One artist stands on the bedside of her career, watching the glorious birth of her discography after a four-year debut album pregnancy, whilst the other sheds a tear for the imminent death of his own as he nears the cusp of his run with the mic. United under the song “Free Fall”, Nigerian songstress Tems and North Carolina rapper J. Cole represent two opposite ends of one musical spectrum expressed manifestly through the matrimony between the songbird’s youthful yearning and the lyricist’s sagacious cunning. The salacious output takes up the form of a melodic dance of sexual tension fraught with the tug-of-war that comes with the struggle of not knowing whether to sacrifice more pieces of yourself for the life of a dying relationship or to walk away and keep what little dignity is left.
The three-minute-long “Free Fall” assumes the build of an R&B song with dancehall sensibilities standing on dreamy and nostalgic production consisting of a thumping yet inertia-inducing bass augmented by warped cowbell strikes, sporadic hi-hats, and a guitar loop reminiscent of Sting’s iconic 1993 single “Shape of My Heart”.
Tems
A tragedy wrought from two lovers possessed by mistrust and disoriented by heartbreak, “Free Fall” is a clash of worlds with conflicting interests spawning from soil fecund with questions about the authenticity of love (“I have fallen too deep / And you watched me, then you fall in with me”) and the power one has over oneself when in love (“I don’t know if I can fight what you do in my mind”). With Tems playing the discontented but not altogether disenchanted lover, J. Cole ensconces himself within the niche of Tems’ weakness, attempting to carve himself a place in her heart from which he has been banished.
The storyline, however, holds deeper implications.
With tactical imagery like Tems’: “Too late for you, baby, I don’t think I can let you in / I’m not opened up anymore” and Cole’s response: “Now the key I once had to your heart does not fit / I got three choices: batter your door or lock-pick”, the pair set the stage for a tumultuous power struggle. Governed by attachment-induced resistance and Cole’s failure to reconcile himself to the humbling reality that they are unsuitable as a couple, the musicians find themselves as helpless props stuck within a loop that condemns Cole to living life as an obsessive ex with stalker tendencies and Tems to unwitting servitude of circumstance.
Yet, the pair are intentional in driving the sour romance forward. Tems’ soft and resigned crooning coupled with lyricist’s forceful delivery and sense of urgent desperation illustrate the lopsided power dynamics which render participants of such unhealthy breakups as hapless marionettes dangling on the strings of their emotions. The song, in real time, represents the dichotomous wrestling match that goes on in the mind when a relationship ends as well as the ensuing ramifications one has to live with externally.
Listen to “Free Fall”:
