I know you probably scoffed at the title, but yes, in all my 20 years on this earth I've never fully listened to arguably one of Kanye Wests best albums. In my defense, I'm technically apart of Generation Z so if need be I'll claim youthful ignorance.
I wanted to listen to this album because of Wests recent scandalous behavior and the discussions that arose of whether his actions could be overlooked because of his classic discography and undeniable talent. Also, I was too busy keeping up with the latest indie band in 2008 to pay attention to the widely acclaimed masterful production so it's about time that I join the conversation.
Here's my track by track thoughts of the album:
West introduced the album with two very electro-pop tracks Say You Will and Welcome To Heartbreak. It's so different than the hard trap beats or neo-soul sounds I'm used to hearing nearly 10 years after the album dropped. I had to send my brain though the treacherous journey of remembering what life was like in 2008, or even worse what West was doing.
I was relieved to hear something familiar when Heartbreak, Amazing, and Love Lockdown came on until all of the autotune started to make me think about T-Pain and my mind went down a rabbit hole of the evolution of autotune down to Travis Scott.
One thing that was definitely notable was the quality of production. It could easily be rated 10 out of 10. However as an album compared to his others 808's ranks number two. (Technically number three, but I refuse to choose between Graduation and Late Registration for the top spot.
This was originally published in 2018