In times like these, it’s important to nip your neighbors’ shenanigans in the bud as quickly as possible, which is why I have created the mood-dampening mixtape of your dreams.
1) “MacArthur Park” by Richard Harris — the Donna Summer Cover
For those of you who are new to this song, you’re welcome. You’ve lived a good life. For those of you who cringe at the chorus “Someone left the cake out in the rain,” you know better than anyone that this nonsensical funeral dirge of a song is bizarre enough to take anyone out of their sexual experiences.
The hilarious truth is that this song is all about sex and the passing of childhood innocence, and the cake is a metaphor for a lost relationship. All that emotion and angst are manifested in lyrics like the following:
I don’t think that I can take it
’Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again
Oh, no
Try to fuck through that.
2) “Afternoon Delight” by Starland Vocal Band
What is it with the ’70s? It’s like they were trying to ruin sex. (I blame Ronald Reagan.) The Starland Vocal Band is comprised of two couples who later divorced, so not only is this song actively terrible, but it will probably put a curse on you if you have sex to it. Shout that through the ceiling as you crank up the volume for the line “rubbing sticks and stones together, making sparks ignite.” I don’t want to know what part of the body the “stone” is supposed to be, and please do not educate me.
3) “The King of Carrot Flowers” by Neutral Milk Hotel
I think we can all agree than an album focused on Anne Frank is probably not the best sex music. Even if you manage to get busy to the dreary whine of Neutral Milk Hotel, “King of Carrot Flowers” — both parts 1 and 2 — is the song you skip.
4) “Dear Future Husband” by Meghan Trainor
Though we all deserve better feminist anthems than this song, a saccharine heteronormative chastising of a young woman’s imaginary ideal, I’ll only say that “Dear Future Husband” will fill your fornicating neighbors’ heads with visions of their ideal lover. You’re presenting them with the alarming truth about their darkest selves and their most selfish requirements in mates. This is also an earworm, making it a stealth missile. Good luck getting this out of your head.
5) “(You’re) Having My Baby” by Paul Anka and Odia Coates
I know, I know, it’s a little on the nose. But sometimes you have to be a direct communicator, and nothing ruins sex more than the concept of reproduction. Plus, Paul Anka has such a daddy voice — not in a hot spanking way, but in a long-lecture-about-money-management kind of way. In other words, taxes plus the fetishizing of pregnancy brings parenthood to mind. Making loud fornicators think about their parents mid-coitus? Cruel but effective.
6) “You’re Beautiful” by James Blunt
Ballads are the best for ruining sex: not only do they not provide a rhythm, but more often than not they end with someone sobbing over an ex. James Blunt’s ode to some rando he saw one time is a mood derailer of the best quality. If you really want to kick it up a notch, weep loudly in time to the music and sing the chorus loudly.
7) “Piano Man” by Billy Joel
Nothing hits a city dweller harder than a fantastic song about failure and existential crises. “Piano Man” is admittedly less torturous than the other picks, but if you have friends over, you can have a sing-along.
8) “How You Remind Me” by Nickelback
Everyone loves to hate on Nickelback — and with good reason. “How You Remind Me” is pure gibberish, chock full of frat-bro emotions. It sounds like a lacrosse player accidentally enrolled in a college poetry workshop and produced a first draft after a breakup. This is probably a “break glass in case of emergency” kind of situation because you have to sit through it.
9) “Downtown” by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis
This song is bonkers. It volleys between show-tune-style, Freddy Mercury–inspired interludes with a white dude rapping about buying a moped and then adds some moderately transgressive comments about black women. Good luck orgasming to that. With that many key and speed changes, sex to this will just be frustrating. Add into the mix the fact that a lot of people have a LOT of feelings about Macklemore, and this will either distract them into singing along or rouse them stomp over to your door to lecture you on appropriation. Either way, the lovemaking will have ceased, and you’ll have won.
10) “Can I Touch You There?” by Michael Bolton
Do I even need to explain why this will ruin the mood? It’s Michael Bolton singing about lovemaking, wanting to be “deep inside” and “touching your heart.” If abstinence-only educators played this track to students, teen pregnancy would end tomorrow. It’s slow; there are weird rain sounds in the background; and it features that flat, easy-listening jazz Muzak akin to the kind you hear in elevators and spas. If you cut the terrible lyrics, you’re left with a soundtrack for a nap.
