TLR SESSION № 001
Basslines so smooth, so sexy, so groovy it's going to make you want to pick up the bass guitar.
TLR SESSIONS
Dakota Nash
7/24/20263 min read
This is the first TLR session ever, and I decided to come out swinging. What attracted me to music in the first place? Million-dollar basslines. The songs in this session have a bassline so nasty, so smooth, so groovy, and so sexy that I'm actually buying myself a bass guitar to learn how to play.
Then this week's album is iconic in every sense of the word (You’ll see below).
Let's get into it, Yuh!
Play it in order. I made it that way :)
Five to Sit With
Track 05: "Snake oil" - Glass Beams
Track 01: "Money" - Leisure
Track 02: "In my head" - Say She She
Track 03: "Masterpiece" - Sault
Track 04: "When I'm in your arms" - Cleo Sol
Takes a deep breath
I chose this album because it represents my mission. To listen to bodies of work as a whole. To be ANTI. Anti-algorithm, anti-AI created music, anti-industry, and to create whatever the fuck I put my mind to.
Rihanna is one of our generation's most reliable hitmakers. And this album went a completely different direction from Unapologetic (love that one down bad too).
When she was touring ANTI, I wanted to go. But my fear of going alone won, and I skipped the tour.
I didn't realize this would be the last album she'd ever release.
Talk about fumbling the bag.
BTW — that will never happen to me again.
I recently sat with this album again and I thought...
ANTI is Rihanna's masterpiece.
PERIOD.
Now let me tell you why I fuck with this album...
Rihanna takes complete control and steps into her own power.
She knows she's the shit.
The emotional journey of asking for consideration, being left all alone, reclaiming your power, falling back in, and finding out exactly what you want and going for it.
My favorite tracks on this album are "Yeah, I Said It," "Same Ol' Mistakes" (produced by Kevin Parker of Tame Impala), and "Higher."
"Yeah, I Said It" is the freak nasty I like to hear from Rihanna. It's one that really puts me in a mood. Remember — I'm a star student in yearning.
"Same Ol' Mistakes" is the one I come back to again and again. It captures this album in its beauty. I keep falling back, but it's okay with me. Maybe the perspective is that there's more out there than black and white.
My favorite song musically, too. Kevin is a genius.
"Higher" is raw. I can imagine coming home drunk as fuck, smoking a ciggy, knowing that if you had the chance to say what you really wanted, it would be this. Then the simultaneous heartbreak of knowing you're not coming.
Rihanna's voice captures so much depth — coloring each song with pain, desire, and haunting us in the best way possible.
It never apologizes. And it's a treat to listen to in its entirety.
A Love Letter to ANTI
If this moved you...
This is the kind of thing that lands in your inbox every Thursday — five songs to sit with, one album worthy of a love letter, sent by a person, not an algorithm.
Join TLR Sessions to get the next one before anyone else.
