MARVIN SEASE
Playa Haters | CD REVIEW

Marvin Sease

Playa Haters

  Marvin Sease was residing in Louisiana at the time of his first Malaco release, but still had a house in New York, too.  A big change in his music life was switching over to Malaco after seven albums for Jive since 1993. (We ran a career feature on Marvin in our # 3/96 issue).  Marvin: “I personally felt like Malaco would promote me better.  There was a big financial difference between Jive and Malaco, but if I got the promotion the money would automatically come.  There were no bad feelings or bad blood between Jive and I.  I had a wonderful career with Polygram Records and Jive Records.  I left because of business reasons.”

  Marvin is still immensely popular in southern states.  “I’d like to think that I draw equally all over.  If I go to New York, and everywhere where I’ve been, I have a strong following; the same thing in California and up north.”

  Playa Haters (Malaco; ’04) presents ten new songs written and produced by Marvin himself.  “We recorded my ten tracks at Muscle Shoals.  I did the vocals at Malaco studios in Jackson, and we mixed it at Malaco.”  On the set there are live musicians only – such as David Hood (bass), Jimmy Johnson (guitar), James Robertson (drums) and Clayton Ivey (keyboards) – and a strong horn section; not to mention three background voices of LaKeisha Burks, Valerie Kashimura and Freddy Young.

  Besides Marvin’s ten tunes there are three songs produced by Wolf Stephenson and Tommy Couch, Sr.  George Jackson’s Bad Love Affair is a catchy dancer, while the first single, a laid-back swayer called I Wanna Do Ya, was earlier cut by the Rose Brothers about eighteen years ago.  A poppy ditty titled Sit Down On It has a Caribbean beat to it.  “I wanted to try something different, just to get the feel and see how the public would react to it.”

  Playa Haters, a swaying slowie, seems to be a popular phrase these days.  “There’s a lot of people that have ‘playa hate’, and especially on Marvin Sease.  Whatever reason, I’ve found out lately that a lot of entertainers are jealous of me, and I wanted to write about it.  That song and F.A. Ya’ll are mainly dedicated to the entertainers, who’ve got a personal thing against Marvin.”  F.A. Ya’ll is a dancer with a never-ending, ticking beat and with the lyrics based on personal experience.  “We changed the title to F.A. Ya’ll from the original title of Fuck All Ya’ll, because we needed to sell the record at places like Wal-Mart.”

  A word of warning in the form of a fast mover called Everything You Eat Ain’t Good could actually be re-titled Candy Licker III.  “I deliberately wrote it that way.”  Pump My Juice is musically and lyrically similar with the punch line of “let me pump my juice in you.”  “People are used to me with those type of lyrics.”  Other uptempo cuts include the rather indifferent Pack It Up, a beater called Cheatin’ John – evolving from a half-spoken sermon into a beater – and the rolling Who’s Knocking At My Door.  A nice and smooth mid-tempo floater titled Too Good To Be With You kicks off almost like Rock Your Baby.

  This time there are less ballads than we’ve come to expect from a typical Marvin Sease album, but Mrs. Right in its own way makes it up by being an impressive and melodic slowie, poignant and emotive.  I Wanna Rock You is interpreted in a more late-night mood.  “I went in with twenty-two songs and picked from those.  It’s just the way it came to me.  I love uptempo, but my fans, I think, like me more with ballads.  I would usually have more ballads.”

  “Wolf Stephenson just took the CD under his wings.  He stayed there many hours, above normal hours, trying to make sure that everything would look and sound right.  I owe a lot to him for this CD.  We are currently getting ready to do a live concert video, January the 8^th, in Montgomery, Alabama.”

Heikki Suosalo