Image via Complex Original
Only eight albums managed to sell more than 10 million copies during the Aughts. Two were made by Eminem. Norah Jones had one. So did Nsync and Britney Spears. But only one black artist managed to go diamond during that time: Usher Raymond IV. The album was Confessions. Featuring production by Lil Jon, Just Blaze, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, and, most importantly, Jermaine Dupri, Usher's fourth solo album was hailed as his best work yet. It was seen not only as musical feat, but a marketing one, as well. The theme of the album, tailored for Usher by Jermaine Dupri, was of a man confessing wrongs he's committed while in a committed relationship. Seeing as how Mr. Raymond was in a two-year relationship with Ms. Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas from TLC, the buying public thought this was art imitating life.
Gossip aside, the real reason Confessions blew up was the stellar song selection. Out of the first seven tracks, four were top 10 singles. The album was so stacked, some songs that didn't even make the album, like "My Boo" with Alicia Keys, were number one hits.
To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the release of Confessions, some COMPLEX staffers picked their favorite of those songs and wrote about what made them so dope.
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"Burn"
Produced by: Jermaine Dupri
"Burn" has an interesting history. Sonically, it sounds a helluvalot like "U Got It Bad," which had a video that starred Chilli, the woman who he ended up having a two-year relationship with. It's almost as of "Burn" is the book end to their history, with Usher choosing to let their relationship flame out, not unlike a a campfire that's on it's last legs. The (R&B-loving) world definitely loved seeing these two together, and their relationship played out through much of Usher's career in the early 2000s, so it made sense to have him throw this one out there to give it proper closure. It also bolstered what Usher laid out with Confessions, truly bearing his soul for the masses.
What's deep is, I could care less about all of that. I'm legit a fan of this track for one thing: Tom DuBois doing a perfect rendition of "Burn" on the "Tom, Sarah, and Usher" episode of The Boondocks, with Tom pouring his heart out to his wife (who kicked him out of the house after catching Usher's eye at dinner). Everything from shouting "CAR!" in the middle of the street during their choreography to Tom and Sarah's mid-song phone call to his "you see my chest!"... it's comedy, and really sends up how corny these R&B videos can be. And truthfully, Huey was right: it could've been Omarion. Thanks, Usher, for indirectly making me a fan of a song I normally wouldn't fuck with by being a random target of The Boondocks.
—khal
"Throwback"
Produced by: Just Blaze
Just Blaze sampled the wistful opening section of Dionne Warwick's "You're Gonna Need Me" for the aptly-named "Throwback," an easy Confessions highlight. On an album that sounded decidedly modern—its biggest single, after all, was the then-groundbreaking R&B/crunk anthem "Yeah!"—"Throwback" was a single purposefully retro moment. Warwick's original shifted moods as the song developed. One moment, her confident singing was undercut by the yearning backgrounds; the next moment, they supported her, steadied her resolve. Usher's song, while referencing R&B history, is structurally modern. He abandons that evolution of feeling, focusing on a momentary rush, looping the anguished loss of the original's intro, tightening it to a snapshot of a nerve's single tremor. One of Just Blaze's strengths has always been his drums, which amplify the original sample's surging urgency. Here, he increases the tempo, a musical heartbeat quickening its pace. —David Drake
"Yeah!"
Produced by: Lil Jon
One dark night in late 2003, Usher murdered crunk music. Or, more accurately, Lil Jon enthusiastically sacrificed crunk music while Usher—excuse me, Ursher—stood over its bloody corpse screaming “Yeah!” The partners-in-crime had set out to craft a cutting-edge club banger that would make Confessions seem in touch with “the streets,” but in the process they curb-stomped a wildly-influential genre that had spent more than a decade growing up in the Southern rap underground.
At the time, it seemed unlikely that Lil Jon would be the architect behind the biggest pop hit of 2004. His recent output with The East Side Boyz was refreshingly raucous compared to the cotton-candy R&B of Murder Inc. and sing-songy bounce of Nelly that dominated pop radio. Underground hits like “Bia Bia” and “Put Yo Hood Up” were mosh pit music, epic beds of bass punctuated by his instructional screaming: “IF YOU SCARED TO THROW IT UP, GET THE FUCK OUT THE CLUB!” But against all odds, “Get Low”—a song that references ejaculation and scrotum sweat in the chorus—became a #2 pop hit in 2003, turning Lil Jon’s cheeky brand of aggressive Atlanta club music into a national craze.
“Yeah!” is a testament to Lil Jon’s genius, in that he found a way to fuse the hardcore aesthetic of crunk music into an accessible pop song so seamlessly. By speeding up the 808s and handclaps from his normal pace, he left less room for bows to be thrown, moving listeners away from an aggressive bounce towards a tidy two-step. The screeching Nord synth line and subterranean bass drops were an approximation of his signature sound, projecting an ominous menace that lent Usher a new kind of cool, allowing him to say silly shit like “Peace up! A-Town down” with a straight face. Even naming the song “Yeah!” was a clever nod to crunk’s exclamatory spirit, mirroring the Youngbloodz’s “Damn!,” another recent Lil Jon hit. Some wild-eyed ad-libs (“Okayyy!”), a predictably-quotable Ludacris verse, and a reference to the A-Town Stomp completed the crunk-lite package.
