Sex Toy Reviews

10 Reasons the We-Vibe Tango is (Still) My Favorite Clit Vibe

Kate Sloan

I’m moving to a new home next week, and while I’ve packed up almost all the sex toys I’m planning on bringing, there were a few items I just had to leave out incase I needed them sometime before leaving. Among this group of exceptional outliers is my duo of We-Vibe Tango vibrators.

I got my first Tango just over five years ago, and it was love at first orgasm. I’ve owned a total of four Tangos in my masturbatory career – due to, it must be said, these toys’ one major flaw, their less-than-stellar battery that tends to give out after 2-3 years. But the Tango is one of those rare toys that I’m happy to keep re-buying every few years if I have to. The orgasms it provides are so deep, delicious, and consistent that they’re worth shelling out for.

Here are the 10 biggest reasons the Tango remains a bedside staple of mine, all these years later…

It’s strong. Like, shockingly strong for such a small vibe. There are only a few other bullet-sized vibes this strong that I can think of: the Jopen Lust L2, Swan Wand Mini, ScreamingO Charged Vooom and VeDO Bam. There’s also We-Vibe’s other mini-vibe offering, the Touch, though it’s made of soft silicone instead of hard plastic so it doesn’t conduct vibration as well as the Tango. Suffice it to say, the Tango is easily one of the strongest vibrators you can get at this price point or this size.

It’s rumbly. This is a different consideration from vibration strength; it’s the quality of the vibrations. The Tango rumbles, thrums, pounds against your body; it does not cause near-instant numbness like buzzier vibes do. What’s remarkable about the Tango is that it remains rumbly even at its higher speeds. This is ultimately what makes the Tango indispensable to me: almost nothing else is this strong and this rumbly, and certainly nothing else of this size.

It’s small. The Tango is my most-used toy during partnered sex. This is partly because it’s one of my most-used toys overall, but also, it’s particularly well-suited to partner play because of its size. It slots easily between bodies during intercourse, can be tucked into a pocket or purse at a moment’s notice for a sex-date, and doesn’t get in the way if I’m pairing it with a dildo or a partner’s fingers.

It’s waterproof. As a diehard fan of the bathtime wank, this is an important consideration for me. What’s more, being underwater doesn’t seem to dampen the Tango’s vibrations much, if at all.

It’s rechargeable. This is pretty much a requirement for me; I don’t fuck with battery-powered vibes anymore if I can help it. The Tango’s finicky charger used to bug me, but a We-Vibe rep taught me a trick to make it easier to use, and now I have zero issues with it. Yay!

It has a versatile shape. I most often press the Tango’s flat tip against the right side of my clit, but there are tons of other ways to use it. You can play with the pointed tip or the broad rounded side; you can lay it against the whole length of your clit or just one specific spot. So many options!

It’s quiet. Particularly for a vibe this strong, the Tango is uncommonly quiet. It’s still audible, yeah, but it’s certainly no Le Wand.

It can be used in other toys: anything that has a hole/slot/sleeve for a bullet vibe. This includes, for example, some vibrating cock rings, butt plugs, harnesses, and dildos. Throw out the shitty, buzzy bullet that comes with these toys, and grab a Tango instead. It’s strong enough that you’ll be able to actually feel the vibrations through the toy.

It can be used hands-free. We-Vibe’s own Dusk attachment allows for hands-free orgasms, as Epiphora first chronicled in her review. Depending on your anatomy, you may also be able to pull off this neat trick I do sometimes: I can tuck the Tango between my outer and inner labia, and it’ll more-or-less stay put while I scroll through dirty fanfiction, click around porn sites, and so on. Magic!

Are you a fan of the We-Vibe Tango? Why or why not?

Review: Stockroom Cocksucker’s Mirror

Kate Sloan

As amateur porn legend Heather Harmon slurped down her husband’s dick on my laptop’s tiny screen, I turned to my boyfriend and said, “This is weird.”

“Why?” he asked, reasonably.

