Chedventures

Anyone who’s met me knows that Pat Earrings by Casisdead is my favourite song of all time. Every year when the annual Spotify Wrapped comes around again, Pat Earrings is inevitably and continually my most played song of the year. I don’t even remember the first time I heard this song, as I feel like I’ve known and listened to it forever (despite only being released in 2018, when I was 20 – I’m now 25). On the surface of it, I really like how this song sounds. It just sounds good in my ears. But it’s a song I think about all the time, it makes me feel a certain way, it takes me back to specific eras of my life. It makes me feel like I’m floating. I find the lyrics, while a discussion of a scenario I and most people haven’t found themselves in before, to be poignantly relatable. For both sides of the tale (which I’ll discuss in more detail later) to be simultaneously melancholically, grittily relatable yet immensely and starkly contrasting is fascinating to me.

The overall vibe and feel of the song is what draws you in. It sounds euphoric, synthy, and nostalgic – so much so, that I created a nostalgia playlist on Spotify solely inspired by the feeling Pat Earrings gives me. The production on this song is nuts. The synthy beat is wildly reminiscent of 80s music, and the floaty, blissful-feeling backing music under Aruba Jasmine’s breathy and ethereal vocals takes the listener somewhere. The song is a first-hand account of a man, the storyteller Cas, falling in love with an escort and eventually getting his heart broken; the floaty, euphoric feeling the listener gets from the beat and vocals contrasts completely with Casisdead’s gritty, harsh vocals and his explicit lyrical content. The juxtaposition of this is intriguing, and this song is very different to the rest of Casisdead’s musical catalogue (check out his 2014 album The Number 23). To have such a smooth, buoyant sounding backing track with jagged and harsh spitting over the top is instantly interesting to the listener, as the blend of two such different sounds is unexpected and not all that widespread.

As mentioned, the song tells the story from the perspective of a man who’s fallen for a sex worker. Within both contemporary pop culture and media as well as historically, sex workers and escorts are objectified, abused and used, and in best-case scenarios plainly sneered at and looked down upon. This is symptomatic of a patriarchal, misogynistic society that views women as objects and sexual beings for the use of men, who can then be discarded, manipulated and abused whenever men have had enough of them. Rap and hip-hop music has long been (often falsely) conceived as being misogynist and enabling the objectification of women (see https://www.growthinktank.org/en/is-it-okay-to-be-a-feminist-and-listening-to-sexist-rap/ for further discussion of rap and misogyny). However, at no point does Cas talk down on the girl who’s the subject of his desires, and seems to be understanding, in awe of and on her side always in the song. The mysterious-sounding and floaty vocals and music further solidifies this, as it seems to symbolise the way Cas sees this girl. He sees her as enigmatic, otherworldly, dreamlike. He’d do anything for her, he’d forgive her regardless of her actions (which he pretty much admits with his lyrics, but more on this later). Sonically the music makes us feel euphoric, which mirrors the feeling Cas gets when thinking about, talking about or seeing the girl he’s infatuated with. As a listener, we are transported to this feeling of pure awe, love, respect, infatuation, and passion Cas feels for her. We understand his emotional response and the way he reacted when he first met her, as well as how he felt about her immediately after; this is done both explicitly and overtly through lyrics such as “when I first saw her it was end credits” (this one makes me feel something every time) as well as sonically through the floaty sensation we get from the 80s-inspired synth background and dramatic drum beat.

The lyrics and story are also paramount to contributing to the feel and story of the song. Pat Earrings tells the firsthand account of a man who pauses the mundanity of his life, falls in love with an escort, and subsequently gets his heart broken after being betrayed by broken promises of fidelity. All while doing this, Cas maintains a cool, aloof theme to his lyrics, seemingly like it is or was no big deal. But despite this, one of the overarching themes and motifs is that either he’s still hurting and pretending not to care, or is starting to come to terms with it and is solemn and sombre when recalling this love story. He tends to be a little self-deprecating; for example, in the first verse “Missed call tennis / Now I’m getting jealous / Maybe I was overzealous” he is instantly putting the blame on himself, stating the reason for his love interest not speaking to him sooner must be his fault for coming on too strong. He is communicating this through an emotional lens and is still figuring out how to process the leadup to the fallout. I previously mentioned that at no point does Cas blame the girl, talk ill of her, or paint her in any kind of negative light; instead painting an introspective, often self-deprecating picture of how he handled a romantic situation. While most of us haven’t had the exact experience Cas speaks of, it feels as though every listener can relate to this. How often have we worried about getting our hopes up too soon, being too ‘keen’, coming on too strong too soon? I recently watched a video essay about the paradoxical phenomenon that the more specific or niche lyrics and art are, the more relatable they are. This is a prime example: I have personally never been in this exact position, in Cas’ exact shoes, but something about the way he views his actions and emotions seems to resonate. The underlying self-deprecation, regret and remorse masked by an external ruse of indifference resonates in a reflective, insightful way.

