Case did not let the room cool off. Thursday night (Oct 22), the New York singer traded slow jams with Carl Thomas on Verzuz at Apple Music Studios in Los Angeles. Apple Music lists his new Love Jones EP with that very same release date, five songs and 16 minutes filed under his own banner. It was waiting for every grown-folks group chat that spent the evening arguing about "Faded Pictures."

Thomas came to that stage dressed for church, at least for a minute. Early in the night he sang a piano-only snippet of the hymn "I Need Thee Every Hour" and credited his upbringing in the Church of God in Christ. He traced the shape of his own "Come to Me" back to the melodies of Thomas A. Dorsey, then slid straight into the record. Later he brought out Too $hort for "The World Is Filled..." and admitted he wrote part of it in high school study hall, which earned him detention. He also reappeared in a turtleneck before running through "I Wish."

Case answered with songwriting receipts, bringing out Nokio of Dru Hill to perform "Beauty," a song he wrote for the group. Nokio returned later to introduce "How Can I Love U 2nite," another Case composition that went to Sisqó. RL walked on for "The Best Man I Can Be," the 1999 soundtrack posse cut Case shared with RL, Ginuwine and Tyrese.

The crowd at home kept score anyway, and in the live fan vote on Complex, "Faded Pictures," his 1998 Rush Hour duet with Joe, pulled 62 percent, and "Not Your Friend" took 60. Thomas had his own blowouts, none louder than "Summer Rain" flattening "Another Minute" 73 to 27. Case closed with "Missing You," his only No. 1 on the R&B chart and a No. 4 hit on the Hot 100 in 2001. Voters gave it a 51 to 49 edge over "I Wish," while Thomas walked over to sing the final moments right next to him.

Case built the project with Travis Cherry, the two-time Grammy-nominated producer from Raleigh who has worked with him for years. Case has released music outside the major-label system since leaving Def Jam in 2009. On Thursday he got a national audience of former slow dancers to sit through his catalog for free, and he made sure there was something new to stream before they logged off.

Case has run this play before, and in February 2017, right after TV One aired his episode of Unsung, he released the single "Heaven." The next day came Love Jones Vol. 1, a four-song Valentine's season EP, along with a hint that more volumes were on the way. Nine years later the sequel finally arrived under a slightly different name, riding the attention of another prime-time look back at his career.

The EP closes on "I Can't Breathe," which streaming listings credit as featuring Minister Louis Farrakhan. The song first surfaced as a standalone single in April under GrownManBiz Music, with Case and Cherry listed as composers. Its title is the phrase Eric Garner repeated during his fatal 2014 arrest on Staten Island. The project shares its name with Theodore Witcher's 1997 Chicago romance, and closing it on a credit for the Nation of Islam leader will start its own conversation before anyone finishes debating the love songs up front.

His 2026 run already included the single "Kick Back," and his Apple Music page lists theater dates through December. He plays the Chicago Theatre on Oct. 29 and Xperience Live on Nov. 20, then the Lansdowne Theater on Nov. 28 and the Lake Charles Event Center on Dec. 5.

His gold albums Personal Conversation and Open Letter came out under Def Jam, and the two-time Grammy nominee now releases music on his own imprint. Verzuz sold the memory, and the EP gives that memory somewhere to go. The next six weeks of ticket sales will tell Case how many of Thursday's voters want to hear what he sounds like now.