The Singles Jukebox

The Bay on her back…

[Video][Website]
[6.00]

Micha Cavaseno: For anyone who’s been paying attention this year, a lot of the promotion for the patchy collection of songs via DJ Mustard’s 10 Summers and Iamsu!’s slumper of a cure for insomnia Sincerely Yours involved a “beef” over the origins of DJ Mustard’s innovations belonging to the Bay, and his supposed “failing’ to pay ‘proper’ homage” (Iamsu! was ON Mustard’s album though, so was this just a way to attract attention to two really terrible albums? Probably). So, the territoriality of Netta Brielle announcing — over the intro to a song produced by Iamsu! affiliate P-Lo and hyphy survivor Traxamillion, named and crafted after a single by Bay star Keak da Sneak’s old crew — that she’s “really from here tho” is a statement in itself. It’s an obvious reply to “2 On”, but she forgoes the more restrained vocal qualities of Tinashe for a slow-burn of vocal heat fueled by the turbulence of the beat. I doubt it’ll have the impact of its progenitor, but it’s more than a song — it’s a challenge to the false divide between Mustard and the rest of the scene that brought him to such heights. Also, this, and every song on the planet, but this specifically, demands a Sage The Gemini verse STAT.
[7]

Anthony Easton: This isn’t even 3xKrazy, unless she meant how many times she Xeroxed Beyonce’s “Crazy in Love” to make something this anemic. 
[3]

Alfred Soto: “Sweating your persona / You think you wanna” is the awkward rhyme of the year, honoring the awkward title. The rest is early ’00s R&B, down to the bleh LL Cool J interpolation.
[4]

Thomas Inskeep: I like the references here — the lyrics lifted from Mary Jane Girls’ “All Night Long” and the general mid-’90s R&B vibe — but I wish there were more here here, y’know what I mean? “3xKrazy” is alright, but very unexceptional. And that’s an awful title.
[5]

Crystal Leww: Netta Brielle kind of seems like the type of girl I’d want to get cosmos with at 7pm and gossip about every ex-boyfriend who ever called us crazy. She’s just so full of vibrant, manic, and colorful personality that I’m sure we’d get a little drunk and talk a little bit too much, you know?
[8]

Brad Shoup: The track’s immersive, with that medium-sized bassline blending well with the sequencing and the dissolute bells. When Brielle breaks off melismas, it’s not so great, but she can hold notes with some grain; nothing’s really crazy (at least, not in the grand tradition of the Bay), but it’ll get you home at night.
[6]

Jonathan Bogart: I detect g-funk somewhere in the DNA of this beat, which no doubt makes me more broadly sympathetic to it than I otherwise might be, because I am old like that. Or maybe I just haven’t been listening to enough great R&B. Either way its midtempo lope and skittering treble have me thoroughly charmed.
[7]

Katherine St Asaph: I know how unimaginative and/or imperceptive and/or gross the statement is, but after years of trendspotting this finally is another golden age of R&B, isn’t it?
[8]