All Reviews

Review: Tantus Flirt

Kate Sloan

Lately I haven’t been in the mood for anal stimulation, like, ever. My butt’s been highly resistant to poking and prodding. Which is why it’s taken me so damn long to get this review written.

Tantus sent me the Flirt months ago. I had actually requested a smaller plug, the Little Flirt, but I was nonetheless happy to see the regular-sized Flirt when it arrived in my mailbox – because it looks sexy as hell. Glossy, black, curvy, flexible. Mmm.

If you ask me (and you’re reading my blog, so I assume you’re asking me), Tantus is one of the few companies that really gets anal toys right. They don’t cause my butt pain or discomfort. They just feel good.

The Flirt is no exception. Its gently swelling curves slip inside me with minimal warm-up, even though the toy is 1.4 inches across its widest point. The curve from the head to the middle of the shaft is just delicious, and feels gooooood going in and out of my ass. Combined with clit stimulation, it’s a knockout. As with many other Tantus butt toys, the sentence that comes to mind is, “This is what anal play should always feel like.”

My only issue with the Flirt is the base. I think it’s due for a redesign. It’s roughly the same width as the widest part of the plug, so it doesn’t feel completely secure; I get the sense that I have to hold onto it or it might drift inside me (though I don’t know if this is actually possible or if it’s just a feeling I have). It’s also circular and wide, so the Flirt isn’t really “wearable” as a plug; it’s more of an active toy, to be used during fucking, than it is one to be worn inside your underwear for hours at a time. (I have other plugs for that.)

If Tantus gave the Flirt a wide, crescent moon-shaped base like their Juice plug has, it would be useable as an all-purpose butt plug. For now, I’ll only be using it for in-and-out-fucking. But it does that very, very well.

Merci, Tantus!

Review: Lelo Ida

Kate Sloan

I never knew a toy could make me scream in pain until I tried the Lelo Ida.

I didn’t see it coming, and neither did my boyfriend. So we were both pretty horrified, since pain wasn’t supposed to be on the agenda that night (and vaginal pain isn’t the kind I find hot, anyway).

The Ida is an overhaul of Lelo’s previous couples’ vibes, the Tiani and Noa, meant to be worn inside the vagina alongside the penis during PIV sex. Incase you didn’t know, Lelo got into a legal tussle with We-Vibe when the latter accused the former of stealing their unique toy design, and We-Vibe won, so Lelo had to scrap everything and start from scratch.

I assumed the Ida would be like a poor man’s We-Vibe, and it is, but it’s worse than that: it’s an assault on the genitals. It’s like trying to fit a square peg into my round hole.

I think my major problem with it is that the internal portion is SO BIG. No, it’s not big by dildo standards, but when you try to shove a penis in underneath it, it digs into the vaginal wall and feels appallingly out of place. It reminds me of those occasional awkward moments when my boyfriend’s penis jams my NuvaRing into an odd position and it hurts, except the Ida is so much worse than that, because it’s firm and it’s rotating.

Yep, the internal portion rotates. I thought this would be my favorite feature, because historically I enjoy internal rotation, but actually I can barely feel it. When my boyfriend’s penis is inside me, I can’t tell if the added girth is stopping the rotation entirely or if I just can’t feel the silicone arm’s slow stroking over the wave of pain I’m experiencing. Either way, it doesn’t do a damn thing for me.

The external part of the toy doesn’t cause me pain like the internal part, but it’s still a pretty massive failure. Traditional couples’ vibes have a slim external part, made to tuck neatly between the labia so it can access the clitoris easily and directly. The Ida, instead, has a large round disc, almost as big as my palm. Ain’t no way a disc is fitting in between my labia, so it just sits on the outside of my vulva, the vibrations ever-so-slightly reaching my clit but certainly not enough to induce an orgasm. I would imagine this problem would be even worse for people with thick outer labia.

I had an orgasm from the Ida once – once – and here is what I had to do to make it happen: I had to use it by itself (no penis, no dildo), I had to turn it up to the highest setting so my clit could perceive the vibrations, and when I got close to orgasm, I had to physically press the disc against my clit to give it enough sensation. When the ordeal was over, I felt so drained and disappointed that the orgasm hardly felt worth it. And that was the best session I’ve had with my Ida.

