why isn't "flap your wings" by nelly HUGE yet?

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This might be the most addictive song I've heard all year. I feel like someone should have written about it by now because you people usually find out about songs before I do. What's the deal?

― billstevejim, Monday, 9 August 2004 22:53 (twenty-one years ago)

I enjoy it but I think people are a little fun-rapped out for two Nelly singles from two Nelly albums at the same Nelly time. He was an important step in the transition from gangsta to the current rap-is-disco state of things, but I think he's gonna get left behind.

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 August 2004 22:56 (twenty-one years ago)

I mean are you gonna look cooler drinking Pimp Juice or Crunk?

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 August 2004 22:57 (twenty-one years ago)

"My Place" is already a top 20 hit though.

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 August 2004 22:59 (twenty-one years ago)

I like "My Place," but it just doesn't scream "HUGE@!" the way "Flap Your Wings" does.

― billstevejim, Monday, 9 August 2004 23:00 (twenty-one years ago)

I agree, but between this, "Headsprung" and plenty of other tracks, the dancefloor is a little crowded this summer.

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:01 (twenty-one years ago)

The bootleg of nelly-vs-nelly furtado, "flap your wings (like a bird)" is really hot though.

― scott seward (scott seward), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Anthony is pretty OTM but the real answer is that it kinda sucks. At least, by the Hot In Herre/Country Grammar standard. I mean, it's pretty depressing that even after taking a 6 month vacation from hitmaking, this is the best the Neptunes could come up with.

― Al (sitcom), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:18 (twenty-one years ago)

it's one of the least 'hit' sounding hits i've ever heard.

― m. (mitchlnw), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:21 (twenty-one years ago)

I have to admit I'm surprised by the immediate success of "My Place", though. it was #1 on TRL today.

― Al (sitcom), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:22 (twenty-one years ago)

have the neps had a good chorus since 'beautiful'? i may well be forgetting something...

― m. (mitchlnw), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:22 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah "Flap Your Wings" isn't as effortlessly pop as "Hot In Herre" - I haven't heard it in a club so I don't know how well it works there.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:31 (twenty-one years ago)

the real answer is that it kinda sucks

Yep. Weak chorus, no hook, boring beats, Nelly too self-conscious about this being an "anthem"... Doesn't even make the cut on the 4th disc of the Neptunes box set.

― bugged out, Monday, 9 August 2004 23:34 (twenty-one years ago)

honestly you'd think after "Change Clothes" that rappers would've disabused themselves of the notion that whatever Pharrell hands them is a hit.

― Al (sitcom), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:38 (twenty-one years ago)

But Change Clothes was a hit

― bugged out, Monday, 9 August 2004 23:40 (twenty-one years ago)

so is "Flap Your Wings" by strict terms of getting decent airplay, but by the standards of a lead single by Nelly or Jay-Z, they didn't do very well.

― Al (sitcom), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Purely subjectively, I have not heard Flap Your Wings once this summer, either on radio, TV, or the streets of New York. Whereas I heard Change Clothes three times a day, whether I wanted to or not.

― bugged out, Monday, 9 August 2004 23:50 (twenty-one years ago)

well, the album isn't out yet. I didn't hear "Change Clothes" that much until after the album had already topped the charts. In either case, I think it's more a matter of career momentum getting the song on the air than people really liking the song itself. and anyway, that wasn't really my point, I phrased it poorly, when I should've said that rappers assume that whatever Pharrell hands them is "good", not "a hit".

― Al (sitcom), Monday, 9 August 2004 23:57 (twenty-one years ago)

who's nelly?

― peepee (peepee), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 00:21 (twenty-one years ago)

"Weak chorus, no hook, boring beats"

Wow, I COMPLETELY disagree.

― billstevejim, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 01:35 (twenty-one years ago)

it's "coolie dance" crossed with a really boring "live" organ sound (sadly not the band live, haha) and nelly's worst performance ever and the stupidest metaphor for sex ever.

― jess, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 01:44 (twenty-one years ago)

I think the analogy I made on Gov't Names was "Flap Your Wings" : "Hot In Herre" :: "Pass The Dutch" : "Work It"

― Al (sitcom), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 01:53 (twenty-one years ago)

the thing is, i think i might really like it if i just heard a dj on the radio drop a bunch of disparate freestyles over the beat

― jess, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 01:57 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't really get the nearly-across-the-board Change Clothes disrespect on ILX.

Nelly too self-conscious about this being an "anthem"

otm otm otm otm

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:03 (twenty-one years ago)

it might be because it sucks diseased donkey cock

― jess, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:04 (twenty-one years ago)

It sucks diseased donkey cock with a tune you probably still have in your head.

Change clothes... and go!

ah ha ah ha

Luvvit ;)

― bugged out, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:10 (twenty-one years ago)

it's gotten to the point that on the 'old school' midday mix on the local station here they'll sometimes do sets of first wave Neptunes hits and it makes me very nostalgic.

