He has hits as an artist, songwriter, and producer, but five whole years went by before we heard new music from The-Dream. Then, in December 2018, he dropped his epic, 40-track project Ménage à Trois: Sextape Vol. 1, 2, 3. What he delivered was a collection of sultry R&B love songs that could be considered to "baby-making music." Who knew that nearly nine months later he'd been belting out two of those songs for NPR's Tiny Desk series.
"It's kinda hard to sing like that with the daylight out," The-Dream said during his session. He shared two of his Sextape tracks, "Bedroom" and "Back In Love," along with his song "I Luv Your Girl" from his debut studio album, Love Hates. In an interview with Billboard, The-Dream talked about his influence on R&B culture and how he changed things up from being "sappy."
"I grew up on Jodeci and R. Kelly," he said. "So for me, there was still a certain coolness to R&B at that particular time. Before them, there was Bobby Brown and so on, but there was an era there from 2003 to 2006 where R&B was just considered this super sappy: 'Let’s make love, we’re never f*cking.' I just said, 'Hey, I’m going to do an album.' I decided to be an artist to fill that huge void where nobody knew what to say at the time."
Check out his Tiny Desk feature and let us know if you think The-Dream is responsible for bringing "coolness" back to R&B.
