Janet Jackson: "No Sleeep"
If there’s one thing tying together the loose ends of pop in 2015, it’s the still-brilliant sparkle of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis—stretching from their contributions to the Time to their decades of songwriting and production work for Janet Jackson and beyond. You can hear their influence everywhere right now: in Dev Hynes’ work for Carly Rae Jepsen, the more purple-hued moments of Miguel’s Wildheart, select cuts from Jason Derulo’s latest, the Weeknd’s recent pivot “Can’t Feel My Face”.
Ms. Jackson could’ve returned from her seven-year hiatus with the snappy, funked-out choreography of her late ’80s catalog, or the slick electronics of her mid-’00s, to show the kids how the hell it’s done. Instead, for the lead single off her 11th album, she’s called up Jam and Lewis and gone full-on quiet storm. “No Sleeep” evokes her richest and most breathtaking era: the mid-’90s stretch including 1993’s super-sensual janet., and especially 1997’s inimitable and deeply personal classic, The Velvet Rope.
Velvet Rope was a sexy album, but its hottest moments were shaded by an unshakeable darkness, a yawning black hole of self-doubt. The nagging fear that you are not deserving of love, physical and otherwise, provides the album’s essential tensions, tugging against its carnality. “No Sleeep”, with its languid downtempo slink, offers a similar sensuality; her delivery is husky, understated, coyly discreet, refraining from those moments of falsetto. But in attitude, it’s miles away from stuff like “Empty”. Toying with the imagined details of a weekend spent “doing whatever” (wink), Jackson exudes a calm, confident glow—the self-possessed freedom Velvet Rope Jackson only imagined. It’s a study in grace, and the ultimate expression of summer lust: you can feel the humidity in your hair, the sweaty sheets, and the relief as Jackson’s quiet storm becomes literal as a summer rain.
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