“Beautiful Monster” hitmaker Ne-Yo is back on the scene with a recycled R&B/dance jam called “Let Me Love You (Until You Learn To Love Yourself),” which I shall shorten to “Let Me Love You” for the purposes of this post. It’s the first single from the singer/songwriter’s upcoming fifth album (his first with Motown Records), R.E.D. (“Realizing Every Dream“) due out before the end of the year.
In early 2012, Ne-Yo (along with his label imprint, Compound Entertainment) moved from Def Jam Recordings, over to Motown, becoming the first major artist to join the newly revitalized Motown family. In addition to being a new Motown artist, Ne-Yo also adds “Senior Vice President of A&R” to his resume, clearly something that will help him land some sort of judging gig on an as-yet-non-existent music reality series. All joking aside, this new position actually makes a lot of sense, since he’s been more successful in recent years as a songwriter than he has as a solo artist, writing for everyone including Mary J. Blige, Beyonce, Justin Bieber, Alexandra Burke, Cheryl Cole, Willow Smith, Alexis Jordan, and Jennifer Hudson. Whichever way you slice it, Ne-Yo knows his way around a hit! Now…if only he could write himself one…
“Let Me Love You” is AIGHT. It’s formulaic urban dance/pop, along the same lines as his 2008 hit single “Closer,” and 2010’s less than stellar (but still catchy) “Beautiful Monster.” In other words, “Let Me Love You” isn’t anything fresh or exciting, but it’s got a good beat and should cater to both pop and dance radio, maybe urban radio if they’re feeling desperate.
Check out the video for “Let Me Love You” BELOW, which launched July 17th. While the special FX aren’t nearly as spectacular as they were in the “Beautiful Monster” video, there’s some shaky camera-work that might catch your eye, as will the set (which looks a lot like the one used for Rihanna‘s “Umbrella“).
“Let Me Love You (Until You Learn to Love Yourself)” is out now in America (iTunes US) and drops in the UKSeptember 2nd. Hopefully the UK release will spawn some nice dance remixes.
