dot_fennel | [music] NELLY - Sweat and Suit (Universal)

Not a Nelly fan, but I had to borrow and play them once, mostly to see if (not having read anything about the double-release except the titles) I could tell the difference between the two records.

And okay, I can. Sweat is the Jock Jams record, opening with one of those freaky songs that's supposed to get people worked up at the club or the stadium but sounds frothingly more grandiose, as though its use at a coronation were the one concession made by court advisors who convinced Nelly to declare himself merely God's chosen monarch, and not an actual god-king made flesh.

Suit is the R&B crossover album, which I enjoyed more except for the desperate need to skip ahead that I developed around the third verse of every song. Which is too bad, since it often took that long for me to realize how bizarre a given song was-- like how "Pretty Toes" is indeed all about Nelly's foot fetish, or how the familiar-sounding sample in "N Dey Say" is oh god not Luther Vandross or Lionel Richie or whatever I would have guessed at first, but rather... Spandau Ballet.