Rush | 3 to 5 BOPS

Rush: 3 to 5 BOPS No. 62 (2023), features musical BOPS courtesy of Janelle Monáe, Mac Miller, Taylor Swift, Troye Sivan, and Vampire Weekend. 

Ah, you know what time it is! It’s 3 to 5 BOPS time – WOO! On 3 to 5 BOPS, it’s all about brevity and sweetness… for the most part! There’s a theme/topic, 3, 4, or 5 songs, and a blurb – two paragraphs or less.  3 to 5 BOPS, hence, is a mini playlist that shouldn’t take much time to consume.  In the 62^nd edition of 3 to 5 BOPS (2023), we select songs that are associated with a RUSH in some form or fashion. The BOPS arrive courtesy of 🎙 Janelle Monáe, 🎙 Mac Miller, 🎙 Taylor Swift, 🎙 Troye Sivan, and 🎙 Vampire Weekend. Okay, let’s get into it!

1. Troye Sivan, “Rush”

💿 Something To Give Each Other • 🏷 EMI Recorded Music Australia Production • 🗓 2023

“I feel the rush / Addicted to your touch / Oh, I feel the rush / It’s so good, it’s so good.” 🎙 Troye Sivan embraces and double down on his sexuality on the club-infused bop, 🎵 “Rush”.  “Rush” serves as the opener and lead single of his third studio album, 💿 Something To Give Each Other.  It’s fabulous and gay AF. The music video seals the gay deal of “Rush”.  Still, even if Sivan had denied us a visual of appetizing shirtless men and sexual liberation, the sound of the record is giving gay club.  This slick joint was produced by 🎛 Styalz Fuego, NOVODOR, and Zhone.  To some extent, this sound is a change of pace for Sivan. Lyrically and thematically, sex is written all over this record.  Sure, there’s dancing, but it’s dirty dancing 😈 🕺 🪩! “Trust the stimulation, don’t you let it break / Every stimulation, promise I can take,” Sivan sings in the first verse adding, “What you wanna give? Boy, you better show me what / You’ve been schemin’ up.” WOO 🥵 🥵 🥵! The heat continues in the second verse, where Troye asserts, “Pass your boy the heatwave,” adding, “Kiss it when you’re done, man, this shit is so much fun / Pocket rocket gun.” Clearly, while listening to the heat and surefire bop that is 🎵 “Rush”, you should be some place where it’s okay if you get a little, um, turned on!

Appears in 🔻:

• Awesome Songs: July 2023

2. Janelle Monáe, “The Rush” (Ft. Nia Long & Amaarae)

💿 The Age of Pleasure • 🏷 Wondaland Productions LLC / Bad Boy Records LLC • 🗓 2023 

💿 The Age of Pleasure, filled with pleasure, delivers quite a rush with the cool, sensual, utterly groovy 🎵 “The Rush.” Here, 🎙 Janelle Monáe gets an assist from 🎙 Nia Long (🤯) and 🎙 Amaarae. Long performs the intro and ‘refrain’ portion of the record (not to be confused with the chorus) in spoken word: “Feel your ocean come to my moon / Let our rain become a monsoon / I want the rush.” It sets the tone for Monáe, who runs with this bedroom joint: “I look into your eyes and I get that rush / Maybe ‘cause tonight you’re gonna be my crush / … Skin to skin, I wanna take my time / Break it in, I wanna make you mine.” Oh, snap 🫰! Amaarae brings the heat in the second verse as well, memorably asserting, “Pussy gonna lay go down, make you rest in peace.” 💀 Ooh wee!!!

