THE UNFINISHED PLAYLIST VOL. 2 — LOVE, LUST & RUIN
🔥 LUST
1. Squirrel Friend — Imperator
Steven's own coinage. A calm but dead-serious warning, built from real post-divorce experience and countless conversations with men. Funny lines ("eat these nuts") cut the tension, but the lesson is cold: some women are for a night, never for life.
2. Take It In the Face — Imperator and LaDrena Arebeegee Louden
Imperator asks the question most men hesitate to voice. LaDrena fires back with the same energy — flipping the lens and demanding an answer. Bass-heavy, percussive, built on claps and a siren-like synth melody. Unapologetic.
3. Rosetta Stone — Imperator
Her body is speaking a language he's determined to learn. The hook is a masterclass in metaphor — "Rosetta Stone ain't, teach me what you saying girl." Autotune on the bridge, 808s, bells, synths. The punchline? His girl probably noticed her before he did.
4. Substitute Lover — Imperator
She hid his shoes. He's reminding her — she knew the deal from day one. "You squirt and I skeet then we sleep then I'm gone." Not autobiographical, but true enough to sting.
5. In the Night Time — Imperator
Inspired by Con Funk Shun's "Love Train," rapped over Slick Rick's "Children's Story" instrumental with Rick's cadence. A playful booty-call chess match — two lovers trying to outmaneuver each other while someone's partner sleeps in the next room. "If she answers and she whispers, she's in bed with her friend."
❤️ LOVE
6. I Love You Girl — Imperator and Ms. Solex
Written in 2002. The opening lines say it all: "I met you in '79, you were a virgin back then / You hadn't traveled the world or hung out with all these men." It's a love letter to hip-hop itself — through the fame, the mistreatment, the heartbreak. Ms. Solex's vocals float over a sample of The Manhattans' "It Feels So Good To Be Loved So Bad." Laid-back, reflective, earned.
7. Chiquita — Imperator
Named after the Chiquita banana girl — not a real person, just a memory of beauty on a commercial. Dirty South beat and flow, inspired by a 2005 tour through the South. The hook says it plain: "Let that monkey, let that monkey, let that monkey get loose." Pure celebration. No drama.
8. Lotta Flow — Imperator
Imperator at full power — bars, style, and a party where even enemies keep the peace because the women are out. "Man put that fucking gun away, it's kids up in this party." Drawn from real nights where rivals coexisted — and real nights where they didn't. "Another margarita for every señorita, the party 'bout to pop, the piñata full of reefer."
9. Picture That — Imperator
The loyalty track. He sees the temptation, imagines it vividly — "you probably taste like licorice" — but won't cross the line. Synths, horns, running hi-hats. Autobiographical at its core: Steven wrote this from years of walking away. And there's real fear in it — "my significant other got a trey eight, six rounds, and two big brothers." A Walmart parking lot favorite when he was selling CDs by hand.
💔 RUIN
10. Ali Baba Girl — Imperator
The beat came first, then the story. Steven's childhood fascination with "Open Sesame" becomes a layered narrative — part fantasy gigolo, part thief, part industry diss. He's robbing the princess of her jewels while roasting mediocre rappers. Storytelling rap at its most ambitious.
11. Judy — Imperator
The emotional anchor of the volume. Dark piano-bell chords, strings, a whistling melody, triplet hi-hats rolling underneath. A missing-persons story — Instagram models flown out by rich men, one doesn't come back. Steven wants to perform this with an orchestra one day. It's not connected to any chapter in the book, but it haunts the playlist.
12. Love Ain't For the Lonely — Imperator
Connected to Chapter 13: "Forty Years, Then Nothing." This is the autobiography. A warning delivered before the marriage ended — "Don't complicate the situation, girl, you made that choice." The hook carries the weight: "Love ain't for the lonely when your one and only ain't with you no more." the song moves at the speed of grief.
13. Crazy Love — 73 bpm | F minor (4A)
The final stop. A toxic couple fighting, shooting, laughing, staying. The opening scene — she overhears "Nina" and thinks he's cheating with a woman name Nina (Nina's his 9mm) — is darkly comic. Then she grabs the gun and fires three times. Partly based on the break-up-to-make-up cycle Steven lived. The slowest, darkest track closes the volume on the "Ruin" it promised.
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