NE-YO v THE DREAM

it's a great club track - it feels weird to listen to it after "kellys 12 play" but i always thought that it was equally as good as it was weird

it's so slooowwww! and it begins badly but by the time it gets into the the-dream-as-barbershop-ensemble stuff i really like it.

hey why did ne-yo win this? im not saying this because i think he's the worse of the two (which i do), but rather there seems to be alot of people on ilm who like the-dream, like alot. i was surprised to see it on so many "best albums of the year so far" lists so i downloaded it and now it's on mine. is it just me and there are only six of you, or do the lot just prefer ne-yo?

a lot of ppl jumped on around the time of the year end polls. before that it was just a core group. read thru the thread

i wonder how many ne-yo voters have heard dream's album

― deej, Friday, March 14, 2008 8:44 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

then again, there's a lot of critics who got really excited when ne-yo got snivelly on Gentleman.

yeah back when this poll was started dream's first album had only been out for three months, had little to know press or promo etc - most ppl jumped on way later and im pretty sure he'd win this poll if it was held again

well yeah this thread basically is ilm's only the-dream thread, and the poll was started over a year ago, before LVM and only shortly after L/H. so thats why the now-outdated poll results undervalue terius' supporters here

xpost or what jordan said

i dunno...i'm not 100% sure the-dream would win if this poll was held today. he might, but it's not a lock.

uh-oh...!

well yeah this thread basically is ilm's only the-dream thread, and the poll was started over a year ago, before LVM and only shortly after L/H. so thats why the now-outdated poll results undervalue terius' supporters here

cool, i hadn't noticed. what are people thoughts on the first album, btw? i haven't heard it.

yeah you're might be right - dream would probs get more than 6 votes at least

year of the gent is good but it's crushed by l/h and lvm - it might have better singles come to think of it

what are people thoughts on the first album, btw? i haven't heard it.

― samosa gibreel, Monday, May 18, 2009 5:50 PM (14 seconds ago) Bookmark

Skipping 1007 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

short answer: lots of ppl on ilm think it's a classic - i think it finished in the top 15 in the end of the year poll

All other thoughts I have about "Let Me See The Booty" are crowded out by wondering why Lil Jon keeps on shouting "LOUIE!"

"Love Vs. Money"
"Love Vs. Money: Part 2"

I'm hoping these flow into one another, the segue being announced by a sudden irruption/eruption of melodramatic strings.

― Tim F, Saturday, January 31, 2009 12:26 AM (3 months ago)

the production effect they do here, that "zipper" shit, is so great. tim almost called it

for the record I said the-dream originally, dunno who the other five were

All other thoughts I have about "Let Me See The Booty" are crowded out by wondering why Lil Jon keeps on shouting "LOUIE!"

― Tim F, Monday, May 18, 2009 5:55 PM (Yesterday)

this is an intriguing mystery isn't it

i love 'let me see the booty' but had to retag it so it's not at the end of the album for this to continue. there's an ikonika mix out there which starts off with it!

"louis" as in louis vuitton, surely?

the-dream would win now, and then in six months or whatever when ne-yo releases an album as good as YOTG he'd win.

i am talking to terius on thu btw. i am going to talk to him about bobbie gentry.

jealousss

you should tell him to read this thread

ask him how his working relationship with los da maestro is different than it with tricky and if he thinks los doesn't get enough credit for his songs

what are people thoughts on the first album, btw? i haven't heard it.

― samosa gibreel, Monday, May 18, 2009 5:50 PM (14 seconds ago) Bookmark

Personally, I think it's better than LvM - the kind of album where if I listen to one song, I'll find myself listening to the whole thing without even realizing it

See, for me Love Vs Money is like that... whereas the debut is spots of greatness but not a realized whole.

yeah youre rong tho

"ilxor" wrong? shocking!

On the key epic L v M tracks you get a sense that you're listening to a unified harmonious concept album, but that's really not the case. In this it reminds me of FS/LS, except that with FS/LS the tracks that break the mood are in the second half so you don't notice that as much.

L/H doesn't have that pretense but it's the more consistent listen - there's not a track on ther I don't love now.

you should tell him to read this thread

― oj da hoosman (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, May 19, 2009 9:15 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ask him how his working relationship with los da maestro is different than it with tricky and if he thinks los doesn't get enough credit for his songs

― oj da hoosman (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, May 19, 2009 9:17 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

lex plz do both of these things

xp Yeah, I even came around to "Mama", which I had deleted at one point.

yeah, i was talking to j0rdan earlier about a justified/lh -> fsls/lvm parallel

Except that L/H is much more consistent than Justified I think - basically Justin has never done an album that consistent.

in what sense does LVM not work as a concept album for you, tim?

Well, sure, it works as a concept album in the same way that L/H and almost every R Kelly album ever does.

But my point was less "hey this isn't a concept album" and more that when I'm listening to "Fancy" droop down into "Right Side Of My Brain" I can easily forget that the whole album isn't conceived on quite that grand and melodramatic a scale.

I mean, I like "Sweat It Out" heaps, but it's working in an entirely different register.

Actually the album is kinda like Donna Summer's Once Upon A Time in reverse.

