Welcome to the Overplayed Song of the Week. Every week, Hollywood Prospectus editor and masochistically devoted mainstream radio listener Emily Yoshida will pick an aging Top 40 hit that she has heard enough times to render the song meaningless, and thus likely to inspire otherwise inaccessible epiphanies.

Weeks on Chart: 30
Peak: No. 77 on Billboard’s Hot 100, September 1, 2012
Current Radio Play Frequency No. 13 on Power 106 FM’s Power Playlist

[Lyrics]

A few things, rill quick, about “Make It Nasty”:

• Do NOT let that seemingly tepid chart performance fool you — this song is inescapable, at least in Los Angeles, right now. Hence its inclusion in this column.
• I am not posting the “official” “too hot for VEVO” version of the video because it is incredibly NSFW.
• TYGA is an acronym for Thank You God Always. This is hilarious, for several reasons.

Miguel Ray Nguyen-Stevenson is a 22-year-old rapper from Los Angeles who has been a part of Lil’ Wayne’s Cash Money label since he was 17 years old, and is perhaps best known for his ubiquitous “Rack City,” but I didn’t feel like talking about that song today. “Rack City” is ancient, anyway; it was originally released in 2010, so next time you’re at a cool party and they start playing it you can tell that hot piece tending bar that all these sheeple who are “just discovering” Tyga now are are totally lamestream. Yeah, I’d say that is definitely a good way to find a life partner.

I’m not an easily shocked person, but “Make It Nasty” might be the most aptly named song of 2012. Even when the incomprehensibly censored version of it comes on the radio, I find myself blushing, clutching my pearls, and praying for the children. Please, Lord, let the little children have their Skrillex and Flo Rida and gobble their psychotropic drugs in peace. Hail Mary and whatnot. Thank You God Always. It belongs to the subgenre of rap songs that I will go ahead and dub “lists of things at a party” (LO-TAP). The point of songs like this is to set a scene for what we can only assume will be a very sexy, deviant get-together. But LO-TAP songs are far more concerned with description than with plot. “Be Our Guest” from Beauty and the Beast is a total LO-TAP song.

I usually take hip-hop and R&B artists’ descriptions of excess with a grain of salt. If I’ve learned anything in life, it’s that most people are more boring than you imagine them to be; which is why The Weeknd’s initial anonymity was so startling and fascinating. Basically, I don’t believe “Make It Nasty” is based on a true story, but that doesn’t make it any less gross. Am I offended by this song? I’m not sure. I find it unpleasant, but I also think it is very funny, like watching a young child try to eat five brownies and knowing he’s not going to be very happy about that decision later on. It’s sort of cute, I guess.

Production high/lowlight:

Tyga’s songs tend to stick to one very simple synth line and beat, which sound like they could have been made in someone’s bedroom on a laptop. Sometimes I like that sound; “Walk It Out” is a pretty successful example of three synth notes carrying a song to indisputable jam status. “Make It Nasty” also punctuates every other measure with an orgasmic sigh sample, in case you missed that this song is about very sexy things, so give it points for clarity.

Lyrical highlight:

I like it when my bitches don’t wear no clothes

This feels like a placeholder for something more scandalous, but as is, it comes as a welcome, comparatively simple statement of preference before the next volley of shock and aw hell no. Ditto for Verse 2’s “Pull out, hop out, valet the car,” which is delivered in Tyga’s occasionally appealing deadpan staccato, and, even better, is something I have actually done before and can relate to!

Lyrical lowlight:

After the car gets valeted, the second verse really starts to decompose lyrically; Thank You God Always pretty much just starts on a Semi-Bilinguial Sex Addict with Tourette’s spree which I might get fired for repeating here. Unfortunately, none of it is actually that shocking after this gem from the first verse:

Got a China bitch, straight from Beijing
P***y so tight, all she do is scream

:( ∞