And I ain't making ultimatums; I'ma tell you like this - verbatim.

[weasel-seeker.livejournal.com]

After many many leaks and still no sign of a second album, Cassie's released a lead single for the tentatively titled Connecticut Fever and its accompanying video, with (naturally) a Lil' Wayne guest feature.

The song still rocks, and the video's not bad, even if it's nothing mindblowing. Highlight might be the dance moves during the middle 8 that line up perfectly with Wayne's "skip-jump-hop on her." Highlight of Wayne's verse is "op-er-a." Cassie spends the video coming off as halfway between Ciara and Aaliyah, and just generally walking around looking hot.

Don't know whether this will boost the song's tepid showing on the charts, or what all the (incredible) leaks mean for the future of the album, but hopefully it'll still see release, since it's easily on my Best of 2008 list.

EDIT: Feel free to use the comments section to discuss not just the single/video but the album's worth of superb material that's leaked (Is It You?, Official Girl, Thirsty, Turn the Lights Off, In Love With the DJ, 2 the Morning, My House, Nobody But You, Sometimes, etc.), Ryan Leslie, and/or the ratio between ubiquity and quality of Lil' Wayne guest spots.

Comments

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I tried to do a list of my favourite moments in this song and ended up with basically the entire thing. She is so Aaliyah in that video!

'My House' is spellbinding, Cassie's fragile stillness set against the lush, pretty music...like she's some sort of half-seen mirage leading you on. There's something v secret-garden about it all, "this is my castle babe..."

Also: new leak! 'Activate' (http://www.zshare.net/audio/17477282dfc1c662/), jitter freestyle post-Janet awesomeness. Apparently she's really pissed off that her songs keep leaking, but says that every time one leaks she goes back in the studio to do another one w/the aim of raising her game each time.

Prediction: album and entire Cassie project gets shelved :( BUT WE WILL ALWAYS HAVE THESE LEAKS.

[koganbot]

Wayne, uncharacteristically, seems out-classed and out-of-place. Maybe that's the point.

I hope Cassie doesn't jettison "Turn The Lights Off."

I don't think they'll deep-six the album, though. I assume that she's got enough of a cult following that it's bound to earn its money back, even if it isn't a hit. But maybe I'm wrong about the cult; perhaps it only consists of a half dozen of us at poptimists.

Everything she does seems a bit strange and off the beaten path, and I'm not sure if that's deliberate, but I really wonder if anything she'll do will fit in.

Btw, weasel_seeker, welcome back from vacation. During my vacation we drove by Cassie's high school! That wasn't the purpose of the trip, however. It was just on the way to Mystic Seaport.

Haven't heard "My House." Two other good leaks, maybe outtakes from the first alb, are "Don't Go Too Slow" (massive bass, which she leisurely drapes her voice around, for a very reggae effect) and "In Love With U," a sweet sexy glide, half-way between the hauteur of "Me & U" and the teeny playfulness of "What Do You Want?"

[weasel-seeker.livejournal.com]

Thanks, and...weird. Does it advertise itself as her high school on a sign outside or somesuch? Because that would be brilliant.

I'll search out those old non-album tracks. Never too much of a good thing, in this case.

And yeah...Turn the Lights Off, and Thirsty (along with Official Girl and Is It You?) are my essentials from the leaked stuff. The rest can be replaced for the album, but those four tracks are certainly the strongest I've heard from Cassie, and among the best pop I've heard from anyone this year.

Was 2007 as sparse as this until the fourth quarter? Britney wasn't out yet, but Aly & AJ were, as was Rihanna and M.I.A. Solange is promising, and E=MC^2 was good, if spotty, but otherwise, I'm at a loss for MASSIVE WORLD-CONQUERING pop albums. Maybe just a 2 am brain-freeze.

[koganbot]

Er, I gather that what I referred to as your "vacation" was actually work.

No, Cassie wasn't on the sign. Peter Tork and Rivers Cuomo aren't on the sign on my high school, either. I've never seen the high school in Rockville, about 25 minutes drive from where I live, but my guess is that Gene Pitney's name isn't on its sign, either. I think Cassie is the first major musician to make a point of the fact that she's from Connecticut. I wonder why, and what it symbolizes for her. I don't know much about New London, though my family lived there for a couple of years several years before I was born. I assume that like most of Eastern Connecticut, its economic heyday was in the nineteenth century. Wiki mentions only whaling in relation to its economy, and that's an activity I'm sure it has nothing to do with anymore. About 15% of the population is under the poverty level. I don't know if that's important or not, but when I think of eastern Connecticut I tend to think "dying economy," though at this point the dying was so long ago that for all I know "reviving economy" or "economy, whatever," might be more accurate.

As for albums of the year, I'm not finding a lot but that's often the case at this time of year, and one of my major sources of new music disappeared when Xhuxk was canned as the Voice's music editor in early '06. So whether I'm liking the albums I'm hearing is always going to be idiosyncratic and chancey, not based on a good knowledge of what's out there. But with Cassie now moved back, I've really got no idea what's likely to be a dominant album. Right now Ashlee is number two on my album list, and that's where she ended up in '05, but I liked I Am Me significantly more than I like Bittersweet World. A t.A.T.u. release is in the works, though you never know, and they've not got the label backing they had in the past. I don't know how Yulia and Lena will do cut off from their previous songwriters, though I like "Beliy Plaschik." And the extended version of the video is a pisser.

But I'm also struggling more finding top ten worthy singles this year than at this time in the last two. ("Disturbia" is somewhere between 1 and 3, and I don't necessarily like it more than I like "Umbrella," which ended up as my #14 last year.)

[koganbot]

Fwiw, the albums I'd list were the vote today are Danity Kane Welcome To The Dollhouse, Ashlee Simpson Bittersweet World, María Daniela Y Su Sonido Lasser Juventud En Éxtasis, Willie Nelson Moments Of Time, Vanessa Hudgens Identified, and Jamey Johnson That Lonesome Song. And I might fill out the rest from among Jamey Johnson, Lil Wayne, Keak Da Sneak, Lil Mama, Santogold, Mariah Carey, or Ashton Shepherd, though they're all pretty inconsistent. (Not that inconsistency bothers me if someone has three or four super great tracks, but most of those are running at only one or two.) Some newbies that might have outside shots if they really grow on me are Jordan Pruitt and Cansei De Ser Sexy and Cyndi Lauper. Danity and Ashlee are the only two that I'd say for sure will still be standing by the end of the year. Haven't heard Solange in full yet.

[koganbot]

My guess is that Cassie makes a point of the fact that she's from Connecticut, went to the Williams School, etc. I mean, it seems rather esoteric information to make it into someone's Wiki entry. Though I just looked at Peter Tork's Wiki entry and it says, "was a member of the first graduating class at E.O. Smith High School in Storrs, Connecticut." Maybe someone who went to E.O. Smith thought this needed to be in the biography, that he was a member of the first graduating class.