With my partner, no amount of lube and warm-up and patience can make the Ida pleasurable or even comfortable. It just feels like I’m getting stabbed in the vaginal wall. I scream into the pillow and push my boyfriend away. He gets upset and distressed that he has hurt me. And then we give up on the Ida and have sex normally, which still kind of hurts after the Ida’s onslaught on my vagina. This happens every time we use it. I have had enough.

Did I mention that you have to pay $200 for the luxury of getting poked in the vaginal wall with a piece of rotating silicone?

There are other details I could mention in this review – the Ida has a remote, it’s waterproof, it has two high-tech motion-sensitive settings, it’s made of smooth body-safe materials – but really, none of that matters, because I cannot recommend this toy to anyone. I refuse to.

If you want a comfortable couples’ vibe to wear during PIV sex, try the Noa – it’s the only one I’ve ever liked, and it’s half the price of the Ida. If you want to have more control of your experience, try holding a long-handled or small vibe against your clit during PIV: I recommend the Eroscillator, Mia 2, or Tango.

But please, don’t get the Ida. Or if you really want the Ida experience, try putting a sharp rock in your vag next time your partner’s about to penetrate you.

This toy was sent to me for review by Lelo. Dear Lelo: I still love you, even though I hate the Ida.

Porn Review: SPIT

Kate Sloan

Some friends of mine have started a feminist porn collective, and it is blowing my mind and titillating my genitals.

Spit calls itself “alternative porn for the aroused mind.” It’s photographic porn featuring performers who have never or rarely made porn before, so it feels authentically sexual – because it is.

Most of the photosets on the Spit website thus far were shot at play parties (i.e. sex parties) held with the explicit intent of generating porn imagery. Participants can have sex privately anywhere in the space, and if they want to get involved in the porn, they can sign up in advance, get partnered up with another performer based on mutual attraction, and fuck in a porn-specific room in front of photographers.

I have friends who have modeled for Spit, and I can confirm from their stories that they’ve been treated ethically and have had a great time doing their shoots. Ongoing consent is valued and is clearly communicated through the photos. That’s important to me in the porn I consume. My conscience needs to be at ease before my pussy can get in on the arousal party. If you’re that way too, you’ll dig Spit.

Straight sex, queer sex, hard-to-define sex. Some sex without kink, some kink without sex, and a whole lot of kinky sex. Cocks, twats, hands, toys. You’ll see all of this on the Spit website.

The photographer of each set is identified along with the performers, so if you find yourself digging a particular photog’s style, you can look at other sets they’ve shot. I find it especially fun to see different photographers’ takes on the same erotic event: while one artist might focus more on genitals, another might pay more attention to facial expressions. It’s so cool to see.

I’ve never been a huge fan of still-photo porn – it calls to mind stuff like SuicideGirls, which is beautiful to look at but (at least for me) not nearly as arousing as video – but some of Spit’s sets capture passion and movement wonderfully.

The folks behind Spit also mentioned to me that they will be moving into the realm of video in the future. I can’t wait.

I’m in an interesting position in that I know a lot of the people who are in these shoots. I’ve talked with them, I’ve sipped wine with them, I’ve cuddled with them – so it’s surreal and magical and cool to see them fucking each other in porn.

But I think, even if you’ve never met any of these people, there is a neat sense of “Huh, these people look like average, regular people.” They’re sexy as hell, in a “I could actually fuck a person like this” sort of way. I love that.

The website’s interface isn’t the best. Each photoset is laid out all on one page, so it’s not terribly friendly for people with slow internet connections. I’d prefer a system that allows for flipping through sets using arrow keys, or viewing a set of thumbnails and choosing just the pictures I want to see. Spit is still in its infancy, and I’m looking forward to seeing its functionality improve as it gets bigger.

Membership is $9.99 a month, which gets you unlimited access to the photos. (Spit also hosts some erotic stories, but the photos are really the main event. You can find sexy stories all over the internet, but these photoshoots are one-of-a-kind.)

If we’re betting on what’ll be the Next Big Thing in the feminist porn genre, my money’s on Spit.

Thank you, lovely Spit folks, for letting me look at your porn!

Review: LoveLife Dream

Kate Sloan

Happy Valentine’s Day, cuties!

I feel bad for disliking the LoveLife Dream. It could have been so good. It has the bare structural bones of a vibrator that could do something other than suck. And yet it kind of sucks.

