Billy Paul's Me and Mrs. Jones

I've given myself the task of writing about one song a week for 2024 because, well, I think it'd be fun.

Billy Paul's Me and Mrs. Jones

(34 million views? Wow.)

Infidelity is often portrayed as sexy because it's wrong. So goes the motto of the subject of a 2015 data breach, Ashley Madison: "Life is short. Have an affair." The phrase seems to contain it all: we're all confronted with our mortality, and thus our limited ability to see and do everything in the world. This is particularly felt by people stuck with a binding vow they had made in a specific period of time in a specific frame of mind, whereas the world, after all, does move along, minds turn about, and love forever changes. Having an affair occasionally is like rattling the bars of one's cage: a pointless act of defiance, but nonetheless defiance, critical to our sense of freedom.

Well. Whatever "wrong" means, anyway. People really condemn infidelity not in the person, in my opinion, but in the act itself: we condemn that appetite wins over the human will. We reflect the sin of others upon ourselves and, by doing so, create an image of ourselves in the heat of the "sinful" act. We project our weaknesses into the subject and the act itself, and we come to fear the subject and the act because they are constant reminders of our own inabilities, therefore villifying them. But fear only leads to, what else, more fear; fear does not grow, fear does not remove, fear does not abet in any way. Fear only fosters more fear, until we find pleasure in surpassing those fears by indulging in our weaknesses. By committing adultery, by relapsing, by running away from our problems, we say "I have no weaknesses, I have overcome fear", only, on the morrow, to begin picking up the stones to build fear again. This is all to say: there is something human, and correct, in our desire to get out of ruts, liberate ourselves, try to change things. Leonard Cohen, describing our human need, said it best: "I'm aching for you, baby, / I can't pretend I'm not; / I need to see you naked, / in your body, in your thought." The physical intimacy is a route to spiritual intimacy. Though this is no commendation of adultery whatsoever.

Billy Paul's "Me and Mrs. Jones" is the most chaste song about infidelity I've ever heard. It's the best one I can think of off the top of my head, for that same reason. It confronts the topic on these precise axes: it's a song little about carnal satisfaction, beyond the holding of hands. It's entirely about the brief moment of liberation between two people, every day, at the same café, six thirty.

I'm careful to set Billy Paul as the song's possessor, over the songwriters Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff and Cary Gilbert. Sure, it's a well-written song, but compare Paul's version to, say, Michael Bublé's version. The lyrics when looked at alone don't amount to much beyond the actual affair.

You know Paul is onto something special - and strange - as he croons the opening, "Me and Mrs. Jones...", with an intense smokiness coming out of his voice you already feel the humidity and heat coming from their cups of coffee. Elongating the "e" after "Me" creates space before the "and" where a whole line of thought can fit in. Paul places special emphasis on the "es" of "Jones", holding onto it for so long; yet whereas another singer may use this moment to show off technical skill by sustaining the note, Paul wavers, showing physical strain as he tries to keep his lover's name in his mouth. It's entirely by intention.

He continues, to the quickening drum like a fluttering heartbeat, "We've got a thing, going on. / We both know that it's wrong, / but it's much too strong, / to let it go now." There is a peculiar attribute of Paul's singing, that I hadn't encountered in other artists: he has an odd rasp, or lisp, such that the certain consonants are sung weaker than others. For example, the "ng" endings of "wrong" and "strong" should place some emphasis on the trailing "g", but for Paul the "g" is almost vanishing. It seems to help him make his point. A Teddy Pendergrass would seize by force, demonstrating how much this affair is an inevitability. Paul's approach is tender, softly admitting that, yes, this attraction has become fatal, and has snuck by him as gently and silently as the night comes.

We meet everyday,
at the same café,
six thirty,
and no one knows she'll be there;
holding hands,
making all kinds of plans,
while the jukebox plays our favorite song -

the music quickening, Billy shouting jubilantly,

Meeeeeeee aaaaaand, Missus, Missus Jones!

That elongated "and" is exceptional: Paul sings it in what I call a "dry" way, reaching that height with just the wind in his throat and barely hitting the "d" in his unusual lisp. Another thing: he sounds so frenzied that it sounds like "yand", not "and". Further, the way he sings "Missus", the onset of "sis" is so sharp. It's a particularly tactile way of singing this critical part of the song, that we feel his Dantean agony at being unable to truly connect with the woman he is in love with. Only to then cool down immediately with the refrain, "We've got a thing, going on..." understating the intensity of his emotions, resetting back to zero.

Besides Billy's remarkable singing, there's that little riff the strings and horns make after the intro, so memorably tied to the chorus, aligned entirely with the ephemeral and wistful nature of this affair. This little touch was arranged by Bobby Martin.

That's what makes the song special: most love songs describe a heat and humidity so intense they overwhelm the singer. Paul here paints a love that flares up suddenly, as if from the dryness of tinder, blazing in the early hours of the evening, before dying down, disassembled by the wind only to resume tomorrow. The restraint, the hidden smiles and the repressed pain, in the participants' loving demonstrates the intensity. As Billy recounts, "Now she'll go her way and I'll go mine, / tomorrow, we'll meet at the same place, the same." There's something eternal about their misery, mythological as the tale of Orpheus, as if these two lovers represent the folly of every love in the world.

Well, not trying to be down about love, as for this song and last week's "I Loves You, Porgy", but I prefer songs like these. I'm no starry-eyed Swiftie. There's something about this song that appeals to the intellect, depicting a kind of melancholy over the world not reciprocating our ideals. I think this grief makes us more honest people, so that we can have joy more purely. Thus Billy's reluctance turning into certainty and strength at the end: "You know and I know that it was wrong, / but I think it was strong." Me too, Billy, me too.