What makes the perfect sexy music video? Some say it’s the anticipation of the final scene, or the slow motion of the artists lips moving with the music. If you toss in some beautiful women in lingerie with a sprinkle of rose petals, smooth beats, and sensual lyrics theses videos come to life. All these elements bond together to mix up a sinful four minute experience that gets embedded in our heads. Next thing you know you’re re-creating the magic in your private sanctuaries. 

So lets get it on started :

Day 26- “So Good”

Marques Houston- “Naked”

Usher- “Trading Places”

Usher- “Nice and Slow”

Ray-J-”One Wish”

R.Kelly- “Honey Love”

112-”Anywhere”

Blackstreet-”Deep”

Ginuwine-”When We Make Love”

Tyrese-”Lately”

Jagged Edge- “Put A Lil Umph In It”

Boys 2 Men-”I’ll Make Love To You”

Avant-”Don’t Say No”

And last but certainly not least…

D’Angelo-” Untitled”

Fans are hyped over the Jay-Z and Alicia Keys duet performance (sans Lil’ Mama) on the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. Listening to these two heavy hitters on the “Empire State of Mind” track recalls to mind all the other collaborations in music. Songs with one superstar are good, but songs with two or more superstars are even better.

Watch the music videos for some of the hottest track collaborations over the years:

Jay-Z, Rihanna and Kanye West – “Run This Town”

Jay-Z and Alicia Keys – “Empire State of Mind”

Jay-Z and Mary J Blige – “Can’t Knock the Hustle”

T.I., Kanye West, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z and M.I.A. – “Swagga Like Us”

T.I. and Justin Timberlake – “Dead and Gone”

Ciara and Justin Timberlake – “Love, Sex and Magic”

Diddy, Jermaine Dupri, Murphy Lee and Snoop Dogg – “Welcome To Atlanta (remix)”

Diddy, Faith and 112 – “I’ll Be Missing You”

Busta Rhymes, DMX, Mary J Blige, Missy, Rah Digga, Papoose and Lloyd Banks – “Touch It (remix)”

Busta Rhymes and Janet Jackson – “What’s It Gonna Be”

Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson – “Scream”

R. Kelly and “Mr. Biggs” (The Isley Brothers) saga -

• “Down Low (Nobody Has to Know)”

• “Contagious”

• Kelly Price’s “Friend of Mine (remix)”

Drake and Trey Songz – “Successful”

Left Eye, Lil’ Kim, Missy, Angie Martinez and Da Brat – “Ladies Night”

Brandy and Monica – “The Boy is Mine”

Robert Kelly stares at the cover of Vibe magazine for a second, then rolls it into a column of paper that he might use to swat a fly. “R. Kelly Special Report: Innocent Or Guilty?”

“This is nothing different we’ve heard from six years ago and even then I’ll say what I would have said then: I’m a professional, and in my world you can be at one level or another level. I understand the depth of my struggle is gonna determine the heights of my success and I’m willing to go deep to go high. This is one of the depths that gets me to the heights. You stoop to jump, and the lower you go the higher you go.”

He flips the contraband on the hotel bed near us. “I don’t worry about stuff like this because my fans don’t worry about stuff like this. I don’t worry about stuff like this because my family and God don’t worry about stuff like this. And now that I’ve accomplished the things that I’ve done, the haters have become my inspiration for staying on top. Whenever people tell me I can’t or won’t stay on top, I have to. I’m more hungrier than I was in the subway, then I was selling stockings and putting on a suit with a bowtie, perpetrating that I was a Muslim, selling bean pies. You gonna have these kind of people after you who do what they have to do to sell magazines. You can’t stop them. But I have the ball and I’m running toward the touchdown…”

ALSO READ: The Pursuit Of Thandie-Ness

For a while this year, you couldn’t turn on the radio without hearing R. Kelly. There he was with Snoop riding the stately staccato rhythms of “That’s That Shit.” There he was putting it down with Ciara and “taking it down to the old school” on the ultra-sexy remix of “Promise.” There he was anointing Young Jeezy with his R.-ness on the masterful “Go Gettas.” Most superstars go away when they don’t have a new record out to sell, huddling up to produce the next project that will plaster them across video channels and MTV. Not R. Kelly. There’s too much music to be made, too much fun to be had remixing hits into even bigger hits, too much inspiration to feed the beast that is the radio constantly playing in his head. How does he do it? Why does he do it? The man who was just burned by the interview-less, scandal-mongering tabloid treatment, finds comfort and solace in the close creative quarters of a recording studio, spinning out the kind of music that keeps fans (and other artists and music industry execs) begging for more. Amid the kind of allegations that would ruin some men, that would derail the career of a lesser musician, it appears as if R. Kelly is bigger than ever, making music for the ages. All you have to do is hear the open-throated yodel that greets the ear on “Go Gettas” or the smooth-talking Lothario giving his “Promise” and you know why he’s still at the top of his game, you know, indeed, that this is why he’s, still, well, hot.

