Dylan Jones: If you ask me

If you ask me what we sing in the shower says a lot less about us than we've been led to believe. We might think the shower test is a good indication of what we really, really like (although I'd like to point out that I've never sung a Spice Girls song when naked), but that's never been the case with me. The reverse is true, in fact.

For years I would sing "Synchronicity II" by The Police, not only a song I have no affinity or fondness for, but one I can safely say that I actively dislike. (The only Police song I've ever really liked is "So Lonely", and only then because it sounds like "Sue Lawley".) But there we are. A few years after this affliction, I was hit by another, rather less infectious song: "Bull Rush" by Paul Weller. Again, a song that's not exactly close to my heart. I played it in the car a few times when it came out, but it's no Desert Island Disc. Not even for Paul Weller I would imagine.

Just about the only song I sing in the shower that I actually like is "Are You Ready For Love" by Elton John. The rest just seem to be things that have, possibly through osmosis, though more likely through repetition, lodged themselves in my brain (most recently "Breaking Free" from High School Musical, a song played on average 10 times a day by my kids, and one on which I don't so much hit the notes as wander round them).

Perhaps the one song I sing when wet more than any is Eddie Murphy's "comedy-rap" record "Boogie In Your Butt", which contains the immortal lines, "Stick a telephone in your butt, Stick a dinosaur bone ... in your butt, Stick a tree in your butt, Don't you wanna stick me in your butt?" I don't know why I sing it, but I do, and can often be caught in the office singing this to myself, much to the embarrassment of any passing purveyor of luxury goods. The first time my new PA overheard me singing this, I caught her staring at me as though I had suddenly decided to cover myself in jam. It's certainly not the world's best record, and I can only imagine the reason Murphy agreed to make it is exactly the same reason he agreed to make the execrable Best Defence after the huge success of Beverly Hills Cop: "Three men walked into the room carrying a cheque."

Dylan Jones is the editor of 'GQ'