The porn itself wasn’t weird. In fact, if anything, my inner erotic rhythms feel tuned to Heather’s, after adoring her porn for at least half a decade. I’m well used to the mischievous twinkle in her eyes, the slick facility with which she swallows her man’s entire dick, the pleasingly predictable sounds he makes as she brings him closer to orgasm. What felt weird was sharing this all-too-familiar experience with another person – albeit a person whose dick has been in my throat. “I dunno, it’s just, you’re here, and I’m having private-time feelings,” I attempted to explain.

My darlin’ snuggled a little closer to me and our eyes drifted back to Heather’s eager mouth on-screen. “It’s okay,” he said, over Jim Harmon’s formulaic moans, “because I’m right next to you having private-time feelings too. And later, you’re gonna put that BJ mirror on me and suck my cock.”

A shiver went through me. Had he planned this on purpose? A perfect evening of weed-smoking and blowjob-ogling, all in the service of making me more comfortable with the Stockroom Cocksucker’s Mirror I had to review for my blog? If so, apparently my boyfriend was a fucking genius.

The mirror scared me, you see. Don’t get me wrong, I had requested it to review, because it scared me in the same way as certain edgy kinks like knifeplay do: they’re a little hot and more than a little terrifying. What worried me about the mirror was being literally face-to-face with myself during a BJ, after fearing my own sexytimes visage for my whole adult life. I don’t like eye contact during sex, or being aware that my face is someone’s erotic focal point, or feeling my face twist up into aroused contortions when a partner can see. The whole idea makes me incredibly, inexplicably anxious – to the point that I’ll often wear a blindfold during sex on bad anxiety days, to limit the amount of my face a partner can see, and to free me from being expected to watch them in return.

We kept putting off testing the mirror – me because it made me anxious, and my boyfriend because “the thought of it didn’t do anything for him.” I found this surprising, because, months earlier, he’d told me, “The most intensely arousing thing for me is to force my lovers to do things I know they want to do, and have previously consented to.” I thought it would turn him on to watch me do something he knew made me consensually uncomfortable – in this case, watching myself give a blowjob.

After a few more Heather Harmon scenes and a little more weed, my mouth was sufficiently horny that I did something I rarely do with my mega-dominant boyfriend: I got bossy. “You should take your pants off,” I said, in a tone of voice that was closer to begging than commanding.

“Okay,” he said, laughing. “I can do that.” I watched as he shed all his clothes, smiling at me all the while, all chest hair and strong muscles, my toppy masculine angel.

And then he slipped the hole of the BJ mirror over his half-hard dick and I burst out laughing.

Even after he laid on the bed and I set to work, I couldn’t control my giggles. Sometimes laughter is how my body responds when I’m enjoying myself in bed, and sometimes it’s a nervous response to discomfort; in this case, it was decidedly both. The tactile pleasure of his dick in my mouth, coupled with the visual assault of my own face devouring his cock in up-close-and-personal HD, felt so sinfully sexy to me that I was almost uncomfortable being that turned on in front of another person. These were, once again, “private-time feelings,” and my partner was watching me have them. And I was watching me have them. From inches away.

My boyfriend, who is prone to mid-beej dirty-talk, cleared his throat and began to speak. I steeled myself for a filthy missive, but instead, he said, “If you deepthroated me all the way, you could kiss yourself!” It was more a gleeful proclamation than a salacious jibe. I laughed around his cock until I couldn’t breathe, and then I took it out of my mouth and laughed some more, nose tucked into the warm crease of his thigh. Some doms try to cut you down with critical jeers, and here mine was, essentially encouraging me to love myself. Through BJs.

I eventually caught my breath and returned to the task at hand. It was at this point that I began to notice how much I was drooling. Sloppy BJs are increasingly my jam – especially since I read Aerie’s blowjob guide where they advocate “drooling uncontrollably and making a giant mess” for the lubrication and visual appeal – but this was on another level. I have never gushed this much spit during a beej before. It reminded me of when you see a commercial where someone takes a big bite of a juicy hamburger and your salivary glands immediately kick into gear – except in this case, the burger was a dick, and the commercial was my own fucking face. It was absurd, and delightful, and wet.

