Though Next have made a name for themselves with steamy bedroom ballads and hot dance cuts, their current single, "Wifey" — at #1 on this week's Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks chart —
is all about romance and commitment.
"The song is about your real girl, the one who you keep coming back to no matter what happens," the group's lead singer and chief songwriter, R.L. (born R.L. Huggar), said from his home in Minneapolis. "Even though a lot of my songs are pretty explicit, I wanted to show that Next is romantic, too."
"Wifey" (RealAudio excerpt) came out in April and has been steadily climbing the chart since. The trio's second album, Welcome II Nextasy, came out June 20.
This isn't the first time one of Next's hits made a slow climb to #1. Their previous big hit, "Too Close" (RealAudio excerpt), from their 1999 album, Rated Next, didn't reach that level until early 2000.
" 'Wifey' peaked for us about a month ago, and it's still extremely popular," said Chris Lee, program director of WKPO in Janesville, Wis. "I didn't expect it to do so well, because it's not one of those songs like 'Too Close,' where when you hear it, you immediately know the dance floor is going to be full."
Whether singing about romance or sex, R.L. said Next always try for realism in their lyrics.
"We just sing about what every guy is thinking, but sometimes they don't want to admit it," R.L. said, trying to divide his attention between the telephone and the game of "NBA 2000" he had going on his PlayStation. He pointed to the song "Banned From T.V.," from Welcome II Nextasy, as an example.
"Guys always think about what they'd do if they came home and found their girlfriend with someone else," he said. "If it's with a man, they always say they'd kill him. If it's with another woman, they always say they'd join in. So that's what I wrote."
The group's next single is "Beauty Queen" (RealAudio excerpt), a song that tells a woman she doesn't need to play into stereotypes to find love.
Next — R.L., Tweet (born Raphael Shawan) and T-Low (whose birth name is unavailable) — spent the summer playing various radio station summer jams across the States, but R.L. said he's always writing, even when he's on the road.
"Whenever I see something, anything, I'm always thinking about how I can turn it into a song," he said. "You've got to make it real, but you've also got to make it unique, so that people will think about whatever it is in a new way."
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