y cousin had the answers for everything. The song “Billie Jean,” for instance, in which Michael Jackson so provocatively growled: So we danced / On the floor / In the round.” What did that mean? Well, that meant to “have sex with people in a circle while other people were watching,” she told me, while spiking her bangs. Or take that song “Sister Christian,” when they keep saying that someone is “motoring”. What was that about? “Motoring,” my cousin explained, while applying a fourth coat of mascara, “is having sex with people when you’re really young.” Looking back, I realize that all her made-up answers had a curious obsession with sex. But at the time, I just took it for granted that all the world’s secrets involved coitus. Like the word “blowjob.” Man, the meaning of that one was a shocker.

I have to wonder how my older cousin would interpret The Shins. “Chutes Too Narrow”? It means “having sex without a condom,” she might tell me. Or, “it means screwing someone in a laundry room.” And hell, maybe it does. Recently, I interviewed the Shins' James Mercer about his cryptic lyrics and why you won’t see him doing sexy dance routines onstage anytime soon.