“Girls Around the World”
by Lloyd, ft. Lil Wayne
(IG/Universal)
This melting Creamsicle of a record is so immaculately constructed
that its craft renders itself invisible, each part meshing into the
other till there is only an exquisite whole. But it’s still worth
celebrating those parts. There’s Lloyd’s falsetto, so cocoa-buttery
that the first time I heard it, it took till the second “I just wanna
be your man” to realize it wasn’t actually a woman. There’s the title
phrase, embedded in the background—Chubb Rock, I think. There’s
the sliding-block synth-strings that one-up “Sensual Seduction” by
cutting its signature into bite-sized chunks. There’s Lil Wayne
concisely rewriting Rakim into a come-on as sly as Lloyd is doe-eyed
sincere. And there’s the source of those Rakim quotes, the eternal
“Ashley’s Roachclip” break that Coldcut used to remix “Paid in Full”
even deeper into the annals. The secret, though, is the absolutely
guileless, wussed-out way Lloyd repeats the word “song” after the
chorus’s killer line, “Can’t get you off my mind/You’re like my
favorite song”—the most shameless pussy-tease this side of Prince
doing “Do Me Baby” or “Adore.”
“Cold Shoulder”
by Adele
(XL, UK)
A few months ago, Adele had a big British hit with “Chasing
Pavements,” proof that just because a god-awful-maudlin ballad isn’t as
horrifying as Leona Lewis doesn’t mean you ever need to hear it. This
follow-up is a different story. Adele still evokes Shirley Bassey too
much for her own good, but instead of belting and wailing here, she’s
scratchier and friskier, buoyed by the track’s breakbeat. The words are
better (funnier, meaner), too, which helps. Advantage: faster tempos,
as usual in R&B from England (and elsewhere).
“Be a Nigger Too”
by Nas
(Columbia)
This sounds cynical. Not disgusted or sly or deadpan or sneaky or
confrontational—just cynical. Nas’s great ex-rival Jay-Z gets
away with these kinds of singsong choruses because he sounds so
self-amused, but if Nas has a self-amused bone in his body he’s never
exposed it on record. Besides, it’s hard to imagine what could be the
appeal of a chorus taken from a sickly Oscar Mayer ad jingle. Anyway,
he changed the title of his new album to Nas, so this kind of
isn’t the title track anymore. Boo-hoo.
“Golden Cage (Fred Falke Remix)”
by the Whitest Boy Alive
>(Modular)
The most Camaro-ready synth lick of the year so far, even counting
the Quiet Village album; or, “Son of ‘Digital Love'”—for this
week at least, the number-one son.