Here's R. Kelly: "Sipping on coke and rum/I'm like, so what I'm drunk/It's the freaking weekend, baby/I'm about to have me some fun." And the song gets even more brilliantly juvenile soon after that: "I'm 'bout to take my key and stick it in the ignition," which, yes Beavis, is about something besides an automobile, although R. Kelly later mentions a Stretch Navigator with the requisite honeys and Cristal.
Here's Akon: "Nobody wanna see us together/Nobody thought we'd last forever/I feel I'm hoping and praying things between us gon' get better." And the song gets even more brilliantly mature soon after that (which is pretty cool coming from the dude who also came up with "Smack That"). Akon admits lying to the object of his affection and keeping secrets, but he then points out that he's always been quick to apologize and tells his "queen" how much he loves her and always will.
"Ignition (Remix)" is a song from a defiant man who doesn't seem to want forgiveness or peace. R. Kelly was 36 when he released it in 2003. "Don't Matter" is a song about wanting nothing but forgiveness and peace. Akon is 25.
And here's what's really fantastic about this exact moment in R&B and hip-hop: Akon is hardly the only young buck who's already all grown up. Lloyd, who's currently burning up the charts and setting himself up as an heir to Usher (who's still just 28), is 21. In his hot single "You," a collaboration with 24-year-old rapper Lil Wayne, Lloyd makes this plea to a potential gal pal: "I'm a playa, that is true/But I change the game for you" and then "Can I be for real?/This is how I feel/I'm in need of love/So let's dip up out of here/Oooh, you're just my type/Everything's so right/I just wanna chill/Let's dip up out of here." It's a pretty perfect pitch by a young fella who knows that being a man can get him where he wants a lot faster than being a punk.
And given that Lloyd's new album has been selling faster than the decidedly more thuggish Rich Boy's new album (one glance at both album covers pretty much sums up the difference in the marketing of these two dudes—the slick Lloyd, with a leather jacket and sunglasses, looks ready to take you out to dinner; the scowling Rich Boy, with his ripped chest, cross and tattoos, looks ready to knock you out), listeners are ready for the nice guy to win this fight. And the somewhat surprising success of Musiq Soulchild's album last week adds fuel to the idea that favoring bouquets over bling can simultaneously add lots of digits to your phone book and bank account.
The record industry has to be ecstatic that all these albums can move more than 100,000 units in the same week, and there's certainly a lot of room in the playground for these quite different young men. (Rich Boy is 23, while Musiq Soulchild is 29.)
But one record exec might be losing some ammo for his own rhymes. On "30 Something," Def Jam President and CEO Jay-Z calls out, without naming names, all the silly young'uns who just don't get it. It's a song about recognizing your youthful mistakes, making good life decisions and business decisions and appreciating the value of the finer things.
"I don't got the bright watch/I got the right watch," Jay-Z raps. "I don't buy out the bar/I bought the nightspot." And then later: "Yeah, we used to ball like that (like that)/Now we own the ball team, holla back (holla back)/Now I got black cards, good credit and such/Baby boy, 'cause I'm all grown up."
My age is almost right in between that of Lloyd and the 38-year-old Jay-Z, but I'm still older than 30. So in spirit, I feel much closer to Jay-Z, and not just because I'm probably about to buy an apartment that's blocks away from his NBA arena. And I really hear what he's saying in "30 Something." But I now have to admit that his raps about "diapers" and "young boys" who "ain't got enough stamps" in their passport to roll with him and how "everything you want to do, I did all that by the age of 2" looks pretty silly now.
Look at the charts, Jay—the young boys do get it: 30 might have been the new 20 when you released that song last year, but 20's the new 20 right now.