poptimists | Number one with a bullet?

just heard it on radio 1 on my way home from work. i was hoping for a dancefloor banger. something i could play at my clubnight.

i get that.

far too dull. nice. but dull :(

I did not realize this was going to be literally about playing Russian roulette.

It really emerges from its cocoon and becomes a full-fledged Andrew Lloyd Weber ballad around the 2:23 mark, doesn't it?

Rhianna never saw a metaphor that she didn't want to take way too literally. cf. "Shut Up And Drive", "Unfaithful", entire career to date

At least those had metaphors -- body is like a car, cheating is like murder. This is straight-up narration.

It's surely MEANT to be a metaphor for something, though. (I imagine people will draw lines between it and The Whole Chris Brown Thing in some way).

Wikipedia: Ne-Yo said Rihanna requested the song’s somber vibe. "She wanted to be dark, but not just dark for the sake of being dark," he told MTV News. "Dark with kind of a meaning, dark with some kind of thing to it." Ne-Yo called the track "my first ventures off into the fictitious," as he explained how he came up with the haunting Russian roulette theme, which appears to be a metaphor. Rihanna is expected to perform "Russian Roulette" at the American Music Awards on November 22.

But that's the Wikipedia writer who's saying that this is a metaphor, not Ne-Yo, who is quoted here.

Then these gems from the comment thread:

Roc-A-Lum commented | 10.23.2009 01:41 AM
Wow, you people heard of a metaphor! The song is about taking a chance on love, with some one that u feel maybe doesn't it. He is probably a player, or just taking advantage of you, but u pull the trigger anyways. Learn the art!

www.myspace.com/coreywilson10 replied | 10.23.2009 08:14 AM
What in the world? What you said doesn't make any sense. This song has nothing to do with the meaning of Love. Love won't make you take a chance with your life. This song is about Depression over a man and taking a chance with your life. There have been cases where fans hurt themself over songs like this.

So, risking your life by playing Russian roulette is a metaphor for:

(a) Taking a chance on love.
(b) Depression.
(c) ?????

Or (d) nothing, because THE SONG NEVER SETS ONE UP.

Apparently that's no longer necessary.

(But seriously, I think that she and Ne-Yo are using the fact that people will project metaphoric meanings onto a story of Russian roulette. "Dark with a kind of a meaning," even if in fact there is none; "dark with some kind of thing to it," even if the lyrics add no thing to it. The "thing," some thing, whatever thing, with Chris looming, is there no matter what, even if it's never specified. Rihanna seems to have an affinity for dark stories anyway, though this is the first one she had a hand in writing [as opposed to "Disturbia" and "Question Existing" and "Haunted" and "Unfaithful"]. Of course delivering dark stories credibly is her job on such songs, but subtext is now screaming at us, even though it might well have nothing to do with her talent for such stories.)

Some comments:

But surely projecting a new meaning onto an existing object isn't the same thing as that object actually *asking* for the comparison is it? By that logic one could say "this song reminds me of that time at the beach when I threw up in the kitchen" and claim that the song is a METAPHOR for it, which spreads "metaphor" a little too thin.

I don't think that Rihanna song is a metaphor for *anything*, even if there are rich possibilities for connection to real events. (Being with an abuser is like playing a game of Russian Roulette.) But "hoping people will naturally put this in the context of her personal life" is not necessarily the same thing as making the distinction consciously (Britney's "Blackout" seems to be in conversation with, but is not strictly a "metaphor" for, her off-the-rails period, for instance).

And then:

The phrase I usually use to hedge my bets in these sorts of situations is just "metaphorical weight," which means that it has some of the "feel" of a metaphor without the metaphor itself. In my Singles Jukebox review, I compare her to Heath Ledger's Joker, sucking all the camp OR actual-seriousness by finding an awkward middle ground that's both self-serious and insubstantial (i.e. dumb as fuck).

Ha! I used the word "camp" in my Jukebox review, too.

Brilliant and absolutely pitch black. Huge.

I regret to say that when I heard Rihanna sing "Take the gun and count to 3," my mind involuntarily proceeded, "Or 4... on the floor."

Love this. Everyone was being really meh about it on R1 last night. Fules.

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