In the late ‘80s there was a trend of songs whose mood evoked the wee small hours of the morning. Everything about them was sensual, emotional, and decidedly dark in feel, even when the lyrical subjects were as bright as a discussion about new love. Songs like Cherelle’s “Everything I Miss At Home,” Babyface and Karen White’s “Love Saw It,” and just about the entirety of Al B. Sure’s debut album, In Effect Mode. The late 90s saw a revival of this kind of song and album, especially through producer Chucky Thompson for artists like 112, Faith Evans, Mary J. Blige and the unsung Frankie. Carl Thomas’s So Emotional debut was essentially In Effect Mode for a new generation, matching its dark emotionality and sexual tension in song after song.
In the late ‘80s there was a trend of songs whose mood evoked the wee small hours of the morning. Everything about them was sensual, emotional, and decidedly dark in feel, even when the lyrical subjects were as bright as a discussion about new love. Songs like Cherelle’s “Everything I Miss At Home,” Babyface and Karen White’s “Love Saw It,” and just about the entirety of Al B. Sure’s debut album, In Effect Mode. The late 90s saw a revival of this kind of song and album, especially through producer Chucky Thompson for artists like 112, Faith Evans, Mary J. Blige and the unsung Frankie. Carl Thomas’s So Emotional debut was essentially In Effect Mode for a new generation, matching its dark emotionality and sexual tension in song after song. Call them story songs for the love neurotic…or maybe the mentally disturbed, but they’re seductive and once they have you, they envelope you in their lovesick world of night. There are portions of D Maurice’s debut album, Mosaic, that mirror this feel and atmosphere for yet another generation, perhaps best personified by the album cut, “Ear Hustlin’.”
The shimmering bell tree that opens “Ear Hustlin’” and the synthy keys opening echo the smooth, late ‘90s version of this song style, but D Maurice’s decision to sing with himself in doubles, harmonies, and counterpoint are throwbacks to the master of this kind of layering: Marvin Gaye. Given that we’re inside the head of the storyteller, the different voices within the song also suggests a kind of madness. The voyeuristic lyrics describe the sexual torment and fantastical inner life of an ear hustling neighbor who creepily is listening to his neighbor’s love making and longing to take the place of her lover. The minor chords further darken a song that already is primed to unsettle, even the tone is of a romantic seduction and not a crushing, stalking neighbor too gun shy to step. Rockwell and Sting would’ve been proud. And, so should D. Maurice for so completely capturing a moody, melancholic, and sometimes spine-chilling sound that never goes out of style.
By L. Michael Gipson
D Maurice - "Ear Hustlin'"