“Certain artists have taken the emotions of it to create themselves, but they can’t do that record.” “Records like ‘ Fancy,’ they can’t steal,” he said in that same interview about escaping the “basic Dream” sound. The-Dream knows not every producer could pull a move like that off. Its centerpiece, the nearly seven-minute-long, practically bass-free “Fancy,” is so indulgent that when an accordion comes in after the lyric, “In Paris seducing me,” - where “Paris” is pretentiously pronounced pair-REE - you can almost glimpse a stereotypical French busker: mustache, beret, horizontal-striped shirt. The next four songs, from the brutal, two-part title track to the open-veined “Right Side of My Brain,” form a vivid breakup suite. That’s where everything falls apart, at least for the couple. Soon, however, a plot emerges from a chance encounter in the club (“Rockin’ That Shit”) that evolves into a more serious relationship (“Take U Home 2 My Mama”). Money plays out like an EP of straightforward, steamy R&B, one where the carnal and the romantic are so intertwined that a song about ruining a woman’s freshly-styled hairdo via vigorous sex (“Sweat It Out”) builds to a harmonized refrain - “I know you like the love we make” - that’s unquestionably gorgeous.
Money, The-Dream doesn’t just fine-tune his masterful knowledge of verse-chorus songcraft, he uses it as a jumping off point for a full-length that’s full of creative risks and turns.
Plenty of its songs still have Nash’s signature “dumb parts” (read: sticky, wordless refrains) - one of them, from the song “Fancy,” would even form the basis of a future Fabolous and Drake track. But on Love Vs. Money tracks the rise, fall and denouement of a relationship defined by a struggle between the record’s two titular elements. While it’s not explicitly a concept album, Love Vs.
We’re basically in there just musically jerking off. “Putting a bell here, a snap here, a whistle here, keeping it in the same key or taking the key up, turning the end of one song into another song. “Trick and I go all over the place,” he said in a 2012 interview about the creative process. The-Dream, Tricky and their cohort Carlos “Los Da Mystro” McKinney merge Atlanta hip-hop - primarily snap music and proto-trap - with electronic music via lush synth pads (check the pillowy chords that open “Right Side of My Brain”) and flourishes of baroque music provided by acoustic instruments (check the Spanish-style guitar licks and timpani hits that accent the last 90 seconds of that same song). Money is a more carefully considered whole than Love Hate, which he wrote and recorded in eight days flat. In sound, scope and narrative arc, Love Vs. Instead, he followed the path paved by ‘70s auteurs like Isaac Hayes or Randy Newman: allow others to make hits out of your catchiest songs while devoting most of your attention to ambitious solo albums. Money feels like the moment he realized that his unique voice, while clear and capable, was never going to carry massive singles on its own, like Usher’s or Chris Brown’s.
“But there’s certain shit they can’t steal from me.” Love Vs. “I noticed that people can steal certain stuff,” he said in a recent interview, looking back on on what he described as a move away from a “basic Dream” sound for Love Vs. But it also felt like a bit of a grab bag at times, so he aimed for something more singular on his follow-up. The-Dream’s 2007 debut, Love Hate, contains some truly great R&B music, dabbling in Prince homages (“Fast Car”), psychedelic slow jams (“Falsetto”) and punchy pop (the Rihanna-assisted “Livin’ A Lie”) while Top 20 singles “Shawty Is Da Shit” and “I Luv Your Girl” fit comfortable into the sounds of mid-2000s radio rap. The 100 Greatest Choruses of the 21st Century