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"History in the making!" rapper Jay-Z announces on "Crazy in Love," the first track on Beyonce Knowles' 2003 solo debut, Dangerously in Love. And while that may be overselling the appeal of the ex-Destiny's Child beauty and her... Read More

"History in the making!" rapper Jay-Z announces on "Crazy in Love," the first track on Beyonce Knowles' 2003 solo debut, Dangerously in Love. And while that may be overselling the appeal of the ex-Destiny's Child beauty and her omnipresent booty, it's not doing it by much. Beyonce's songs are dressed up with state-of-the-art production, guest stars aplenty and the singer"s undeniable fabulousness, but when you analyze them lyrically, they're almost all about pop music's No. 1 topic: love.

But Beyonce -- who in Destiny's Child used her lyrics to thump the drum for "Independent Women" -- intrigues by straddling the line between coy ingÈnue and down-and-dirty temptress. On Dangerously and its follow-up, 2006's B'Day, she's both, delivering direct come-ons such as "Naughty Girl," "Freakum Dress" and "Hip Hop Star," on which she boldly asks/demands, "Do you want to get nasty? I dare you to undress me." Or "Speechless," in which she feels "your skin rubbing and touching me" with "only sweat between us." Turn on the shower!

But for someone so famous and in control of her career, there's a surprising submissive streak running through Beyonce's lyrics, too. On the song "Be With You" she coos the words "I am your woman/I belong to you," while on "Upgrade U" she offers, "I can do for you what Martin did for the people/Ran by the men but the women keep the tempo." She may prefer to let her man lead, but she does demand respect from him, making sure he knows he's not, as one title puts it, "Irreplaceable." "You must not know 'bout me," she sings on that song's independence-asserting chorus. She may be crazy in love, after all, but she"s definitely not crazy.