(this would apply for "Mr Yeah" too if not for the awesome little coda)

"Fancy" droop down into "Right Side Of My Brain" I can easily forget that the whole album isn't conceived on quite that grand and melodramatic a scale.

i agree with tim here - in many ways i want to say that l/h isn't better than lvm because it doesn't have something quite like the "love vs money" -> "right side of my brain" stretch, and yet i also want to say that lvm doesn't stand up to his debut because the rest of the album isnt as good as that stretch. to me it's like, there are all these incredible songs floating in orbit around the more incredible concept suite, and it gives me this weird dissonance and it kind of pisses me off tbh because i can't decide whether it's okay that the rest of the album is only an "A" compared to the "A+" 'concept stretch'. obviously lvm is far and away my #1 of the year but when comparing it to l/h i have a hard time taking a stand. i need some time but if i had to use the left side of my brain (forgive me, i'm drunk) i would probably say that l/h is still better. but then again it's like trying to compare everything to a masterpiece so who even knows, it's not really fair. i love them both and A T L A NT A G A is where i stay imo.

well for me the "concept stretch" of LVM is 'love vs money' right thru to the end, so that's half the album there, and it works as in album of two halves: first half of what you'd expect done brilliantly, then it suddenly lurches into the really high-flown shit. obv got loads of love for L/H but there's no question in my mind that LVM is superior, both as an "album" and a collection of tracks.

"ilxor" wrong? shocking!

― autogoon crew for coldplay (The Reverend)

:'(

B-b-b-but lex agrees with me!

... are you guys gonna tell him or shall i?

i agree with tim here - in many ways i want to say that l/h isn't better than lvm because it doesn't have something quite like the "love vs money" -> "right side of my brain" stretch, and yet i also want to say that lvm doesn't stand up to his debut because the rest of the album isnt as good as that stretch. to me it's like, there are all these incredible songs floating in orbit around the more incredible concept suite, and it gives me this weird dissonance and it kind of pisses me off

otm. My attention drifts at midpoint, and those spongy synths on "Walking On The Moon" really annoy me (Kanye draws me back in, just barely). I love the first album, but forcing The-Dream to use their "hey!"s and unexpected harmonies over the course of a purported concept album exposed their weaknesses in a way that the weak tracks on L/H didn't.

As someone who finally came around to L/H after listening to LVM more, I think that LVM works more as a concept album if you don't already know The-Dream pretty well from his first album. It concisely sums up who the guy is so that the song suite actually means something in the context of the album. It's not as important that dude's got feeeeeeeelings as it is that THIS dude has feelings, the Kelly protege working extra hard for his seeming effortlessness. And so it's satisfying when he kind of collapses conceptually, but you don't need him to exert the effort if you're already familiar with him. (And I'm starting to agree that a few of the peaks on L/H really don't match up with anything on LVM for immediacy, but I like the LVM counterparts more anyway.)

Unrelated, is it just me or is he quietly singing along underneath Mariah in "My Love"? It sounds like he's reading her lines along with her, or maybe it really is an Autotune effect...

yeah, that might well be the case if you've come to it that way round.

i mean, this argument could go on forever - it's obviously subjective in the extreme as to how we as listeners bridge the gap in conceptual intensity that jordan talks about, to be able to read the album in its entirety. more often than not that sort of thing generally results in either just accepting half a product (and glossing over the rest), or conferring an intentionality onto the artist where there was none before, or straight-up rewiring his or her shit even. so yknow, while i do absolutely continue to believe in lvm as a concept album i'm also willing to concede the concept concerned as being somewhat more to do with me being so 3008 rather than, for instance, the-dream ever agreeing with me that 'walking on the moon' is necessarily shitty as a self-satisfied monied prelude, or with how i see him, or whatever.

i do prefer love/hate though, much in the same way that ne-yo will always be the correct answer to the thread question.

kinda wanna take issue with the idea that the album with (or that was supposed to have) the full title of love me all summer / hate me all winter ISN'T a concept album, but i know what yall mean and i'm sure yall catch my drift by now too.

(the other thing is that sheer consistency is often more of an invitation to scry conceptuality at play than it is with just razzy rhetoric and the odd nod, imo.)

btw, why with the bobbie gentry lex?

(this would apply for "Mr Yeah" too if not for the awesome little coda)

Do you mean the part with the "* on my ella" refrain? I think that little section might be my favorite 15 seconds of anything The-Dream has done, ever

It does have that full title on the album cover, which I didn't even know until I actually bought Love/Hate. Though I don't think I could tell you which songs on there are summer and which are winter.

conferring an intentionality onto the artist where there was none before, or straight-up rewiring his or her shit even

Pretty much guilty as charged, I suppose, though it doesn't bother me to rewire for my own purposes since for me part of the fun is in cramming the album into the (usually somewhat pat) narrative I've made for it (and I do have to legitimately like the stuff first before I rewire it). But as soon as I get to "Put It Down" I feel pretty much in for the whole album, as opposed to L/H where I tend to skip around, starting on a different track each time and letting it play out (and usually stopping before "Livin' a Lie" for some reason, even though I like that song).

Wednesday, May 27:

NBC: Late Night With Jimmy Fallon: The-Dream, the Roots (house band)

he's terrible live

alright welp that clears that up see you guys l8r

http://i43.tinypic.com/359cosy.jpg

haha