"You got my time, girl, don’t you disrespect it," he huffs, barely concealing his impatience with his companion’s sexual ambivalence. "Don’t Play" starts seductively enough, with its spacious, Jeremih-esque atmospherics, but quickly devolves into negging on wax. Intermission feels like a conceptual homage to pick-up artist bible The Game. But the fantasy quickly fades: almost every song doubles down on the #meninist platitudes and reductive misogyny more than anything he’s released to date. The satiny synths, leisurely finger-snap percussion, and evocative bass rumbles, all providing a cushion for Trey’s velvety tenor, are the aural equivalent of scattered rose petals and lit candles. If you squint, Trey’s recent six-song Intermission EP, a stopgate to tide fans over until Trigga: Reloaded this summer, does what Trey does best: provide a no-skips-required sex playlist, or at least an escapist fantasy for zoning out at your desk. But Trey’s alpha-male anthems have always had a bit of a chauvinistic edge, and "Touchin, Lovin" succeeded in no small part because it allotted space for a strong female perspective as a counterpoint to the bro-y narcissism of a guy used to having his way. Trigga emphatically reaffirmed Trey’s hit-making pedigree: The album spawned a whopping six singles, best among them Nicki Minaj collaboration "Touchin, Lovin". Trey and production team The Featherstones dabbled in the surefire 2014 hit strategy, "interpolate a '90s classic" (in this case, Big and Kells’ "Fuck You Tonight"), but made sure to slyly note, "If we talkin’ bout sex, girl you know I invented that"-a reminder of his indelible stamp on millennial baby-making jams. Kelly’s torch-bearer and while he’s subtly evolved over the years, gracefully embracing hip-hop and R&B’s increasing cross-pollination, he hasn’t made too many pronounced stylistic shifts. He might lack the crossover appeal or critical darling status of, say, The-Dream or the Weeknd, but his singles discography is unimpeachable-not to mention, he can sing any of the aforementioned under the table. As his less firmly established peers have dipped their toes into the "alt-R&B" pool or flirted with EDM to stay relevant, Trey’s point of view has remained trendy but traditional, his generation’s best candidate for R.
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