But wait: this brilliant moment in cultural appropriation almost didn’t happen. The song’s original beat—one of many that had been floating around at Jive Records—had also been used to create Petey Pablo’s "Freek-A-Leek" without Lil Jon’s knowledge. Petey’s record was already getting pressed up, so Jon was forced to construct another 105 BPM track at the last minute that could easily slide under Usher's vocals. So in this sense, not only was "Yeah!" an imitation of crunk, it was an imitation of itself.
Although Lil Jon would go on to produce a handful of other crunk-tinged R&B songs (including Ciara’s #1 hit “Goodies”), the party was over. Crunk became an energy drink, and Atlanta moved on to trap music, snap music, and beyond. But like all hip-hop trends, crunk music was destined to be skinned alive so mainstream pop music could prance around in its shell like Buffalo Bill. There’s nothing anyone could have done to stop it, and if Lil Jon didn’t do it himself, some creep would have done it for him, and the results would have been hard to watch. We should be happy that we got a perfect pop record like “Yeah!” to play at crunk’s funeral.
The only sad part? “Yeah!” didn’t win the Grammy for Record of the Year, because they gave it to some song by Ray Charles and Norah Jones that no one remembers. That’s the real crime.
—Brendan Frederick
"Confessions Part II"
Produced by: Jermaine Dupri
It starts with a bounce. A bounce too upbeat to be a backdrop for a song that details the inner turmoil of a man who has to tell his girlfriend that not only does he have a girl on the side, but that said girl is "three months pregnant and she's keeping it." Such a song should be drowned in long drawn-out strings, some melancholic chords, or—well, it should have sounded like "Burn." But that's what makes this record great. Despite it's subject matter, it's not one of those break-up songs you can't listen to because it will make you sad about leaving that one girl you dated freshman year for three months.
Unless, you know, you knocked up your sidepiece freshman year.
It was new ground for Usher. Whereas before he was seen as a meek, well-meaning, lovey-dovey kind of guy, this song (and album) painted Usher in a more humanistic hue. What happened to the Usher with impeccable dance moves who sang about having it so bad he had to call the girl back after hanging up the phone? Or the one who sang slow jams with Monica? That dude was gone. This Usher still danced well but he did things the old Usher would never admit to doing. Usher had become a man, it seemed.
Also, couple that with the covert notion that this story may have actually happened—that Usher actually got a girl he was seeing in L.A. knocked up and that was the reason he and Chilli were separating—and you get a song that as much greater than the sum of its parts. —Damien Scott
"Bad Girl"
Produced by: Destro Music, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis
It’s the guitar riff, like a steady swat on the ass. (And pick an ass—Usher’s claiming a willingness to be bad; he’s also in need of a bad girl—everyone’s looking to get lightly disciplined and have a good time.)
On an album defined by really real moments about infidelity and uncomfortable truths, “Bad Girl” is just fun, the kind of fun you can have now, in 2014, without having to contemplate Lil Jon. “Bad Girl” is just Usher’s light-as-a-feather falsetto, restroom sex, brand support from Hypnotiq and Alizé, and so many outdated pejoratives for women, it’s like he’s writing a Raymond Chandler parody. Usher’s out here spotting not just broads, but dames, too. This is Film Noir Usher, and he’s detecting for a girl who will go home with him tonight. Thing is, Usher’s always been too boyish to sell the kind of “fuck my brains out” r&b that Prince or The-Dream does so well. Like, Usher opens this song with a string of adlibs that make me look like Dolemite: “Sho nuff, shawty, what it do, oh, pimpin’, oh boy.” Usher, man, this isn’t a sentence.
It’s really important to be able to laugh along with great r&b. And if you hear me, get at me. —Ross Scarano
"Caught Up"
Produced by: Dre & Vidal
Sometimes we forget exactly how influential is Usher. But when you revisit the video for "Caught Up," it's clear it's the proto-"Hold On, We're Going Home" but has way more verve. The period styling is better and who doesn't buy Ursh saving the girl, fleeing the scene via a dance-fight to make it to his night club performance right at curtain? And the charm doesn't stop there. "Caught Up" is surprisingly sparse despite being one of the most emphatic tracks on Confessions. But it's the collage of scant sounds that makes it so likable. There's the roller rink-primed bass line and even-keeled, yet still fierce percussion bolstered by little details like Usher's "dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee"s, gauzy synths that still punch, and the sporadic punctuation of elephant-like horns. All of those pieces were conceived by the song's producers, Dre & Vidal, whose résumé includes Ciara's "Oh," Chris Brown's "Poppin'," and Justin Bieber's "All That Matters," so buttery minimalism on "Caught Up" was a foregone conclusion.It sounds sloppy on paper, like when you are a kid and mix together every color of paint, but instead of that murky brown, "Caught Up" is a rainbow. —Claire Lobenfeld