LoveLife is a new-ish line of toys made by OhMiBod, formerly best known for its vibrators that sync up to the music on your iPod (dear god why). It was definitely a good step for OhMiBod to move toward producing “normal” sex toys, i.e. ones without silly gimmicks. But if the rest of the toys in the line are similar to the Dream, I think the collection has missed the mark and OhMiBod should go back to the drawing board.

First of all, every toy in this line is obnoxiously pink. I realize that pink is a top-selling color in the sex toy industry, that it’s “romantic” and “girly,” etc., but none of that can make me like the overwhelming pinkness of this collection. It feels overly gendered and a little juvenile. And despite the fact that I’m visually quite attached to heart shapes and what they represent, the hearts sprinked throughout the LoveLife line feel cloying and silly. These toys look appropriately saccharine on Valentine’s Day, maybe, but that’s it.

I was prepared to set aside my distaste for the Dream’s aesthetics if it felt good, but it couldn’t even meet me halfway on that one. It is sooooo buzzy, you guys. And buzzy just doesn’t do it for me. The vibrations stay right at the surface of my body and don’t rock my internal clitoral network. Inserted vaginally, this vibe feels almost pathetically weak to me, even turned up to the sixth and highest speed. Buzzy vibes don’t stimulate me the way I like, and they cause fast numbness for me, so I just can’t use ‘em.

There were literally times when I got bored midway through using this vibe and gave up. I didn’t just give up on using this particular toy; I gave up on the entire masturbation session. More than once. Because buzzy vibrations make me feel like all vibrations must be boring and awful like they are. (However, if I forced myself to use an über-rumbly vibe immediately afterward, I remembered why vibrations rock and all was well again.)

I will say that the Dream’s control panel is easy to use, which can’t be said for all sex toys. You press a squiggly button to turn it on and off, and plus and minus buttons to change the speed. The toy is rechargeable and comes with a USB cable so you can charge it that way, which is always convenient (for my life, anyway – you might feel differently if you share a computer with your grandmother or something). The toy’s gently sloping shape feels nice inside me, though not so nice that I’d want to use it as a dildo. It’s reasonably quiet. The silicone is soft and smooth but requires significant lubeage.

I just can’t get excited about a vibrator if its motor doesn’t thrill me, and this toy’s motor is a major letdown.

The major standout of the LoveLife line, according to some reviews I’ve read, is the Adventure, a three-pronged vibe that can stimulate the clit, vagina, and anus all at the same time. Each prong has its own motor, so it’s got to be stronger than my disappointing Dream. If you, for some ungodly reason, adore the cavity-inducing aesthetic of the LoveLife line and really want one, it seems like the Adventure is the way to go.

As for me, I’m going to file this one away under “vibrators so buzzy, they’re utterly incompatible with my genitals.”

Thanks to OhMiBod/LoveLife for the toy!

Review: Tantus Adam O2

Kate Sloan

The Adam O2 was my gift to myself for my 20th birthday. I had never owned a realistic dildo before, and having recently recovered from penis terror, I was, for the first time, interested in owning a genuinely dick-like toy. I had also discovered Tantus fairly recently, and basically wanted every dildo in their catalogue.

The Adam was a good choice and is still one of my favorite dildos in my whole collection. Its 1.5" girth was slightly uncomfortable to me back then, but I’d warm myself up eagerly each session because I knew it was worth the effort and preparation. Lots of lube and a smallish in-between dildo is enough to make Adam comfortable for me.

The main factor that made me click the “Add to Cart” button was that delicious curve. There are times when I wish Tantus’ dual-density O2 formula was softer and more flexible, like VixSkin, but the firmness is absolutely appropriate for Adam: without it, this dildo wouldn’t have the intense G-spot impact that makes it one of my favorites. The curve feels natural – less like a G-spot homing device and more like a flesh-and-blood penis that happens to have a curve – and it’s very, very good. If you enjoy feeling like you’re being fucked by the unrealistic and hunky well-hung hero of a romance novel, Adam fits the bill.

I have two other O2 dildos, the Mark and the Cush, and while they both get their fair share of usage, it’s the Adam I reach for when I want to feel fucked.

FYI, all O2 toys are 30% off throughout February with the code “IHEARTYOU”! If Adam isn’t up your alley, take a look at the ridgy Cush, enormous Max, average-sized Mark, or girthy Mikey. Gotta catch ‘em all!