LL Cool J - Hey Lover

As opposed to R Kelly's 'Down Low', where a simple song about an affair is spun out in the music video as an epic story of love, loss and Kelly's massive ego (the R in R 'n' B), LL Cool J's video for 'Hey Lover' is pretty much a literal conversion of words to pictures. Which I like. I'm from the MTV generation and as a result have an attention span of about one and a half minutes.

Watching this video now it's actually pretty unremarkable - but this song is smooth as hell. I think the sample used is from Michael Jackson's 'The Lady in My Life'. I went through a phase this summer of listening to it at least twice a day and it holds a special place in my hip-hop heart though, probably solely for the signature LL stood atop a car special move (See the 'Bad' album cover).

I never know what period LL I prefer - eary LL (Radio, Mama Said Knock You Out), or the sleazy mid-perod LL (Doin' It, Loungin). On balance I'd go with sleazy LL - "tounging you down with vanilla ice cream".

One more thing; a lot of people I've spoken with lately are under the impression that Mr. Smith is dead. He ain't!