This past Monday, Mr. Kanye West of Chi-City released what is basically one of the more expensive albums ever, to much critical acclaim. Said album is probably going to be on the shortlist for “album of the year” in lots of award shows that random tv channels show and in newspapers, music mags, etc. Lol on music mags (ahem Rolling Stone).
Anyway, this is a very expensive sounding album, and it’s got good songs. All the makings of a good, expensive sounding album already. I’ll start with a song-by-song as I see fit review.
The first song is the closest thing to a title track Ye gives us, called “Dark Fantasy.” I like this song because he makes a Kings of Leon reference and The RZA produced it. That’s why I like it. Nicki Minaj’s intro speech in a bad British accent is bad.
I don’t feel like covering the next song because Kid Cudi is on it. Spoiler alert: Kid Cudi does his sing-talk thing and sounds blazed-as-fuck. Raekwon is also on the song. It would have been better if The RZA had done this verse. Or U-God. Yeah, U-God would have been awesome/hilarious. Oh damn you guys, looks like I just covered the song.
“Power” is up next. This juicy cut is one of my top 4 faves off the album. It’s got one of the best beats on the album, an awesome sample of King Crimson (you can’t even buy the original song on iTunes OMG!!!), and the lyrics are hilarious, especially when Kanye genuinely states he preferes his own penis to the genitalia of a woman for pleasure. Regardless, this is really one of the best songs on the album (one of his best evah??)
Now comes “All of the Lights”. This many famous people haven’t been on a track since that “AIDS for Africa” song or whatever. This song’s beat is really good too, and Elton John plays piano. Another one of my top 4 album picks. TL;DR, a shit ton of people make a good song on Kanye’s Album.
“Monster”. Listen to it. Sick bass, Nicki Minaj makes up for her stupid album intro bullshit with her verse here. In fact, she kinda makes up for her presence on earth with this verse. Jay-Z talks about being “a zombie with no conscience”. Another top 4.
On the next song, “So Appaled”, Jay-Z comes back for a verse and talks about being offended by people using his name in vain because they aren’t rich enough or something. Whatever Jay-Z. the real star of this song is the guy who does the intro/chorus thing who sounds like he actually didn’t give a fuck that he was on a Kanye West album. Douchebag. The RZA loses some god-points for mispronouncing”ridiculous” as “ridikilus”. No, fuck that, he gets RZA points for that.
“Runaway”. This song broke the amazingness gauge for the album. We’ve all seen/heard this song, especially if you watched the MTV Movie awards last year… I think. Regardless, for six straight minutes this is like the second best song on the album. Maybe the best song. And then after six minutes, the piano stands alone once more until… OH MY GOD A THREE MINUTES AUTO-TUNE SOLO WITH A STRING BACKBEAT!!!!! You heard that right. Three solid minutes. While ripe for parody, this doesn’t detract from the song.
“Hell of a Life” is cool because it samples “Iron Man” by Black Sabbath. Oh and this is one of two whole tracks on the album that Kanye doesn’t have someone else on.
“Blame Game” makes you feel like a schizo if you listen to it through headphones.
And now, tied for my favorite on the album is “Lost in the World”. Everything about this song is excellent: Bon Iver’s presence is awesome, the Imogen Heap-like intro is sufficiently creepy, and the beat is one of Kanye’s best ever. Lyrics/chorus amazing. TL;DR I love this song, it’s awesome.
The outro is pretty weird. Some angry sounding black man poetry-slams about the world being raped by white people. Damn colonialism.
And so the album is over friends. Now this has been quite the journey. I definitely would categorize this album above The College Dropout and 808’s. Song for song worth, I would say it also beats Late Registration. Graduation is still Kanye’s best album in my opinion, as this was kind of a “Kanye and friends” production. Graduation is all Kanye except for Mos Def and Lil’ Wayne, so I see it as a more personal/true representation of what Kanye can do on his own. Plus, any album that has “I Wonder”, “Good Life”, “Champion”, and “The Glory” can’t really be beat by the same artist. I would def. recommend “MBDTF” for purchase/illegal download though. Jk, I don’t condone illegal downloading. But seriously, get this album by any means possible.
Originally Posted to Tumblr on November 27, 2010
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