It helped that my boyfriend was holding the mirror in place, and moving it back into my sightline whenever it slipped off to one side, as if to demand, “No, seriously, look at yourself.” I imagine that the mirror would stay put better if it was draped over a huge dick – the hole has a diameter of 5.5 centimeters or about 2.2 inches – but it might also dig in uncomfortably if used on a dick of that size. It didn’t bother my boyfriend to have to hold the mirror still, except that he couldn’t fully relax.

I snuck peeks at myself from time to time, but mostly my eyes remained closed, as they usually are during BJs. It allows me to concentrate on the sensations in my mouth, and keeps me focused on the steady rhythm that’ll get my partner off. Every time my eyes drifted open for a moment, though, I felt seized with a strange blend of arousal and guilt: seeing myself give head was unbelievably hot, but it felt arrogant for me to enjoy the sight of myself that much. And it embarrassed me to imagine my boyfriend watching me watching myself, as if he’d think I was being arrogant, too – even though he told me later that it turned him on to see me viewing this act from a different angle than I would normally get to.

The mirror didn’t just induce arousal and embarrassment in me, though – it also made me competitive. With my damn self. Seeing myself give head from the angle at which I’d usually watch porn stars doing the same, I saw that what feels like intense deepthroating to me isn’t actually that deep. That real-time view made me want to do a better job: go deeper, faster, harder, put on a better show for my love (and for myself). I could see I was bringing my A-game, but it didn’t feel effortful – it just felt fun.

When my darling started to come, he grunted, “Deepthroat me,” just like Heather Harmon’s husband does in all the porn clips I like best – and I did as I’d been told. Though it would’ve been hot to watch my own face at that crucial moment, doing so didn’t occur to me; I squeezed my eyes shut with the effort of keeping that dick as deep as it needed to be, and enduring the intense contractions of muscles against my tongue and throat. I swallowed, and swallowed, and kept on swallowing, and I couldn’t breathe for a while but it didn’t matter.

When it was over, I pulled myself up and gently slid the mirror off my boyfriend’s dick. He lay there panting and raised one finger as if he had something to say, but couldn’t get it out quite yet. I curled up beside him and waited patiently for him to catch his breath.

“That was the best blowjob you’ve ever given me,” he said finally.

You know that silly adventure-movie trope where the hero uses a powerful artefact to beat the bad guy, only to discover afterward that “the power was within them all along”? I feel that way about the Stockroom Cocksucker’s Mirror. Like a good coach, it brought out the best performance of my career thus far – but it did so by pitting me against myself, challenging me to meet my own standards. It literally reflected my own capabilities back at me, and made me better in doing so.

And y’all, I looked hot.

 

Thanks so much to Stockroom for sending me this product to review!

Review: Le Wand

Kate Sloan

Y’all, I’m so angry about the Le Wand. SO ANGRY. It has been a long time since a sex toy has pissed me off this much. But I have some Opinions and Feelings about this one and we are going to talk about them.

This rechargeable wand vibrator – sent to me for my honest review by the lovely folks at Peepshow Toys – was designed as an upgrade to existing wand vibes like the Magic Wand and Doxy. In a braggy interview about her product, designer Alicia Sinclair says, “I’ve always found the aesthetics and design of wands rather unappealing, industrial and masculine… In my humble opinion, Le Wand satisfies this need in the market by offering a refined classic wand massager with upgraded features and gorgeous design.”

It’s definitely good for companies to keep trying to outdo the Magic Wand, reigning queen of the wand vibe genre. Innovation and improvement are important, and perpetual forward motion in the market is one of the only good things about capitalism. But here’s the thing: if you claim to be innovative, you need to actually innovate. The Le Wand does not. In fact, in many ways, it’s a massive step backward for wand vibrators.

First, let’s talk aesthetics. Sinclair says her wand’s design is “elegant,” “sensual,” “fresh” and “stylised.” But let’s be real: it’s essentially a re-skin of the Magic Wand Rechargeable. Seriously, they look like fraternal twins. The product names are printed in the same spot, the number of buttons is the same and they are located in exactly the same place on the body of the toy, the bases of the toy are the same shape, and they even use the same charger! For a toy that claims to be so groundbreaking, the Le Wand sure seems like a straight-up ripoff of the Magic Wand.

