Video: Ne-Yo – Don’t Love Me

The latest music video for Ne-Yo’s new single, “Don’t Love Me,” might be his most cinematic to yet. The abstract black-and-white video features Tyler Lepley from P-Valley and Serayah from Empire, with the singer narrating the tale of the “I hate you/I love you/I hate you” romantic trope in the forefront.

The couple in the song’s video navigates adultery, a lack of trust, fears, and general misery as they determine whether or not to stay together, much like the visual plot presented in Netflix’s 2020 melodrama, Malcolm & Marie. Lepley becomes frustrated while cooking and dealing with his partner’s fixation with social media, and she doesn’t seem to comprehend it.

Ne-Yo, in the meantime, exhorts listeners to leave, particularly if doing so will benefit them. He croons in the pre-chorus, “You should walk away/It’d be selfish of me to ask you to stay/When I know that I cannot love you the way you deserve.”

Lepley ultimately decides to leave first. He says, “I think we might need to press the brakes on this for a second,” in confessional fashion. This isn’t right, to be honest. You’re not content. Your face makes it clear to me. It serves no purpose for us to be unhappy together. We didn’t begin this way. It doesn’t make sense for me to cling onto something for a self-serving cause, even though I’m not sure how it got here. As much as it pains me to say it, I can’t be what you need me to be at this time. Girl, I care about you, but only enough to allow you to leave.

His first album since 2019’s Another Kind Of Christmas, “Don’t Love Me” establishes the tone for Ne-Yo’s much anticipated new one.

Check out the music video for “Don’t Love Me“.