26 songs to soundtrack your self-loving.

Lately, for no particular reason relating to being stuck in isolation, we here at Music Junkee have thought hard and long about songs dedicated to self-love.

Sure, there are the classics — ‘I Touch Myself’ by the Divinyls, ‘Feeling Myself’ by Beyoncé and Nicki Minaj, ‘She Bop’ by Cyndi Lauper — but there were a few surprises too: who would have thought Animal Collective had written about cranking the hog?

We’ve gone and made a full Spotify playlist below, but here are a few choice favourites.

Tori Amos — ‘Icicle’

We’re staring off this list with a solid serving of Catholic guilt — best to get that out of the way early. As only Tori Amos could, this song’s a chilling recount of masturbating as a young girl while her family prays downstairs, her hand positioned as a cold icicle, ready to melt in a Spring enclave. As it thaws, shame remains. Love!

Choice lyric: “And when my hand touches myself/I can finally rest my head/And when they say take of His body/I think I’ll take from mine instead.”

Macy Gray — ‘B.O.B’

In 2015, Macy Gray wrote an ode to her Battery Operated Better — a little pet name for her vibrator, “‘cuz he’s not complicated”. It’s got a cute animated video to match, which, despite the cutesy colours, is definitely not child-friendly. This one’s been scrubbed from Spotify, which is a shame. Scream it loud, Macy.

Choice lyric: “He fits like a glove, always up for love/Steady like a Caterpillar/Rabbit from a hat, he knows just where it’s at.”

Janet Jackson — ‘If’

While The Velvet Rope is arguably Janet Jackson’s most sensual album (featuring interludes where she’s masturbating), it’s ‘If’ from 1995’s Janet that delves into self-love most explicitly. Here, with her voice just under an industrial beat, Janet sings about longing for a man, and all the things that she’d do to him. As she says she’s laid in bed thinking about what she’d do in the second verse, that’s when you realise we’re in her mind mid-masturbation.

Choice lyrics: “How many nights I’ve laid in bed/Excited over you?/I’ve closed my eyes and thought of us/A hundred different ways/I’ve gotten there so many times/I wonder how ’bout you.”

FKA twigs — ‘Kicks’

The closer of FKA twigs’ LP1 is about filling a void: “tell me/what do I do when I’m not here?” Against the sparse, resentful electronic backdrop, masturbating never sounded so defiant.

Choice lyrics: “When I’m alone/I don’t need you/I love my touch…I just touch myself/And say, I’ll make my own damn way/Own damn way.”

Animal Collective — ‘Guys Eyes’

You’d be forgiven for not picking up on this song’s masturbatory lyrics: this Merriweather Post Pavilion highlight sees Panda Bear’s voice loop on itself around eighteen times, making the words a little hard to follow. It’s a nice sonic equivalent for the song’s lyrics: feeling yourself in wake of having anyone else around to play off.

Choice lyrics: “I wanna do just what my body needs to/I wanna do just what my body needs to…So I used my mind/And I used my hand/It was what I want to do.”

Goldfrapp — ‘Strict Machine’

Listening back to this early Goldfrapp hit, it’s very clear this is a love letter to a vibrator. At least five of my friends have told me they’re in love with their personal ‘strict machine’.

Choice lyrics: “When you send me a pulse/Feel a wave of new love through me/I’m dressed in white noise/You know just what I want, so please.”

Björk — ‘It’s Not Up To You’

Okay, this one is probably the biggest stretch on our playlist — but we love this reading too much to not include it. While this Vespertine track could be read as an act of self-determination and agency in a relationship which threatens to subsume Björk, it’s the opening lines which hint towards something a little more physical.

When she sings about waking up and tilting her head to find an angle, we get the sense it’s not about finding the light — followed up by a line about the evening she’s always longed for, we get the sense the song is about imagining a perfect night with someone, and realising the image might be better than the actual act. It’s not up to you: it never really was.

Choice lyrics: “I tilt my head/I’m trying to get an angle/Cause the evening/I’ve always longed for.”

Arctic Monkeys — ‘My Propeller’

Alex Turner loves an obtuse lyric, and this Humbug track is no exception. Here, he’s pleading with a lover to come over and play with his propeller: he’s tried himself, but can’t seem to get it working. A perfect track for when you’re struggling to have fun by yourself.

Choice lyrics: “My propeller won’t spin/And I can’t get it started on my own/When are you arriving?”

Caesars — ‘Jerk It Out’

Ugh, remember this song? Yeah. Well, it still exists.

Choice lyrics: ugh whatever.

Tweet feat. Missy Elliot — ‘Oops (Oh My)’

Attention must be payed to this largely forgotten hit from 2002, a sultry dedication to being unable to control yourself around yourself. Sorry Nicki and Beyoncé, but this sounds like what it means to ‘feel yourself’, its beat practically oozing self-satisfaction. Lest we all have the confidence of Missy Elliot here, who raps “I was lookin’ so good I couldn’t reject myself”.

Choice lyrics: “OOPS! There goes my shirt up over my head, oh my/OOPS! There goes my skirt droppin to my feet, oh my.”

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Jared Richards is a staff writer at Junkee, and never thought he’d write this article. Follow him on Twitter.