It’s not an improvement vibrations-wise, either. Though Le Wand’s ad copy repeatedly claims its vibrations are rumbly, it’s one of the buzzier wands of this size that I’ve tried. The Magic Wand, especially on its two lower speeds, is so delightfully rumbly that you can actually see its head thrumming back and forth during use, and feel it rippling against you. The Le Wand, comparatively, stays pretty stationary and its vibrations are much more surface-level, leading to numbness far more quickly. My clit gets bored and blasé instead of staying engaged and excited.

And the noise! The Le Wand is one of the loudest vibrators I’ve ever encountered. Even on the lowest speed, it sounds like an angry robotic cow having a mooing tantrum. Its lowest speed is just as loud as the Magic Wand Rechargeable’s highest speed, though not as strong or as rumbly. In testing my Le Wand, I was reminded of that time a partner fucked me with a toy while my best friend shot porn in the next room; I had my Magic Wand on my clit, set to the lowest speed, and it was quiet enough that we didn’t even have to worry about fucking up the porn happening nearby. There’s no way that would’ve been true if I was using the Le Wand. (It wouldn’t have gotten me off anywhere near as quickly, either.)

The Le Wand’s head is more rounded than the angular, squarish head of the Magic Wand. For many people, this won’t be an issue, but for me, it has a marked effect on my ability to get off with this toy: I prefer relatively pinpoint stimulation on my clit, so I always hold my Magic Wand slightly angled so as to get that focused corner right on my clit. That isn’t possible with the smooth, rounded head of the Le Wand, though they do sell attachments separately which can narrow the vibrations into a slimmer shape.

Additionally, one of the most-advertised features of the Le Wand – its bendy neck – isn’t actually as effective as the toy’s promotional copywriters seem to think. As with the Magic Wand, there’s a little flexibility in the neck, but you have to press pretty hard to get it to bend. This is a good thing for people who like pressure on their clit, but seems to me like false advertising.

The Le Wand has 20 different vibration patterns, and unlike most patterns, some of them are actually good. My complaint about patterns is usually that they’re too slow or that there’s too much space between bursts of vibration, so they act as a tease without really getting me closer to orgasm. But many of the Le Wand’s patterns are continuous vibration moving up and down in waves or fast pulses, so I can actually get off using them. This toy’s vibrations are still so aggressively buzzy that I don’t like using it on my bare genitals, because of the numbness and slight itchiness that ensues – but the Le Wand’s patterns, applied to my vulva through panties and/or pants, can be kind of nice sometimes.

But for a vibe that costs $170, the Le Wand should be way better than it is. It should be rumblier and quieter, and it shouldn’t be an obvious Hitachi clone. The Magic Wand Rechargeable costs only $125 and is superior in every way that matters to me. Get that one, or the also-wonderful (but electric, not rechargeable) Doxy Wand for $120. You’ll be much happier with either choice than you would with the shrill, buzzy bleating of the Le Wand.

 

Thanks so much to Peepshow Toys for sending me this vibe to review!

Review: The Butters Lubes

Kate Sloan

I’ve never overthought and overanalyzed a lube as much as I did with The Butters. When Peepshow Toys offered to send me jars of The Butters Original and The Butters Raw Honey X Cocoa Butter lubes to try, I said yes, but trepidatiously: I’d never used oil-based lubes like these before. But these got stellar reviews from people I trust, like JoEllen and Lunabelle, so I was curious to give ’em a shot. Here are my thoughts…

Safety and health concerns: It is important to note, right off the bat, that you can’t use oil-based lubes like these with latex condoms, or any other latex barriers (dental dams, gloves, finger cots, and so on). Oils break down latex and compromise the safety of your barriers. However, you can use oil-based lubes with condoms made of lambskin or polyurethane.

I was worried about getting a vaginal infection from these lubes, because I am historically prone to BV and there are mixed opinions about whether oils and honey are vagina-safe. Some people say all oils hang around in the vagina and trap bacteria there; some say only synthetic oils do this, not the plant-based ones used in The Butters. Some say honey inherently contains sugar and is a risk for the forming of botulism spores. I don’t know enough about vaginal health or microbiology to have a damn clue, frankly – so if you know you’re super infection-prone, I would recommend avoiding these lubes.