Cas also displays how strong his feelings are for his love interest, exemplified by “Got the text, dipped on the fellas / Straight to her premises, it’s always the premise”, highlighting how he would and did drop everything for the chance to see her. While it’s obviously stated that the love interest is a sex worker (“Money on the nightstand, making all the right sounds”) it is also very clearly displayed how Cas has feelings for her that go deeper than physical intimacy and sexual transaction. This is seen throughout verse one, for example “And maybe I want more than just right now”; “I love her too much to pay in duds”. This already demonstrates an interesting emotional difference and uneven playing field; if the woman Cas desires is a sex worker, she will be used to seeing multiple clients and even having clients mistake paid transactional intimacy for genuine feelings of reciprocated love. While this isn’t necessarily a unique and brand-new concept of a man falling for a female sex worker, Cas’ outlook on it seems fresh in its pure, unconditional love. By combining the nostalgic feel of the music with this seeming path to emotional destruction for our protagonist, we infer this won’t be a straightforward fairytale of requited love. This, again, is something that as a listener we can all understand and empathise with; haven’t we all been in a situation of unrequited feelings, blindly hoping we are right to trust our feelings? How many times have we all believed or constructed explanations of behaviours to suit our idealised narrative of a person we hold romantic feelings for?

While the first verse sets the foundational scenes for the story in Pat Earrings, the chorus juxtaposes the often harsh-sounding, gritty vocals and lyrics of Casisdead with the beautiful floaty vocals of Aruba Jasmine singing “I know you want it, come and get it, I’ma give it to ya”. Not only is her voice gorgeous, sounding both floaty and distant as well as sexy and inviting, but she’s actually a porn star. Considering the occupation of the female love interest in Pat Earrings, this is pretty fitting. She sings in a way that sounds aloof, almost detached from the person she’s singing to. This fits the narrative of the song that Cas is far more romantically involved in the girl than she is in him. It’s also interesting to note that in many songs (especially rap/hip-hop/grime songs), when a male is telling a story about love or sex, it tends to be that he’s the one being chased by women, the one being desired and selective. In Pat Earrings it’s the other way round. It’s almost refreshing to hear the gravelly, deep voice of Casisdead pine after a woman, show vulnerability and introspection, while the female vocalist is the one being distant and demonstrating lack of interest and abundance of other suitors. It intrigues the listener and we hear a new perspective; Cas challenges typical toxic and hegemonic masculinity by showing his emotions and vulnerability.

There’s only two verses by Casisdead in this song, and while the first verse tells us how Cas met this woman and his initial feelings for her, verse two is more focused on his feelings after meeting and the nature of their relationship or connection. He makes it explicitly apparent he loves her and wishes for a future with her, beginning the verse with “I’m dead serious / I’m ready now, I wanna get serious / I’m looking for the girlfriend experience”. As aforementioned, it’s refreshing to hear this kind of vulnerability and openness from a man wishing for a commitment with a woman. While as the listener we are aware it may be naïve, foolish or misguided to fall in love with a woman who works in this industry and encounters numerous men and potential suitors, I personally truly believe Cas wants ‘the girlfriend experience’. He makes excuses for her, and will never allow her to be seen as in the wrong, for example “I think I might let her meet the parents / To be fair, I could do without their interference”. He knows his parents may frown upon them as a couple due to her occupation, and rather than highlighting this and potentially bringing her shame, he shifts the focus and excuse onto himself and his own convenience. Not wanting parental interference in a relationship could be true for any person, in any occupation, so by saying this Cas is not shaming his girl or allowing the listener to think thoughts of shame on her. While he may be aware that her profession isn’t the most traditionally respected, and will know that parents of all people will point this out, he doesn’t allow this to affect his feelings towards her and would never allow her to be even mildly humiliated. It’s pretty admirable really.