He tells me that he “doubled up” on this new CD for one main reason. “Because I’m mad,” he says, his face a serene mask of patience, as a hairstylist braids his long hair into backswept cornrows before a photo shoot in Chicago. He’s mad at the fact that “some people don’t appreciate good music.”

I ask R. Kelly who those “some people” are, if they’re just the gossips and chatterboxes or if he’s talking more about music industry types.

“A little bit of all those,” he answers. “Usually when anybody hates anybody it’s because they hate themselves, ‘cause they don’t know how to be go-gettas enough to go get what the person they hate has gotten. I work hard for the money, and there’s a lot of work that goes into being R. Kelly. They don’t see the work and blood sweat and tears that went into being R Kelly.”

Check out the Giant exclusive R. Kelly gallery below!

The generalizations continue, in that Third Person Superstar Singular manner, until I ask him about how appreciated he is by the music industry, considering every artist on virtually every label seems to have recorded or is in line to record an R. Kelly song or production or remix.

“It’s one thing to appreciate somebody, but it’s another thing to hold your nose and get what you need from them. Some people hold their nose. I’ve done collaborations in the past and it was hot as hell and then don’t no video happen. Or people get up at the Grammys or some award show and win for some thing I did for them and my name don’t get mentioned. Shit like that has happened a lot in the business. But I don’t trip on it. This is the first time I’ve even ever mentioned it…

“It don’t stop me,” he yells at me right before heading off to smile for the camera. Why? “Cause niggas and chicks lie, but stats don’t!”

Double Up was originally going to be a suite of love songs called Makin’ Babies, made up of nine songs that lovingly tracked the nine-month gestation period before a woman brings a life into the world. But, before he realized it, he’d had twenty songs written and recorded. He was either going to have to nail it down to the best nine or leave it as is, and that would have been some baby to deliver. But in the process of making that baby—R. Kelly says he thinks of his records “like a body, like a person with nose, eyes, teeth, legs arms, all the elements that go with a body”—the calls for outside remix work were pouring in.

“I put my all into a remix because it’s like, I got the hit already, so now I can relax.” He sits forward, a bright smile on his face, the kind of smile that can only shine on the face of a man who knows that he truly is on his game, and is happy to be talking about.  “It’s like playing a pickup game after you won the championship, it’s all easy and relaxed now and you gonna kill, ‘cause you already won the game. Like I got on “Ignition.” I know y’all love that; well, if you love that, I’ma really kill y’all now.”

I watch R. Kelly as he’s being photographed in a sleek and elegant suite of Chicago’s iconic Drake Hotel. Tracks from Double Up explode from tiny speakers hooked up to a small clock stereo. He’s spinning when asked to, smiling when asked to, and stroking poses for the photographer like a guy who’s done this millions of times to sell millions of records. There are reps from his label Jive Records hovering around, and security guards, and the R. Kelly Style Crew waiting nearby to fix a collar or dab a bead of sweat away. It occurs to me that this kid from Chicago’s South Side—who grew up with little to nothing and has now traveled the world as a global superstar—has probably spent much time in hotel rooms, living his American Dream with a vengeance, a commodity sleeping within a commodity. It occurs to me that when you live part of your life in hotel rooms, touring and chatting and being such a public figure, you have to work doubly hard to keep the clichés at bay, to find a bit of authenticity in the world that feeds your soul the nutrients of real life that you need to stay alive. It occurs to me that R. Kelly must do that by crafting music as sturdy and timeless as the furniture lining the hotel suite. And it doesn’t surprise me when he tells me that he the melody of maybe his most famous song—the one that is, truly, a standard at this point in pop culture—came to him as he slept in a hotel room after a performance on tour. I ask R. Kelly how he came up with “I Believe I Can Fly.”

