Reba McEntire, Fancy | Controversial Tunes 😈🎶

In the 2^nd edition of Controversial Tunes (2023), we explore the controversy behind the song, “Fancy” by Reba McEntire. 

Bring on the controversy! Controversial Tunes 😈🎶 is a column that provides background information and insight into songs that raised eyebrows and totally stirred the pot.  The records that grace Controversial Tunes 😈🎶 are old and new alike, with all genres of music welcome.  In the 2^nd edition of Controversial Tunes 😈🎶 (2023), we explore the controversy behind the song, 🎵 “Fancy” by 🎙 Reba McEntire. 

“I stepped into a satin dancing dress / That had a split on the side clean up to my hip,” 🎙 Reba McEntire sings in the first verse of 🎵 “Fancy”, adding, “It was red velvet trim and it had fit me good /… There stood a woman where a half-grown kid had stood.” What is Reba getting at on this cover of the 1960s 🎙 Bobbie Gentry classic?  Poverty makes you make tough decisions, and for Fancy, the character portrayed by Gentry and McEntire in this cover from her 1990 LP, 💿 Rumor Has It, her mom encourages her to get out of poverty through sex work.  Yes, this country song is about prostitution – let that sink in.

Even in the 2020s, songs about sex work still raise eyebrows, though arguably less so compared to ‘back in the day.’ Still, where country music’s biggest vice often seems to be an exorbitant amount of alcohol, prostitution obviously raises the bar.  The lyrics never cross the line, mind you, but the innuendo is loud and clear.  Furthermore, the fact that Fancy’s mother encourages her 18-year-old daughter to become a prostitute is shocking: “She looked at the pitiful shack / And then she looked at me and took a ragged breath / She said, ‘Your Pa’s runned off and I’m real sick / And the baby’s gonna starve to death.’” Desperate times call for desperate measures, exemplified by this record, where Fancy’s mother goes on to say, “‘Just be nice to the gentlemen, Fancy / They’ll be nice to you.’” Damn! It is worth noting that Fancy ends up on top: “I charmed a king, congressman / And an occasional aristocrat.”  She also addresses the pushback: “There’s a lot of self-righteous hypocrites that call me bad / They criticize mama for turning me out.” Even by the time the Reba version of 🎵 “Fancy” arrived, there was still C-O-N-T-R-O-V-E-R-S-Y! Later, 🎙 Orville Peck covered it, transforming the record to a queer male perspective, opening another can of worms.

🎙 Reba McEntire • 💿 Rumor Has It  • 🏷 MCA • 🗓 1990

Reba McEntire, “Fancy”: Controversial Tunes 😈🎶 No. 2 (2023) [📷: Brent Faulkner/ The Musical Hype; MCA; Tazz Vaughn via Pexels; Darkmoon_Art,  TheDigitalArtist via Pixabay]