6/7/2011, imma drop that body work / fuck my brains out double single (TERIUS NASH aka THE-DREAM, LOVE IV: anticipation and adoration)

lol alex when u first heard 'living a lie' did u also shed a little tear imagining what nivea would think when she found out about terius and rihanna's shock affair

not every song in the world is directly autobiographical

that's clearly what he's suggesting by saying a song about your ex tearfully begging you for mindblowing sex is kinda distasteful coming from a recently divorced dude

like, I dig this song but I don't feel the pretend those who think its piggish are being absurd.

the need to pretend, i mean

yeah but my point is the "recently divorced" alarm is just being activated arbitrarily here, like is there some milian-specific detail i'm missing in this?

and alex even if you wanna go there how does "i don't need another bitch to lie to me" not fit in with your vague bitter rationalization etc anyway?

max otm

but i think ppl kinda demand piggishness in their modern R&B

or at least artists think we do

my other point is how is it any more "piggish" than he's ever been since the very beginning once you take a couple of raunchy couplets out of the equation, this is just beyond superficial stuff

Jeez. Ok. I concede, I was wrong and I shouldn't have read it in. I'd probably find it vaguely distasteful context-regardless, and on reflection I probably find Abyss even less pleasant. None of this means that I don't enjoy them as songs, and I have no desire to be the voice of ridiculous moral outrage or whatever.

It was a vague impression and I stupidly decided to defend my rxn when the idea that the story as written/sung/narrated has weird gender overtones was declared to be prudish and laughable, etc. But yeah, it's not 'reprehensible', I should have picked my words more carefully. Thread can continue along normal course now, sorry for the interruption.

i think you can be kinda bummed/grossed out in his transformation from chubby, unlikely loverman to sweaty las vegas sleazeball without it being moral outrage

actually, listening to FMBO, i dont really see how this is all that piggish, allowing for some stupid/juvenille boasts, though i expect those kinds of lyrics from the dream - i mean, isnt this what he does most consistently? its not as vulgarly/crudely personal as say, r kelly might do. if i didnt know about his public breakup, and tbh i barely do - he/this doesnt have as much celeb appeal as say if the song was sung by chris brown a few years back - i dont think i would read it that way.

or it could just be that i really like both songs so dont care

fwiw i had a kid right around the same time as Nash/Milian and my general mindstate then of "how the fuck do you even think of creeping or walking out on somebody at that moment in your life" was the main source of my take on "Make Up Bag" and as the instigator of that whole line of conversation i will say nothing about these new songs strikes me as beyond his usual relatively inoffensive skeeviness.

xxxp Last word on this.

There's pretty much nothing on Love/Hate that's has the same sort of tone. "I Luv Your Girl" got cited a couple of times, and while picking up someone else's girlfriend isn't like...gentlemanly...or whatever, but what was triggering my sensor or whatever only really surfaces in Nikki, Love vs Money Part 2, Nikki Part 2 and Abyss. Oh, and Hater.

I'm not saying women aren't objectified in his other songs, but normally they're being wooed or he's having sex with them, or being admired, or whatever. They're either sex objects or objects of affection. Just....when he gets angry/dismissive/vitriolic about women it feels uglier somehow.

But again, FMBO does this less than the others, maybe, and I really like all of the above songs (except for Hater). It was an observation about tone and content, not quality, because I like FMBO better than most of Love King.

from chubby, unlikely loverman to sweaty las vegas sleazeball

good career summary

personally i just find laziness and carelessness way uglier than angry/dismissive/vitriolic at the end of the day

if he's a pig here then he's a sprightly attentive one for a change and not the useless fat fuck of 'make up bag' and 'panties to the side' or the guy who trashed 'february love' by breaking off for a hatercentric tirade about his taxes and owning his publishing or w/e

yeah i mean anybody who says "ahem, this guys a douche, no thanks" won't get a cross word out of me, but "FMBO" is the kind of "big ol' butt" style, heavily detailed and absurd "i'm a douche and loving it" shit that I'm not above enjoying. I don't know if it ranks with my favorite dream songs, but I'll take uptempo-and-nasty over the more indulgent slow jams of late

also it's not a great tune or anything but i have much love for 'hater' and its succinctly otm depiction of the evil side of wanting someone

"hit that shit like a parked car" one of his finest lines too

all the Prince comparisons had me looking forward to another "Fast Car"/"Yamaha" jam and then i felt let down by those "Beat It" drums

kind of novel for him to put out these connected songs in advance instead of waiting until the LP to run them together, but i'm not really digging the transition between them

it's more Ready For The World than Prince imo

yeah i mean anybody who says "ahem, this guys a douche, no thanks" won't get a cross word out of me, but "FMBO" is the kind of "big ol' butt" style, heavily detailed and absurd "i'm a douche and loving it" shit that I'm not above enjoying. I don't know if it ranks with my favorite dream songs, but I'll take uptempo-and-nasty over the more indulgent slow jams of late

― da croupier, Wednesday, 8 June 2011 18:48 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

otm

The Prince comparisons always seem kind off to me, as with RTTW I kinda see The-Dream as one of those blouse wearing linn drum enthusiasts who came in his wake (if an especially ambitious) rather than a callback to the original article. Even on Love/Hate his perspective was more typically R&B assman, like ray parker jr.

