“Sex Therapy” came out in October of 2009, but there’s a chance you might have missed this remix. Finals are breathing down your cardigan and you know you need a jam for your study break. So even though Ludacris has even put out a new album chock-full of lewd track titles since this song hit the web, let’s relive all the times we never partied to this song together and give it the closer look it deserves.

We’ve learned from his recent collabo with a certain underaged lesbian-lookalike that his first love was at age 13 (*perhaps like some NYU Local writers…), but Ludacris is 32 now, and it almost feels like he matured with us while we grew up. Rappers always seem to pull off funny pop cultural references and absurd comparisons better than oh, say, Miley Cyrus, but we remember Ludacris for his particular brand of ridiculous. Prime quotes like, “Watch out for the medallion, my diamonds are reckless/feels like a midget is hanging from my necklace” (“Stand Up”) and “I’m about to take off, so eff what you heard/Because my side mirrors flap like a fuckin’ bird” (“Act A Fool”), are surely jumbled among your own repertoire of favorite Ludacrisisms.

Thankfully, the man who brought us classics like “Fantasy” and “Move, Bitch” when we were typing out our pubescent woes into LiveJournal and Xanga, is still making music. And not just with Justin Bieber. The remix of “Sex Therapy” brings us away from this toned-down version of himself catered for fans of a 16-year-old heartthrob, back to the vulgar sexuality we’ve come to expect from him. (The day will come when Bieber makes a song about licking people, though, be sure).

His mixtape featuring this song dropped for free on the Internet January 20 (the same day as the after-shock in Haiti. Maybe there was cleavage involved). It has since disappeared due to copyright laws, but you can buy it on iTunes. The Ludacris remix is cheaper than the Robin Thicke original, and it’s definitely the more worthy purchase. Don’t get me wrong, the Robin Thicke song is an amazing pop/r&b hump-ballad. When I first heard it I was overtaken by its many soothing layers, but the lyrics started to bother me. Couldn’t he have made the song without words and just sang “hah hah” in infinite harmony? Observe.

“Stressed out, uptight, over-worked, wound-up”
“OMG HE’S TALKING ABOUT ME!!” you think. “This is so awesome because I just want to relax!” Just wait.

“Follow me, where we go, we won’t need no bread crumbs”
Phew, thanks for clarifying, Robin Thicke. For a second there, I thought this was like that recurring nightmare of mine where we’re on the way to a witch’s house who wants to cook us and we have to think of some clever way to shove her in the oven—because just like you, I’ve internalized Grimm’s Fairy Tales and often confuse them with my love life. Oh wait.

“I’ll be your Valentine/ Spread your wings and baby, fly away.”
SHUT UP. I cannot hear this line and cognitively process it without bursting out laughing. The worst part is, I don’t even think it’s supposed to refer to R. Kelly, it’s just a regurgitated cliché that I guess no one would mind or notice at the height of one session of ‘therapy,’ but when walking around with my ipod, I think if I spread my wings and tried to fly I would probably get hit by a cab. Fail.

Thankfully the remix moderates doses of the original verses and refrains with rhymes from our trusty Atlanta-by-way-of-Illinois emcee. Ludacris sums up all Robin Thicke’s sentimental verbal diarrhea quite nicely: “It’s so/ therapeutic/how I do it.” Perfection. Plus, Thicke’s crooning and Luda’s verses sneak up on each other seamlessly.

The best part about this is Luda’s pronunciation: in the line “Get ready for Seduhh-kshun/… your body language is the only Discuhh-ssion,” it’s impossible not to say the “uhh” without baring your teeth like a groundhog. Even better is Luda’s rhyming “bawdy” with “nawdy” and “da pawdy.” For this, the “Tik Tok” reference is excusable. Listen for yourself if you haven’t already. Unfortunately this track is not available for free anymore even on its own, but that is why God made Youtube.