Tinashe Savages a Middling “Companion” with “I’d Rather Be Alone”

Released as a “double single” with “Pillow Fight,” “I’d Rather Be Alone” (not to be confused with Greta Garbo’s sentiment behind, “I want to be alone”) is clearly more akin to the “B-side” of the former. Not because it’s “inferior” or anything, but mainly because it wasn’t blessed with a video like “Pillow Fight.” However, if it was, one imagines that it would feature Tinashe in at least one scene of bluntly delivering some of her verses to a boyfriend she wishes to make her ex.

But before she lays into him completely, Tinashe begins “politely” enough with some words that attempt to cushion the blow. Namely, “I’ll always love you that way, nothing’s ever gonna change how I feel about ya/But honestly, nowadays, I believe straight up you could never give me what I want.” So it is that the initial starting point of “fondness” gives way to merciless candor.

With a musical opening that has echoes of Rihanna’s “Kiss It Better,” this track, like “Pillow Fight,” is also more R&B-veering than pop. Which is somewhat ironic considering that, in general, the R&B genre is associated with either romantic or pining expressions. But Tinashe turns that notion on its ear, quickly negating her previous “niceties” with the insult, “Ain’t that somethin’? Thought that we’d work it out if I just stuck around, let you grow up/You got a thing for withholding your love, you give me a little, but never enough.” It’s that last line that has flickers of Lily Allen’s “Just Enough,” during which she sings (albeit in a far more melancholic and regretful tone), “Yeah, you/You give me just enough/Hope to hold on to/Nothing.”

And, like many of Allen’s songs on West End Girl, “I’d Rather Be Alone” also toggles between being an “unapologetic bitch” when it comes to savaging her man and being a bit sentimental toward him. As is the case with another line that goes back to showcasing a more “loving” side of Tinashe: “But you’re the only one in my heart, and that is making this so hard.” Unfortunately for her soon-to-be ex, not hard enough to “bite [her] tongue,” as she says at another point. As in, “Oh, I tried to bite my tongue, but I just couldn’t help it/Oh, if pain’s the price of love, then I just can’t accept it” (obviously, Tinashe is not a Taurus—in fact, she’s an Aquarius, a sign known for being detached…especially if it becomes a point of necessity, as is the case in this song).

At the fifty-one-second mark, things go back to sounding noticeably Rihanna-y (both musically and vocally) as Tinashe at last delivers the coup de grâce of a chorus, “‘Cause, oh, I, I’d rather be alone, woah-woah/Than wait around for better with you/Oh, I, I’d rather be alone/Than spend my life holding on forever with you.” And while it might sound cruel on the surface, it’s much harder for Tinashe to be honest about her feelings in this matter than it is for the bloke she’s confessing those feelings to. For, in the end, he’ll be spared from a greater heartbreak/ego-wounding because she didn’t keep pretending for longer. Or, as Tinashe phrases it, “You left me no choice, and I don’t wanna be hurt forever.”

That lyric comes from the same verse that has Tinashe speaking in an intonation that, oddly, sounds a lot like how Lady Gaga’s cadence on 2008’s “Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say).” But when Tinashe (unwittingly?) mimics it, she instead says, “I know all about you, but you’re never there for me/So close to me, it seems, you’re always out of reach/So I’d rather rip the Band-Aid off than scratch ‘til it bleeds, oh-woah.” And, sooner or later, that’s an epiphany many women have after years spent trying to just “hope it gets better.” Alas, as Tinashe also says, “It gets to a point where believing you’ll change is a foolish assumption.”

Yet, it’s the kind of assumption that women in a long-term relationship can’t help but having. At least until they’ve been burned by reality one too many times. That’s when they must (hopefully) come to the same conclusion that Tinashe does in the standout bridge of the song that goes, “I will put myself first, I find out it’s worse to look back and admit I lied to myself when I always knew better/Potential’s just potential, and love is not pleasure, oh” (again, Tinashe is proving herself to be so Aquarian here).  

Or, as both Samantha Jones and MARINA have said in the past when it comes to knowing when to “cash out” on a relationship, “I love you, but I love me more.” And it’s often the most hard-won revelation for many a woman to arrive at because, unlike Tinashe, they’re too afraid to hurt a man’s feelings. Then again, how can women be blamed for such fear with the rate of femicide being what it is?