Mostly a question for us older folks as we actually know these songs. KISS - Christine 16 Ringo Starr - You're 16 Stray Cats - Sexy and 17 Kentucky Headhunters - 16 and Single Chuck Berry - Sweet Little 16 And what I mean is, "for a mainstream crowd". Surely there are far more offensive songs that get made today. In fact, these songs are quite mild when compared to lots of metal / rap songs...... but these songs basically are about being with underage girls, and were mainstream pop songs or rock songs. I think they might get made, and even played, but there would be a lot of backlash from the PC crowd.
Might be a problem ,but the demographics these songs appealed to were the high school age, and 'older' people by in large didn't like rock. Also, while pedophilia has always been around - it is now highly publicized and likely considered much more common than it actually is as with many things like child abductions, gun related violence, etc. Information is a great and necessary tool, but as with any tool, it needs to be used correctly to get the most out of it. Used poorly generally yields poor results.
Well, let's say USA, and that these guys were 5 to 20 years older than 16. ( because they were ) I know Brian Setzer was 24 when he sang Sexy and 17, and Chuck Berry was 32 when he sang Sweet Little Sixteen. And I just looked it up, Paul Stanley was 25 when KISS did Christine 16.
Its 'funny' that when a famous singer marries/sees someone so young it doesnt seem to (at the time) cause people to worry, eg... Michael Jackson - Having lots of very young friends, kids staying over at his house/room. Taking a young boy to sit on his lap to a music awards show (Monaco) Elvis Presley - Met Priscella when she was 14 ! Jerry Lee Lewis - Married his 13 year old cousin (to be fair at the time he was totally slated for this by the media etc and rightly so)