― Al (sitcom), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:12 (twenty-one years ago)

I yearn for a simpler time when I wondered who the guy with the baseball cap and the pubescent mustache was who kept showing up in videos doing a Curtis Mayfield impression.

― Al (sitcom), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:17 (twenty-one years ago)

I yearn for ~~a simpler time when I wondered who~~ the guy with the baseball cap and the pubescent mustache ~~was~~ who kept showing up in videos doing a Curtis Mayfield impression.

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 02:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Best Neps track since "Milkshake". It sounds like nothing else, and its seriously far from being . "Change Clothes" and "Beautiful", OTOH, are Neps-By-The-Numbers and therefore boring .

Nelly's a different story, though. He usually gets on my nurves, but he's tolerable here.

― Jay Vee (Manon_70), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:01 (twenty-one years ago)

I completely understand "Change Clothes" hate, but am baffled by "Beautiful" love.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:36 (twenty-one years ago)

I mean, remember "Southern Hospitality"?

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Colin that's unfair - practically *everything* pales next to "Southern Hospitality"!

(although in my opinion the underrated Neptunes track from that period was Mystikal's "Danger")

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:54 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm willing to accept inferior product! Just not as inferior as "Beautiful".

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:57 (twenty-one years ago)

Beautiful--another great tune. I mean, you have to be pretty miserable not to sing along to that one.

― bugged out, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 03:59 (twenty-one years ago)

Remember "Young Fresh n'New"?!!?

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:05 (twenty-one years ago)

I always thought that one was a bit thin, really. They did much better other stuff with Kelis.

― bugged out, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Thin? I know this is a pretty silly argument, but on what planet is "Beautiful", uh, thicker than "Young Fresh N'New"?

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Remember "Caught Out There"??

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Haha, mock all you want, but getting excited about "Flap Your Wings" and "Beautiful" for not being as terrible as "Change Clothes" is like getting excited about Gosford Park because it's not Dr. T's & The Women.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Beautiful has a TUNE!

It's been a while since I heard YFNN, but I just remember one big synth noise repeated a lot and a fairly anemic chorus. Maybe I'm mixing it up with something else.

Yes, Caught Out There is a bit more like it if you want to invoke radical past glories... Which shouldn't make us enjoy a bit of funky fluff like Beautiful any less

― bugged out, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:21 (twenty-one years ago)

I wasn't mocking Colin!!! I was getting swept up in Neptunes nostalgia!!

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:25 (twenty-one years ago)

I find Beautiful to be far less catchy than Change Clothes. It's mildly shocking to me that this is such a wildly unpopular view of things.

― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:26 (twenty-one years ago)

"Ego"!!!

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:26 (twenty-one years ago)

"Beautiful" is more suited to dancing I guess. I think a lot of people liked the novelty of a club track with such twee male vocals.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:27 (twenty-one years ago)

What's "Ego" again?

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:27 (twenty-one years ago)

Clipse

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:29 (twenty-one years ago)

Ego is the shit. I'd use it as track #1 on a mix cd. Pharrel's vocal hook sounds like a parody of Snoop Dogg.

― herbert hebert (herbert hebert), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:32 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh my god how I could I forget "Ego" AKA best beat ever!!!

I was thinking it was some ol'skool Neps tune you were talking about and couldn't for the life of me work it out.

But yeah, I could talk about "Ego" all day. "So sad but we won't think twice/we're rich, we get the best judicial advice!" Plus it was the absolute pinnacle of nutty Neptunes riddimatics. I just don't think they could make a beat more convoluted/compulsive than that if they tried. It's always linked in my head to Jay-Z's "Nigga Please" for similar reasons.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:36 (twenty-one years ago)

I was going to post it in the "In a perfect world this would be at the top of the charts" thread, but the hook makes it pretty clear why it was never a single.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:42 (twenty-one years ago)

In a perfect world it wouldn't languish in obscurity even amongst other non-chart-topping Neptunes tracks!!! I'm so glad to find other people bigging it up!

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:44 (twenty-one years ago)

I actually liked the beat for "Flap Your Wings" way more than I expected, but the song as a whole? Not so great. The obnoxious hook being the primary problem w/ it.

I dont think it's a guarantee that nelly's being "left behind" though - Tip Drill was huge (in its own strip-club late-night-BET-anthem way) and really good, (mostly bcuz of DBanner's production).

Beautiful and Change Clothes are both pretty great, although obviously they're not top tier neptunes productions - still amazing work. Milkshake trumps both easily, as does Southern Hospitality.

― djdee2005, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:45 (twenty-one years ago)

Even you forgot the title!

x-post

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:45 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh man, I forgot about "Tip Drill" so fast.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:46 (twenty-one years ago)

"Even you forgot the title!"

Yeah exactly! I'll have to dig into the Skykicking archives to shore up my ego cred...

