To successfully participate in the great raunch revival, then, sexiness needs to serve a purpose beyond simply being, well, sexy. The highlight of Anora, for instance, isn’t the fact that its lead Mikey Madison wears skimpy outfits and can work her way around a dance pole; it’s in her nuanced, humanising portrayal of a sex worker and the film’s careful depiction of power dynamics. The more suggestive lyrics on albums such as Charli xcx’s Brat and Sabrina Carpenter’s Short ‘n’ Sweet, on the other hand, are less about pleasing and more about teasing – expressing desire, yes, but also putting men in their place. “I can’t relate to desperation,” sings Sabrina on her summer smash “Espresso”, before the chorus nonchalantly acknowledges the power of her own sex appeal: “Now he’s thinkin’ ’bout me every night, oh / Is it that sweet? I guess so”.
