No Letting Go

It's obviously like incorporating certain rhythms.

You know, it's not disconnected from, you know, the Diwali rhythm that had sort of like permeated songs like No Letting Go and Get Busy.

You know, it has a very particular like Caribbean aspect to it, but also is geared towards radio, American radio, as you were saying.

So like, how would you describe the song? What is it about? What does it sound like? And what does Rihanna come across on it like?

You mentioned the Diwali rhythm.

In Dancehall, obviously, the term rhythm refers to the backing track and its groove, like the way the groove takes on a life of its own.

And so you hear it sampled in various versions very recognizably in Sean Paul's Get Busy and Luba Dee's Never Leave You and Wayne Wonder's No Letting Go so it's a groove that persists across songs no matter who the performer is and then Ponder Replay kind of leans into the idea of that it is not an actual sample of the rhythm, but it is very clearly playing off of the way that the percussion works.

And as such, it feels like it's playing into all that history, both like literally and psychically, because on top of her, you have her singing the hook, literally asking the DJ to run the song back, which I have always interpreted as like keeping the groove or the rhythm going.