“I was going through something in my life. I was breaking up with my management and I felt like I was gonna be out there on my own. I had been with them for so long, I didn’t have any connections to anybody, didn’t know anybody. It was a really stressed out point in my life. I used to play with Michael at the athletic club in Chicago with him on the weekends and he was doing Space Jam. He asked me to write a song for the movie. I really believe God sent Michael Jordan to me and being the guy that I am, I like to do something big. And don’t let somebody big in their field ask me to do something, ‘cause then I’m really gonna be charged to go forth and do the greatest thing I can to match the intensity of who they are. Jordan is the greatest. I was on tour with Biggie, laying in the hotel room in Detroit and—

[he sings the verse melody that leads into the chorus]

—the whole melody just came into my head, like haunting me, and I was like a fiend, like a crackhead. Usually I’d sing into a tape recorder, but I didn’t have one that night, so I had to call up the hotel and ask them to unlock the piano in the lobby. I was, like, in a panic ‘cause I just had to get it out on something so I’d be able to remember it and [eventually] record it. Biggie was there when I wrote it. He came into the lobby after the after party and I was in the lobby writing. He said it was gonna be one of the biggest songs of my career. That was a magical moment.”

Was that radio playing in his head that night? He nods. “There’s a radio playing in my head consistently every day and every second. And there are different stations. There’s a hiphop station, rock, pop, blues, jazz, everything possible you hear on the radio is on my radio first. So when I go into the studio I know what I’m gonna lay down ‘cause nine times out of ten I’m laying down what I’ve already heard in my head. And I heard it finished.” He adds with a laugh, “I even saw it selling, saw people in the club jamming to it, and saw people makin’ love to it. I just go into my head and copy it. It’s almost like I’m stealing,” he adds with a grin, “From myself!

“I believe that I respect music so much, respect the gift of music and creativity so much, that creativity pays me back in a creative way. It’s like going to the gym and lifting weights. You don’t just go at it, you’ll hurt something if you don’t respect the weight. And I respect the weight of music. I’m able to go in any area of music and spiritually come up with whatever that character or culture of that music is. The spirit of music opens the door for me. I am music and music is me.”

I tell Robert Kelly that not since perhaps the reign of Michael Jackson can I think of an artist who’s music is so appealing in such a cross-generational sort of way. I tell him that each member of my family, my parents in their 60s, my sister in her 30s and me, all have a favorite R. Kelly song. He seems to relax when I tell him that, as if he’s finally heard what he’s needed to hear to make this interview worth his time. He tells me it’s because he’s old school mixed with the new. “That’s the mentality to have,” he says proudly. And it’s about soul. “I feel like the soul is missing out here. I know cause I grew up around my moms and them playin’ cards and playing a lot of Al Green and Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder and I know what that music did for us and I know its part of why I am who I am today. That’s why I got the young people loving me and they’re mommas loving me, you know? The soul is about that old school mentality and you can’t deny that, you can’t deny what’s real.”

Is it real that he can go from “Happy People” to “I Like the Crotch on You”?

“Absolutely. It just comes from different places within me, different attitudes, and different moods. Some days we’re up, some days we’re down, some days we care, some days we don’t give a fuck, and all those things are in me. When I make music all those things can creep out, the good, the bad, the sad, the evil, the church, the drama, the pain, the joy, sometimes all in the same song.”

Which is why, despite all the horrible allegations, R. Kelly still seems to connect with women listeners so well. Until Robin Thicke came along, was there anyone on the radio who loved to love sistas like R. Kelly does? “That’s songwriting ability. But it’s also the ability to understand women and give them what they want and not be afraid to give it to them. I’m sayin’ things that they wanna hear in my music that other cats aren’t…”Down Low,” “Ignition,” women love my metaphors. They know what I’m saying, they know when I’m being a little sarcastic or whatever but they love the melody [and how] it touches their hearts. Through my music, I think I have a personal relationship with every woman on earth.”

We may never know the real story behind the allegations put forth against R. Kelly. But do we really need to know? Or do we just deserve to get the best of what he does care to share with us, the beautiful results of his musical gift?

“I just have that confidence in me that my mother and my teachers instilled in me,” he tells me before we say our goodbyes as the sun is about to rise in Chicagoland. “‘Don’t worry about what the people think because you are the people.’ And I still feel that way to this day. So musically if I take that attitude and keep that in me, I’ll never lose the soul, ‘cause once you lose the soul you’re dead.”

For more with R. Kelly, check out his exclusive GIANT interview here!

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On Being A Prince Fan(atic)

I don’t only love hip-hop. I don’t even think I love hip-hop, but anyway… Peep this new track from upcoming R&B singer Kevin “KC” Cossom.

The first act signed to superproducer Danja’s new imprint New Age Rock Stars (N.A.R.S), Cossom is a 24-year-old Orlando native, who’s written hooks for Rick Ross, R. Kelly and Young Jeezy.