I think this guy is more "Digital Display" and "Love You Down" than "When Doves Cry" or "Raspberry Beret."

xpost

the Prince thing doesn't make sense in other words

crossposted with croup

the problem, though, is that i don't think dream finds anything absurd about filming your girlfriend crying with mascara running down her face as she gets on her knees and pleads with you for one last fuck. it's totally straight faced.

xpost

let's not go crazy, there's clearly a ton of very direct Prince influence in his whole catalog, even if it doesn't need to be a critical reference point as often as it is

well whether he realizes the absurdity or not, he's the kind of guy who bothers to follow a sex jam with "take a shower/take a shower/meet me in half an hour" so god bless him

xpost some dude, I wouldn't be referencing Ready For The World and '80s Ray Parker Jr. if I didn't think Prince was a valid critical reference point. I just think it's further removed than a simple "he's like Prince"

As dirty as Prince is, he's not the sleazo that RP Jr is – in the best sense.

my "let's not go crazy" was directed at Alfred's "the Prince thing doesn't make sense" craziness

I overstated it. Like croup, I hear more RFTW and second-tier eighties R&B (we haven't even mentioned Maze + Beverly) than Prince, in part because Nash recycles his own audio/aural tricks.

um hey i don't suppose anyone remembers that video that went round for a bit a couple of years ago, it was like some random guy coming on 80s public access tv doing this totally straight heartfelt prince tribute act and he was all dressed up? the song turned out to be pretty rad and i think the chorus was like "her name is [silly complicated name like letishikitarita]"

sorry but i've been trying to find it for like 20 minutes

let's not go crazy, there's clearly a ton of very direct Prince influence in his whole catalog, even if it doesn't need to be a critical reference point as often as it is

― Letters From Iwhiney Gima (some dude), Wednesday, June 8, 2011 2:04 PM (25 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

actually, LET'S GO CRAZY

(like the prince song)

("lets go crazy")

i remember it illuminated a lot for me about Ne-Yo when he picked a block of videos on BET and most of the Prince/MJ was Diamonds & Pearls/Dangerous era -- i think The-Dream's reference points are definitely more first generation Minneapolis sound by comparison but there's definitely some of that late '80s stuff in the mix too

He's totally a sleaze, but both of these get full support. Now why didn't Love King ever come out on vinyl?

And continuing the Dream vs. Prince things, yeah Dream is an asshole, totally misogynistic, aggressive whereas Prince just loved the sex. Even his early 90's more aggressive stuff seemed to basically just worship the ass. My wife pointed this out to me once.

what's gross about FMBO is how after a highly public break up he's written a song about how no matter how much of a jerk is, his ex-girlfriend is in thrall to his awesome magical penis. i mean, it's a good song, but it's still all sorts of gross

― Alex in Montreal

alex has recanted, but i'm still slightly bothered (though, as i said way upthread, i got over my initial squeamishness pretty quickly). given the dreamer's insistence on his own controversial "honesty" and the crassly public nature of contemporary celebrity, i think it's disingenuous to treat this as though it's completely unrelated the events of the artist's recent life. of course the song isn't necessarily autobiographical, but he's pushing buttons nonetheless.

it would be nice if when terius was listening to prince ... he took notes on how to be a freak without being a pig

― max

max and matt2's points about prince's sexual excesses OTM. prince's lyrics may be a bit grotesque ("masturbating with a magazine"), but they're generally focused on his desire and her allure. terry's only using her desperate, panting desire to paint a picture of his own complete sexual dominance. it's not like this kind of boastful excess is unique in dude's career, quite the opposite, but sometimes things work for you, sometimes they don't. i mean, shit, i dig "panties to the side"...

oh noes, no strings sex! odious! reprehensible! literally have no idea what u prudes are moaning about

in particular the notion that this song makes him come off poorer "as a human being" than the trite plodding idiocy of 'make up bag' or god idk a hundred other little things over the years is just laughable

― r|t|c, Wednesday, June 8, 2011 12:45 PM (3 hours ago)

thank you

i've never been too offended by the pig-talk cos none of it seemed even a little bit real to me. i'm sure he gets laid plenty but idk, the guy's kind of unattractive.

oh wtg goole, now you made dream feel bad

've never been too offended by the pig-talk cos none of it seemed even a little bit real to me. i'm sure he gets laid plenty but idk, the guy's kind of unattractive.

OTM. So is Ne-Yo.

what do you mean "real"? the talk is the same regardless of his PUA stats, right? do you mean that it's in character, an artistic device that says nothing about terry's actual feelings & attitudes? maybe so, but it can still be unpleasant.

or hilarious, or sexy, or w/e.

His swinishness grates when music and arrangements fail him and he looks like another wobbly-voiced asshole. I prefer the swinishness when it's encased in ballad form, cuz he tends to self-absorption (i.e. what she is doing to him) instead of lashing out.

there's sweet exceptions ("February Love").

i mean with a lot of other singers who say this kind of shit it either seems like a crazy story they are getting into, or it has some basis in life. with T i just get the feeling that he's basically lying to me. i'm like, fuck out of here man that didn't happen. i don't know why, just, all the women he sings about feel a bit 'canadian girlfriend' to me.

all the women he sings about feel a bit 'canadian girlfriend' to me.

lol

the funniest/grossest/least believable aspect of FMBO is when she "turns around and gets on her knees"