"Love King"
It may have been a while since we last had a solo album from The-Dream but like a full-force hurricane filled with love and cooing vocal chords, he has returned with “Love King”. While his collaboration on songs for Rihanna, Justin Bieber and Beyonce have held us over for the time being, the new collection of summer love tunes from Terius “The-Dream” Nash is not an album R&B lovers should pass up.
While this newest album has tracks laid down that are similar to the love serenades we know well from the artist, it goes to show that you shouldn’t fix something if it isn’t broken. He gives listeners an array of what he already has done, sugary music to give you a toothache, with a mix of fresh ballad tracks that so many of us music fans have missed in the industry where ‘autotune’ has quickly taken reigns. “Love King” is quite the project to send The-Dream out with a bang if he so chooses to.
The singer-songwriter has toyed with the idea of “Love King” being his last solo album, according to his interview with Ms. Drama TV. That being said, his retirement as a singer would not change the legacy he would be leaving his fans with as he scores wonderfully on this familiar spin of love, sex and jealousy. Should he choose to bow out of his solo career, the singer stated that he would use his music as ‘a soundtrack if he could create a movie in the same vein as Purple Rain”, according the Hip-Hop Wired.
But let’s not fast-forward and stray from what he has left us in the present. His first single off the release, “Make Up Bag”, tells the world the all too familiar tale of a man returning home to his significant other with a strange scent of perfume on his collar. His solution? Sweep the incident under the rug with the purchase of a new designer purse to the tune of five stacks. The lyrics hold the man in question in high regard for thinking on his toes and wooing his woman the best way he knows how: with love making and money spending.
On songs like this, there is clearly no doubt that the repetition of the four words, “the make up bag” are iced over with the melodies and power of what happens when pop meets R&B meets synths to the extreme as with “F.I.L.A.” and “Priceless”. Ballads like “February Love” are heart-felt and truly show the expanse of his vocals even over the light tickling of piano keys in the back. The Washington Post’s review of “Love King” puts it best with the simplicity of saying that “for all The-Dream lacks as a lyricist, he compensates for it as a sonic architect”. Regardless of the repetition reminiscent of R Kelly and the overly sweet serenades, the beats and rhythm of each track on “Love King” goes without parallel.
