Bubblegum R&B with a splash of synth-pop

There's not a lot going on in the song - just a blip of a synth line, a tap of a beat and a voice as light as a lemon drop.
But clearly that's enough to have made "Me & U" one of the summer's defining singles.

This week "Me & U" hopped all the way to No. 1 on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs (on the Pop Song list it's No. 3). The success surprised the song's mono-named singer, Cassie, as much as anyone.

"It's a really robotic song, with pretty much one note going all the way through," the 19-year-old admits. "At first I thought, 'How am I going to perform this?' I didn't expect it to go anywhere."

Then again, summer calls for the shedding of sounds as well as clothes. And there's no denying that "Me & U" has the same irresistible minimalism as an equally hot smash from last year: Snoop Dogg's "Drop It Like It's Hot."

There's also the teasing appeal of its lyric to consider. It presents Cassie as the sexual aggressor. "I'll love you all the way down/get you right where you like it," she purrs. "I promise you'll like it."

At least it's likely her object will like her looks. Like many modern singers, Cassie's entry into the recording world didn't come about by anything as old-fashioned as singing. She started out - you guessed it - as a model, appearing in campaigns for Abercrombie & Fitch, Adidas and Delia's.

The woman born Cassandra Ventura (whose gene pool draws from Mexico, the Philippines and the West Indies) did some singing as a child growing up in New London, Conn. But her first break came as a Wilhelmina mannequin at age 15.