Peep his first single, the Frank E-produced “Late Night” below:

Tired of spooning? Here are few tracks that will have you ready to fork!

Minnie Riperton – “Inside My Love”

Lloyd -  “Party All Over Your Body”

Joi – “Lick”

Scarface – “Fuck Faces”

Prince – “Adore”

Janet Jackson – “Would You Mind”

Des’ree – “I’m Kissing You”

Marvin Gaye -  “Feel All My Love Inside”

R. Kelly – “Sex in the Kitchen”

The Isley Brothers – “Foot Steps in the Dark”

Art Of Noise – “Moments Of Love”

Usher – “Trading Places”

Hate him or love him, R. Kelly is an undeniable star. Check out his exclusive GIANT photo shoot below:

And for more R. Kelly, click here to read outtakes from his GIANT feature!

R. Kelly’s Double Up, which recently hit stores, is more edgy and more hip-hop than any of the Kells’ recent releases. GIANT sat down with the R&B maestro to talk about the method to his musical madness and find out what caused this street-savvy shift in sound and sense…

On the sound of Double Up:
“The R&B joints is what made me, but the vibe is more hiphop, way more hiphop than ever, as far as R. Kelly is concerned.”

“I got like seven midtempo-type ballads that you can slow bob to. But other than that it’s maybe nine or ten uptempo club bangers on it. I’ve just taken every thing I’ve done over the last sixteen years and doubled up on it.”

On the haters:
“The haters sparks fire in me to strive even more and work harder. And stay hungrier. I’m very competitive and the more you talk about me, the more I’m gonna ride and the more I’m gonna strive and stay focused. Thank God for my fans sand radio stations cause all that overwhelms the bullshit as far as the haters.”

On working with other artists on remixes:
“Remixes are about fun. It’s almost like mama jokes to me. You got some good mama jokes and I got some, you hit me up then I got some. You go first show me what you got and if they good we gonna trade off and use em. We just change up and trade up.”

“I’ve been doing this for years now. When I work with Polow [Da Don] and them [for instance], they learned things from me, they’re honored to work with me. And I’m honored to be with them. They’re the youth, the new guys coming up, and I’m proud to work with them. There’s such a strong mutual respect between all of us and when you go in the studio with people with that mutual respect, ain’t nothing but magic gonna come outta that. Polow, The Runners, they’re fresh have fresh ideas and I get inspired by fresh ideas. It inspires me to go into the studio and do something good [for myself]. It’s a silent competition. But it’s all good if you know how to keep it in perspective and have fun with it. A lot of kats don’t understand that the point of a remix is to make it better than the record, not just change it. They think that if they just change it that should do it, but what they’re really doing is just killing the original song. And that’s when you hear people say ‘Ah, I like the original better, why you do that?’ I put my all into a remix because I got the hit already, now I can relax.”

On fear:
“You cannot be afraid. When I did ‘I Believe I Can Fly’ it was at a time in my life where the moon and the stars, as they say, lined up and it all fell into place. I needed some healing and sometimes the doctor has to inject his own self. That’s what I was feeling like, and I felt like I was I was writing something that would inspire myself to come up out of what I was dealing with it and going through, being depressed and being down. I’d gained a lot of weight. I needed uplift. And it worked.”

On his musical influences:
“I usually don’t hear my influences til the song is over with. When I’m writing I’m so into what I’m hearing on the radio in my head that I’m just like, ‘Wow, I can’t wait to finish this so everybody else can hear what I’ve just heard.’ It’s like there’s a monster in the backyard, and you’re just like, ‘Look out the window, y’all!’ I just want people to hear what’s in my head and I just be anxious to get into the studio and get it done. Once it’s done it’s like, ‘Oh man, that riff like there is like some Same Cooke shit.’”

On being compared to Ne-Yo and other young, up-and-coming songwriters:
“You know someone asked me what I think about Ne-Yo. I said, ‘He’s a great talent, he’s promising. [This person] said, ‘Well, he kinda reminds people of you, do you think he’s another R. Kelly?’ And I said I’ll never be able to answer that question and the reason why – no disrespect to Ne-Yo – is the simple fact that when he can look back fifteen years and leave a trail of nothing but hits he’ll still never catch up to me cause then I’ll be thirty years deep. That’s why I’ll never be able to answer that. And you know what happens when he get to thirty years.”

“When I was talking about competition earlier, I should tell you, when I talk like that, that’s me not relaxing. When I’m up twenty I always play like I’m down forty.”

For more  with R. Kelly, check out his exclusive GIANT photo gallery here!