'It's further evidence of how much The Neptunes are now more like an in-house band than they are a production team. Accusations of monochromatic production techniques miss the point: those snare hits and bass sounds are the band instruments, and what impresses still is how effortlessly a dozen unique variations on what is now an incredibly familiar sound can be churned out. "Ego" stands as perhaps their most fluid slice of funk (in the rhythmic not formal-stylistic sense) yet, the stiff-jointed kicks and agile percussion pattern blending and complementing so wonderfully and naturally that it's tempting to imagine these breaks becoming the staple breaks for a new generation of producers in the future - I can almost see people talk about the "Ego break" with hushed reverence. The Neptunes have become a sticking point for me because they are the best at this stiff-to-loose transition within US pop; universally they've only been bested by the most ruggedly naturalistic (and perhaps now outmoded?) garage - the chimeric midnight-funk of London Dodgers' "Down Down Biznizz", UGC's "Mic Tribute (Remix)", James Lavonz's "Mash Up Da Venue" - tracks which seem to offer the same challenge: "throw dem 'bows, but carefully..."'

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:49 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't even think the "Milshake" beat was the amazing. It worked really in elevating the song's sort-of weirdness when it first hit. But, even more than the hook and nonstop airplay, that beat is the song lost its luster.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:49 (twenty-one years ago)

x-post, the=that.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:49 (twenty-one years ago)

Nice, Tim.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Nah I still love Milkshake completely, pretty much. I'm surprised how LITTLE I get sick of it - to be honest, when I first heard it I assumed it wouldn't wear on me well.

Agreeance w/ colin about yr post on skykicking though, tim - nice.

Colin - how'd you forget about "Tip Drill"?! The video aside, it's an incredibly memorable track - "It must be yo ass cuz it ain't yo face"?!

― djdee2005, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:55 (twenty-one years ago)

I dunno, despite how "shocking" (and genuinely offensive) it was, it's a pretty unremarkable song. Which is sort of what most of 2004 hip hop singles have been like. I could be misremembering, I really haven't heard the song in a while (is it still on the radio in the States?), but ,apart from the video controversy, nothing about the song really grabbed (no pun intended) me.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 04:59 (twenty-one years ago)

I didn't know there was controversy - I thought the song was great (and definitely 2003).

2004 hip-hop ... "Lean Back" is the big one I guess - and "Freek-A-Leek" and "Yeah" which are both excellent. Then of course there's a fair amount of other crunk creeping up the charts.

― djdee2005, Tuesday, 10 August 2004 05:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, there's a bunch of great stuff out, I'm an idiot. I guess by 2004 I meant the past 2 or 3 months.

― C0L1N B3CK3TT (Colin Beckett), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 05:21 (twenty-one years ago)

"Change Clothes" is terrific, "Beautiful" is piss.

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 13:18 (twenty-one years ago)

the best part about "Beautiful" is the odd, almost random placement of the kick drum hits. aside from that, I can take or leave it.

― Al (sitcom), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 13:24 (twenty-one years ago)

I can leave Pharrell's ungodly baying. And do.

― CeCe Peniston (Anthony Miccio), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 13:25 (twenty-one years ago)

"Flap Your Wings" is "Hot in Herre" with the quality of the beat and and gimmicky hook decreased by about 75%.

I do like that he uses the word "heavyset," though.

― Talent Explosion (Talent Explosion), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 15:16 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't think I've watched a recent hip hop video all the way through, but I did with this one. I wouldn't call it a great song or anything, but something about it appeals to me. It seems amateurish and clumsy, particularly the "role call" part. But I dig amateurish and clumsy, and the fact that there's not a strong hook is another plus. Maybe I'm just a sucker for jangling percussion.

― oops (Oops), Tuesday, 10 August 2004 18:31 (twenty-one years ago)

and the fact that there's not a strong hook is another plus

'splain yourself. I remember seeing the video for it a while back, the entire song was unmemorable. I'd like to know how the lack of a strong hook is a plus. Do you mean just that a hook isn't the overbearing focal point of the song, and that's refreshing?

― Zach Ayres (Z_Ayres), Wednesday, 11 August 2004 00:45 (twenty-one years ago)

flap.. is obviously not a metaphor for sex but a term for a hot new dance which is like flapper crossed with native american sterotypes and the VDO makes this all clear and is totally awesome.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 21 August 2004 22:03 (twenty-one years ago)

at least compared to the last nelly video.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 21 August 2004 22:03 (twenty-one years ago)

two weeks pass...

ok am i the only one far too amused that the central effect on a track of this name is a flanged organ?

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Sunday, 5 September 2004 19:45 (twenty-one years ago)

This is at No 1 in the UK. Dunno why, I'm very disappointed at how bleh it is.

"Flap Your Wings" is "Hot in Herre" with the quality of the beat and and gimmicky hook decreased by about 75%.

exactly!

Maybe it will grow on me. I don't really care for "My Place" either.

― The Lex (The Lex), Sunday, 5 September 2004 19:58 (twenty-one years ago)

UK has good taste.

― billstevejim, Sunday, 5 September 2004 20:02 (twenty-one years ago)

one month passes...

Is it really any good, Sterling?

― adam... (nordicskilla), Friday, 29 October 2004 02:42 (twenty-one years ago)

No.

― Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Friday, 29 October 2004 02:59 (twenty-one years ago)

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