3. Vampire Weekend, “Married in a Gold Rush” (Ft. Danielle Haim)

💿 Father of the Bride • 🏷 Columbia • 📅 2019

“There’s two seats on the midnight train / The gold won’t weigh us down.” 🎵 “Married in a Gold Rush” marks the second song from 💿 Father of the Bride, the 🏆 Grammy-winning, fourth studio album by 🎙 Vampire Weekend, to feature 🎙 Danielle Haim (of 🎙 HAIM).  The vocal chemistry between 🎙 Ezra Koenig and Haim is simply marvelous.  They sing incredibly well together as well as successfully play off one another, beginning with the chorus (excerpted above). In the context of the album, “Married in a Gold Rush” marks another perfect fit regarding concept – marriage and relationship issues. Koenig sings in the first verse, “We got married in a gold rush / And the rush has never felt the same.” As for Haim, she adds, in the second verse, “We got married in a gold rush / And the sight of gold will always bring me pain.” Besides the state of the marriage, the song also refers to history, something Koenig highlights from the jump (“Something’s happening in the country / And the government’s to blame”).

4. Taylor Swift, “gold rush” 

💿 Evermore • 🏷 Taylor Swift • 📅 2020

According to 🏆 Grammy-winning musician extraordinaire 🎙 Taylor Swift, “I don’t like a gold rush, gold rush / I don’t like anticipatin’ my face in a red flush.” Those lyrics hail from the chorus of 🎵 “gold rush,” a fine record from 💿 evermore, Swift’s second surprise album from 2020.  In the chorus, she continues singing, “I don’t like that anyone would die to feel your touch / Everybody wants you / Everybody wonders what it would be like to love you / … But I don’t like a gold rush.” Essentially, she is seeking to eschew liking this person whom everyone wants to be with.  In the context of evermore, “gold rush” continues the glorious vibes established early on.  I love the rhythmic nature of the verses and the refrain sections.  “What it must be like to grow up that beautiful?” Swift sings in the first verse.  In the refrain, she gets saltier, adding, “At dinner parties, I call you out on your contrarian shit / And the coastal town we wandered ‘round had never seen a love as pure as it.” As always, the songwriting is top-notch, particularly the catchy chorus previously explored. Adding to the radiance of this ‘golden’ cut is the outro, featuring delightful, lush vocals (“Gleaming, twinkling / Eyes like sinking ships on waters”).  

Appears in 🔻:  

• Gold: 5ive Songs No. 4 (2022)
• 11 Songs That Are Golden to the Core (2022)

5. Mac Miller, “Rush Hour”

💿 GO:OD AM • 🏷 Warner • 📅 2015

“I’m a deranged motherfucker, took too many uppers / Now it’s Rush Hour, Jackie Chan, Chris Tucker.” Well, on 🎵 “Rush Hour,” the late, great 🎙 Mac Miller is true to self.  The excerpted lyrics from the second verse of the third track from 💿 GO:OD AM don’t require too much analysis or decoding.  He references the movie franchise, Rush Hour, starring actors 🎭 Jackie Chan and 🎭 Chris Tucker, as well as being crazy because, frankly, he’s high as fuck. Backtracking, Mac clearly doesn’t give a fuck, two, or any fucks, per verse one: “I give a fuck less and less everyday / The more you give a fuck, I guess the less you make.” That said, does the 🏆 Grammy-nominated rapper really not care? Well, to his credit, he has to, right? He’s candid about his demons – drug dealing and being a user –  as well as others’ perceptions (“Yeah, they tell me, ‘Get yourself straight’”). Miller also makes it clear that the world doesn’t really care, unfortunately, something he highlights in the chorus:  

“I’m just tryna grow up old and rich

Maybe get married to a local bitch

I be, I be, I be, I be over shit

The world don’t give a fuck about your loneliness.”

Ugh, re-listening to “Rush Hour” eight years after its release, and five years after Miller’s untimely death, it reminds me of how talented, though troubled he was.  His flow is insane on this banger, while the production is lit 🔥.  Mac left us far too soon.

Rush: 3 to 5 BOPS No. 59 (2023) [📷: Brent Faulkner / The Musical Hype; Columbia, EMI Recorded Music Australia Production, Taylor Swift, Wondaland Productions LLC / Bad Boy Records LLC; NastyaSensei from Pexels]