Living the Dream

MUSIC. You might have guessed that the R&B singer-songwriter known as the Dream chose that name because of an obsession with the fantasy world we occupy when sleeping. Or perhaps you think of the clichéd “American dream,” a phrase he whispers in his 2008 song “I Luv Your Girl” — the video for which finds him draped in an American flag. (That was in April, during the heat of the Democratic primary.)

Actually, neither theory is technically right. Terius Nash named himself t he Dream after an uncle encouraged him to be “the dream” his Atlanta-based family never realized.

But now that Dream has become a respected artist and one of music’s most in-demand songwriters — he could milk having co-written Rihanna’s “Umbrella” for at least three  more years — he’s thinking that even the American dream is  a bit too small for him.

“My vision has propelled further as I reached those goals,” he says. “Because reaching the American dream isn’t really that much. It’s just money. Nobody bases it off, ‘What have you done for the world?’”

Deep stuff for the guy behind this year’s hit “Rockin’ That Thang.” But even while he lives his dream, he’s committed to making the dreams of others come true. “All my songs are for somebody else,” he says. “I have to give everyone else my best stuff. I don’t have to give myself my best stuff to pull it off.”

“I’m in the business of sharing my gift,” he adds. “I can only be so big.”

The Dream
with Mary J. Blige, Friday, The Borgata, Sold out