Jermaine Stewart, We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off | Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶

In the 145^th edition of Throwback Vibez (2023), we recollect and reflect on “We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off” by Jermaine Stewart.   

The vibes, the vibes, those Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶! Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 is a column that celebrates awesome songs from the past.  The records that grace this column are older, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re ancient – no fossils 🦴! All genres of music are welcome. In the 145^th edition of Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 (2023), we recollect and reflect on 🎵 “We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off”, performed by 🎙 Jermaine Stewart. 

“A quick hit, that’s your game / But I’m not a piece of meat, stimulate my brain.” Sigh, if only more people ascribed to those lyrics, 🎙 Jermaine Stewart.  While the late singer is often characterized as a one-hit wonder, he charted four hits on the pop charts.  That said, the one song he’s best remembered for was 🎵 “We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off”, which peaked at no. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100, the biggest hit of his career.  The opening track from his 1986 album, 💿 Frantic Romantic, Stewart lets this man know, he’s not easy, and he’s going to have to put in work to get him in bed.  Essentially, Stewart wants to build something more than a hook-up: “Shake your body to the music, maybe then you’ll score.”

Even if this man scores on Jermaine, he makes it clear on the catchy, innocent chorus, “We don’t have to take our clothes off / To have a good time, oh no / We could dance and party, all night / And drink some cherry wine, uh-huh.” Maybe the partying part is not totally innocent, but clearly, a sexual encounter is not on Stewart’s mind right at this moment.  In the second verse, he tells this boy, “Just slow down if you want me / A man wants to be approached cool and romantically.” Whether a homosexual man, like Stewart was, or a heterosexual man, this sense of romance and opting against hooking up is refreshing. “We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off” certainly doesn’t suffer from being anti-hook-up.  It has the 1980s aesthetic is written all over this cut.  Even if it sounds a bit dated by 2020s standards, the groove and backdrop still slaps. Stewart was a ripe tenor, with a pure upper register, something he flaunts sensationally on this gem from the 1980s.  It’s sad that he only to be 39 years old, dying from AIDS-related liver cancer.  His legacy lives on with the incredibly fun, 🎵 “We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off”.

🎙 Jermaine Stewart • 💿 Frantic Romantic • 🏷 Virgin • 🗓 1986

Jermaine Stewart, We Don’t Have To Take Our Clothes Off: Throwback Vibez 🕶️🎶 No. 145 (2023) [📷: Brent Faulkner / The Musical Hype; Virgin; John Alan Sperry, PIRO via Pixabay]