We Asked a Nudist About Attending Miley Cyrus’s Naked Concert

Miley Cyrus and the Flaming Lips have implied that they're organizing a concert together in which both they and their audience will be naked. Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne said on Instagram: “Oh fuck..!!! @mileycyrus is planning a show where her, the band ( us ) and the audience are all COMPLETELY naked with milk ( well white stuff that looks like milk) is being being spewed everywhere.”

The all-nude event will be part of a music video for her song “Milky Milky Milk” (easily the second most grating song on an otherwise oddly interesting album, Miley Cyrus and Her Dead Petz). Cyrus is a frequent public advocate of body positivity and often promotes the #freethenipple hashtag on Instagram.

While many of us consider ourselves to be forward-thinking, progressive body-positive concert-goers, let us please be honest with ourselves and admit that most of the shows we attend require us to keep our respective junk in our pants. Huge concerts can be logistical nightmares as it is without the additional problems that might arise from you being clothes-free. So it is totally OK for you to have questions about attending an all-nude concert.

We had said questions, so we called Felicity Jones, founder of Young Naturists America, an organization that, according to their website, seeks to “promote a healthy body image and more social acceptance” among young naturists and nudists, especially in the millennial generation through social nudity. We asked her all of the social etiquette questions about attending a concert ass-nekkid so that you don’t have to.

Noisey: Tell me about yourself and your organization.
Felicity Jones: I founded Young Naturists America with my partner about five years ago. We’re based in New York City. We have a chapter in Southern California, but mostly based here. We’ve done tons of different types of events: nude parties in bars, nude gatherings at resorts, nude beaches, obviously, naked Halloween parties, that sort of thing. We promote positive body image and acceptance by using social nudity.

Do you have an office?
No, we work from home.

Oh so you can work nude. Are you nude right now?
[Laughs] No, I’m about to leave and New York City law requires me to wear clothes. And it’s a little cold today, so not the best weather for it.

OK, so the nude concert, where do you keep your wallet?
That’s a common question. Where do you keep your keys, where do you keep your money? Women can carry a purse, obviously. We don’t sell them anymore but we used to have these clear plastic pouches you could put around your neck or wrap around your wrist. You could keep your cell phone or keys in there, they were waterproof.

For a nude concert, do you leave your clothes in your car?
No, usually, you can’t leave your clothes in your car unless you’re at a resort or a beach. Normally, for an indoor thing like a concert… [noises in background] Sorry, I don’t know if you can hear but my parakeets are being really loud. If you were coming to an event or party, we’d have a clothing check where you could put your clothes in a bag and they’d be stored. I don’t know how they’re going to do it at this concert. Maybe you’ll strip at your seat and put your clothes in a bag.

Is it ok to wear shoes?
Oh yeah, totally. You definitely don’t want to step on something. When we do events at a bar, they ask us to wear shoes, just as a precaution.

Concerts are crowded. Is it inappropriate to brush past people when you’re nude?
Obviously you can’t avoid it. You want to avoid touching someone’s breasts or something, clothed or naked. I imagine it’ll just be a bit more awkward at this concert if people have to squeeze together. But you know, it depends on someone’s comfort level, being naked and close to someone else.

What about crowdsurfing?
I’ve never witnessed that. I guess that happened a lot in the 70s at Woodstock, I don’t know. I don’t know if that would happen so much at a naked concert, you’ve got to be comfortable with everyone’s hands on your butt.

If you were to buy merch there, would you have to wait to wear it?
I mean, if everyone bought a shirt and put it on, it would no longer be a completely naked event, would it?

Touché. Are you a fan of Miley or the Flaming Lips?
I’ve always been a fan of the Flaming Lips. Miley… I have mixed feelings about. I was a fan of some of her music, like back when she was singing “Party in the U.S.A.” It’s a great song, still like it.

“Party in the Nude S.A.,” am I right?
[Does not laugh for some reason] But not really a fan of some of her newer stuff and her problems with cultural appropriation, trying to imitate black people and that sort of thing.

How do you feel about her body positivity or her #freethenipple promotion?
Well, yeah, I really like her supporting #freethenipple and I feel like she helped launch that campaign to an even bigger audience. So that was pretty awesome. I think she gets it, how it’s about equality. She’s pretty over the top in general so I wasn’t surprised to hear she’s doing this nude concert. I think she’s pretty much a nudist. I don’t know if she’s called herself that. I remember she did an interview with one of those night talk shows and she was talking about going to a nude beach. She’s pretty free and open with her body so I always thought that was pretty cool about her.

How do you smuggle drugs into a nude concert?
You do it like what’s her name in Broad City, you use nature’s pocket. [Laughs]

One of the benefits to going to a concert might be being around attractive people that you might try to hook up with. Does that get more difficult?
No, not really. As long as you know how to be respectful and polite. I think people know how to be respectful people. It might make it more difficult with the sexuality aspect. People always ask about like, “What if I get a boner?”

Oh my god, thank you for saying it because I didn’t want to say the word “boner.”
Yeah that’s always a question, and the answer is that for a nudist event, it just doesn’t occur, really. I’ve witnessed it maybe a handful of times somebody getting an erection, because it’s just not a sexual environment. I don’t know how this concert’s gonna be. Maybe it’ll be more sexually charged than your nudist party or whatever.

Is that a faux pas, a boner?
Yeah, it is. Because it’s not a sexual event and it can make people around you uncomfortable. Basically the etiquette is to cover up or if you’re at a resort, you go in the water until you feel more calm.

Well thanks for taking the time to talk. Maybe I’ll see you at the concert?
Yeah sign me up. I don’t want to be hit with the fake milk, though. I read they were doing that. Sounds like something Miley would do.

Dan Ozzi writes most of his tweets while naked. Follow him on Twitter - @danozzi