However, I am infection-prone and haven’t had an issue with them. Vaginas are mysterious. (Or at least, they will be until we have a proper body of scientific research on stuff like this.)

Because these lubes are stored in jars, it’s important to make sure your hands are clean when you dip into them. Otherwise you risk depositing bacteria in the jar which will then breed and multiply. They also don’t contain any preservatives, so they’ll go bad far more quickly than regular lubes, especially if stored in a warm environment (like my poorly ventilated bedroom during a Toronto summer – whoops).

As a lube: The Butters lubes have a glorious texture – whipped and creamy, like buttercream frosting. (Except, you know, safer to put in your vagina.) They’re halfway between liquid and solid, so they stay put better than a typical liquid lube; you don’t have to worry about dripping lube all over yourself while you get a toy nice ‘n’ greasy.

These lubes stay slippery for a looong time; I’ve never had to reapply. As I get more turned on, they intermingle with my vaginal fluids, creating an amplified version of my “girly juice” (!) that tastes, smells, and feels natural. None of those gross lubey chemical flavors here!

These lubes can be a little bit gritty sometimes, in the way that coconut oil is sometimes slightly gritty. For this reason, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend The Butters for anal sex, fisting, or any other activity where an 100% smooth glide is preferred. I don’t mind using these lubes for vaginal penetration and small anal penetration, but once I move onto bigger toys, my butt can detect the ever-so-slight grittiness of The Butters and longs for something slicker and smoother like Sliquid Sassy.

Sometimes I have strange vaginal discharge a few hours after using The Butters – it’s thicker and more opaque than usual, because my natural discharge has mixed with the lube and semi-solidified. This has alarmed me a couple times, as I worried I was getting an infection, but it didn’t smell or taste weird, so I figured I was fine. It’s just something to keep in mind when you use these lubes, so you don’t get freaked out!

As for the difference between the two different types of The Butters I was sent: I don’t notice much of one. The original formula is a little smoother and creamier, while the formula with raw honey feels a little heavier and waxier (perhaps due to the cocoa butter), but not enough to cause a problem. I sliiightly prefer the texture of original, but for the most part, I use them interchangeably.

As a pre-shave treatment: The Butters spreads pretty well – though not as well as my usual pre-shave go-to, regular ol’ coconut oil. I applied a light coating of it to all the body parts I intended to shave (legs, labia, mons, underarms) and then went to town with my Gillette Venus razor. While my skin felt delightfully smooth and moisturized afterward, the razor kept getting clogged with yellowish lube-hair gunk that was hard to clean out.

As a makeup remover: Like many natural oils, The Butters melts away even the most stubborn of waterproof eyeliner and matte lipstick. I would recommend wiping it away afterward, rather than rubbing it in as a face moisturizer, because this lube contains some ingredients that some people find clog pores and/or cause acne.

As a leather conditioner: My go-to leather expert, Peri Plunders, tells me coconut oil (which The Butters contains) is bad for leather. However, the lube’s website specifically advertises its suitability for leather care, and I am a curious reviewer, so I decided to give it a shot. I rubbed a bit of The Butters (original formulation) into a tough spot near the heel of my new-ish Frye engineer boots; it was the only remaining uncomfortable spot on the boots after a couple weeks of break-in time. After applying the lube and rubbing it in, I flexed/bent the area to soften it, and wore the boots with thick socks like I already had been. After a couple more days of wear, the spot softened up, and no longer gives me grief (or blisters). Hooray!

Smell and taste: Some other bloggers have mentioned enjoying the natural, slightly sweet scent of these lubes, but that’s not what I get from them when I whiff ’em; I mostly just smell the sour/tangy apple cider vinegar therein. It’s definitely not as powerful as a straight-up sniff of ACV, but it’s there. Taste-wise, The Butters is milder than it smells – sort of sweet, nutty, and subtle. It certainly tastes better than chemical-y silicone lubes or bitter cheap water-based ones.

Final thoughts: I didn’t think I’d be keen on these lubes, but I find myself reaching for them pretty often, especially when I’m using glass or steel toys. They just feel so silky and luxurious! And I love feeling like I’m being nice to my body by using a natural lubricant rather than one full of chemicals.

