Schnipper’s Slept On
- story Matthew Schnipper
Each Tuesday, FADER editor Matthew Schnipper highlights an underappreciated recent release he thinks we need to know about. This week it’s Christina Milian’s It’s About Time album. Listen to the album’s song “I Need More,” buy the album and read Schnipper’s thoughts on it after the jump.
Christina Milian f. The-Dream, “Chameleon” MP3
- story Matthew Schnipper
This song has no hi hats. The intro with Christina Milian humming doesn’t have her gasps for air edited out. There are people yelling instead of big drums. I can be the biggest in the room, like an elephant/ I can be the quiestest, shhh, irrelevant. She whispers that last bit, then whispers on and off for the rest of the song. “Chameleon,” produced by Milian’s fiance (and final Vibe cover co-star) The-Dream has the super sparse skeleton of Cassie’s “Me N U”, and with Cassie going beefier in her song selection, maybe the upcoming Christina Milian album will further the sub-genre of simple, creepy R&B so deeply slumbering.
Download: Christina Milian f. The-Dream, “Chameloen”
Freeload: The-Dream f. R. Kelly, “Kelly’s 12-Play (Remix)” MP3
- story THE FADER
We must confess, The-Dream told us he had written “Kelly’s 12-Play” before we ever heard it. He told us this in a kinda noisy bar so we didn’t fully grasp the concept—we were convinced it was a song he had written for Kellz, not about him. Because, like, why would an R&B dude sing about doing it to another R&B dude’s late-career album? Isn’t that kind of weird? Wouldn’t Dream be freaked that his girl would be thinking about Kellz mid-”engagement”? Then we finally heard it and understood its greatness, but still felt it BEGGED for a Kellz version, because singing about doing it to his own album is basically the most Kellzian thing we can think of at this point. And, voila! It’s Kellz singing about himself in a Dream voice. Now, question three: When is this track gonna get the Charlie Kaufman treatment? Let’s go full pedal Möbius strip, dudes.
Download: The-Dream f. R. Kelly, “Kelly’s 12-Play (Remix)”