We are given an account of how their relationship is going, or how Cas would like for it to go: an idealised, hopeless romantic dream of what their life could be. For example, “You wanna be my Valentines? … Married at the Marriott in summertime”. While we are led to believe these events happened, and hope that they did for Cas, a small part of me thinks that this section could potentially be just an idealised, dreamt-up vision for their future. Either way, it sounds like commitment, love and reciprocity are present here. We feel excited, energised and happy for Cas that he’s got (or almost got) his dream girl. Again, as a listener, we can all relate to this feeling of secretly desperately wishing to be happily in love. Whether real or dreamt up, the uncomplicated romance that Cas talks about takes us all back to a certain time in our lives. The bliss and simplicity of reminiscing a positive romantic experience adds to the overall nostalgic theme of the song. However, this period of bliss doesn’t last long for Cas as he soon discovers her betrayal after lying about being loyal: “Said I’m the only one she bangs now … We’re making all these plans / Til I posed as a punter and caught her with her pants down / Heartbroken I’m at wit’s end”. While this is heart-breaking for Cas, as we can all empathise with getting your hopes up and making grand plans to just have it thrown back at you, he must have been feeling some kind of doubt or lack of trust to test whether she would stray or not. This is the only time where Cas seems to somewhat doubt her or not see her as this perfect enigma of a person. This is an all too familiar feeling, where we see someone through rose-tinted glasses for so long, blindly making excuses for someone we see as perfect, to then realise perhaps they aren’t who we’ve hoped. Despite finding a ground of mutual trust, respect and loyalty, Cas demonstrates acting from a place of insecurity and jealousy to test her by acting as another ‘punter’. I don’t think it would be wrong to say that everyone has acted impulsively out of insecurity in a relationship, be it looking through a partner’s phone or comparing yourself to other people/their ex, uncover answers that don’t want to be found. It’s easy to empathise with Cas here, as his story goes from longing and pining to love, for it all to be destroyed by the one person he idealised and loved the most. The final lines by Casisdead “She’s never accepted by my friends / It’s cool cos I never liked them” is a final shout that he would give up everything for this girl and will defend her until the end. For Cas to side with her over all his friends demonstrates despite her wronging him he will always choose her and always defend her.

While we don’t know how Cas’s story ends, whether he stays with her or never sees her again, we can guess that she will always in some way be in his life. He routinely defends her, idealises her and longs for her. While much of the time we can relate to the story of Cas in the way he allows his emotions to dictate action over logic, we also can relate to the girl in the story. She arguably has done nothing wrong; it started with her just doing her job. It’s difficult to get too much from the girl’s side, as Aruba sings the same one line in the chorus and we don’t receive too much of her perspective. It’s apparent she was pursued and seemingly fell into this relationship; Cas asked her to give up her entire occupation almost and thus source of income just for him. While this specifically is an unusual circumstance, the point remains that Cas chased her, asked for the boundaries and also doubted she would stick to them (which in fairness, she didn’t – but she’s still possibly not in the wrong). I find this interesting, as it’s easy to empathise with feeling perhaps lost, unsure, scared in a relationship, especially when the other person’s feelings and emotions seem to be vastly stronger and realised than your own. We’ve all made slip-ups in relationships, possibly done things we maybe shouldn’t, often coming from a place of insecurity or uncertainty. I massively appreciate Casisdead not painting the girl to be in the wrong at all, and to never shift blame onto her. While it’s neither side’s particular fault, more voice is given to Cas’s story and his strong feelings towards her, meaning it’s difficult to get the full picture. In defence of it being no-one’s fault, these two are simply mismatched, want different things and aren’t meant to be. This outcome is something that hits home for all of us, and feeds into the nostalgic, reflective and introspective energy and theme of the whole song.

To conclude, Pat Earrings may just be a rap song about a guy who falls for a prostitute and gets eventually let down by her. It may just sound like a dated, retro backing track with horny-sounding vocals and raspy spitting about an unknown sex worker to some people. Some people may just like the sound of music and art without needing to overanalyse and overcomplicate it. However, to me, this song is beautiful in its raw emotion, vulnerability, self-reflection and self-deprecation. It challenges typical notions within music as well as in society and masculinity. Every time I listen to Pat Earrings I feel transported to this floaty, cloud-like place where I can either idealise and romanticise the idea of love or a person, or I can empathise with the crushing ordeal of unrequited, mismatched love. It feels nostalgic yet contemporary, confident yet vulnerable, gritty yet sentimental. It makes me feel something, every time, which is what good music should do. This is a love letter to Pat Earrings, my favourite song of all time.