At only $10-14 per jar, The Butters are also pretty inexpensive for the high-quality lubes they are. Hooray!

While thick water-based lubes like Sliquid Sassy and Organics Gel will remain my go-to lubes for their greater versatility (especially with regards to latex barriers), I like keeping The Butters around for their luxe feel and hyper-natural appeal. It’s always good to have different options in your lube arsenal!

 

Thanks so much to Peepshow Toys for sending me these lubes in exchange for my honest, unbiased review!

Review: Fun Factory Laya II

Kate Sloan

How does that saying go? “Be careful what you wish for; you might get a less-good version of it”? Yeah, something like that.

I tried the battery-powered Fun Factory LayaSpot back in 2013. In my review, I wrote: “The vibrations are too weak and surfacey to get me off… I really wish they would overhaul this vibe as a rechargeable, because I would buy the shit out of that.” Lo and behold, four years later, Fun Factory came out with the Laya II, a rechargeable upgrade on the LayaSpot.

This new model has the exact same shape and dimensions as its predecessor, so devotees of the classic will dig it. The Layas’ shape is one of the things I like best about them: the rounded tip can dig into my clit with the moderate pressure I like, and is broad enough to cover the whole head of my clit but pinpoint enough to stimulate only where I want it. It feels comfortable in my hand, which wraps around it ergonomically such that my index finger can rest over the controls. It’s really quite a well-designed vibrator, shape-wise.

Motor-wise, though, not so much. The reason I wanted a rechargeable version of this toy is that Fun Factory is known for their fantastic rechargeable motors. Their other rechargeables, like the G4 Patchy Paul and G5 Big Boss, are remarkably strong and rumbly – but they’re all big enough to be used internally, and I wanted a li’l clitoral vibe, since I use vibrators externally almost exclusively. The Laya II does not have the signature bomb-ass Fun Factory motor; it has, instead, something weaker, buzzier, and disappointing.

It’s possible they did this because of size constraints – you can’t fit the same mechanics into something little like the Laya II that you could fit into a bigger, penetrative vibe – but other companies have managed to make powerful, rumbly clit vibes. (The We-Vibe Tango, VeDO Bam, and Swan Wand Mini come to mind.) I believed that if anyone could make the next truly great clit vibe, the one that would rival the Tango at long last, it would be Fun Factory. I’m kind of bummed that that isn’t the case.

Don’t get me wrong: the Laya II’s motor is fine. It can get me off. I’d rate it as a 6 out of 10 on the buzzy-to-rumbly scale – not awful, but not my favorite. And any level of buzziness grates on me these days, frankly. Like my friend Epiphora says about rumbly vibes: “My clit perks up, longing for orgasm, becoming an active participant in the process. Using a buzzier vibe, my arousal level is more stagnant, less dynamic, and the masturbatory experience is just not as fun.” The Laya II’s vibrations feel great for a couple minutes, but then their buzziness numbs my clit, so I have to move the vibe around, thrust my accompanying dildo faster, and/or crank the power. That buzzy quality would be understandable in a $50 battery-operated vibe like the LayaSpot; it’s less reasonable in a $120 rechargeable like the Laya II.

These vibrations are also loud. They make a high-pitched, jangly clattering noise that reminds me simultaneously of bees and snakes. And they numb my hand. Like it’s been stung and/or bitten by a bee and/or a snake.

To add insult to injury, the Laya II has a super unintuitive controls scheme whereby hitting the “plus” button again after the third steady speed turns the toy to a vibration pattern. This has tripped me up multiple times: I keep thinking I can increase the vibration speed further (because my clit’s so numb that I need mega-powered vibrations at that point), but then accidentally switching to a pattern and fucking up my impending orgasm. Aaaargh!

It’s just so frustrating that Fun Factory put such a sad motor in a toy as otherwise lovely as the Laya II. It makes me want to crack this vibe open and replace its motor with one from the We-Vibe Tango. You know, if I knew a damn thing about electronics and could do that. Which, alas, I don’t and can’t.

 

Thank you so much to Fun Factory for sending me this toy to review! You can shop their toys at SheVibe, Peepshow, and Come As You Are.