It took a decade to see how dark Kanye’s Fantasy was
Image: Photo: Kevin WinterGraphic: Natalie Peeples Music Features 10 For The '10s
In 10 For The ’10s, The A.V. Club looks back at the decade that was: 10 essays about the media that defined the 2010s, one for every year from 2010 to 2019. First up: 2010 and Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
The only thing to do when My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy dropped was to give it a perfect score and get out of its way. It announced itself, immediately, as Kanye West’s masterpiece: the baroque apex of a decade of restless innovation, assimilation, ambition, and self-destruction. This last part is key. After the three-album ascendancy narrative charted out by The College Dropout, Late Registration, and Graduation, each release an exponential expansion of West’s artistic vision and pop appeal, he planned to conclude the tetralogy with an album called Good Ass Job. Instead, he collapsed into himself. In 2007, his mom died, and he went through a prolonged breakup with a long-time girlfriend. Rapping, never his strong suit, failed him; he started singing over bleak ambient tones. In 2009, the Taylor Swift thing happened, and the Hov-quoting president that Jeezy foretold declared him a jackass. South Park got him, and it got to him. West went into exile, and he went through yet another breakup, this one more public than the last.
And so he holed up in a studio in Hawaii and flew in a murderers’ row of hip-hop heavyweights. The result was a storied burst of creativity, chaotic but mannered, the ghost of which Kanye has been chasing ever since. Where previous LPs saw him subsuming influences from far outside hip-hop’s normal orbit—Jon Brion, Coldplay, Daft Punk, Can—realizing his Fantasy demanded neck-snapping drums. What he needed was Pete Rock, No I.D., DJ Premier, the RZA, and Q-Tip to keep it grounded to the asphalt. He needed a low end so solid he could send Nicki Minaj and Pusha T snarling out of the speakers, a structure sturdy enough to support string interludes and elegiac choirs, Bon Iver wailing—all the opulent sonic signifiers of an artist going for broke. While there, he bounced between three separate studios, cycling input from Alicia Keys and Rihanna and Drake into some vision that only made sense in his head. He got Elton John for a hook and Big Sean for a zillion Big Sean verses. He would sleep a couple hours per night, often in the studio, then eat breakfast with the team and start again. He hung up a sign that read, “What would Mobb Deep do?” to keep everyone attuned to the wavelength.
The result sounded nothing like the infamous Queensbridge duo, but it shared with them an indomitable sense of will, a vision of hip-hop at once grimy and gilded. In late May 2010, Kanye released “Power,” a Thanos-sized fist of a song, not so much a comeback as a counteroffensive. But it was only an opening salvo. For three months before My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’s release, Kanye leaked a track per week—singles, remixes, sketchwork, long-lost collaborations, full-blown masterpieces never to see the light of day again, even a Dipset Christmas carol. Again, you just had to get out of its way: a new Blueprint for a new decade. You could hear it screaming over the horizon. Kanye had already proven his megalomania to be, if not correct, at least rooted in reality, presiding over a decade-long sea change in sample-based production. After 808s And Heartbreak, he found his voice as a rapper, too, his sensitivities and insecurities and frankly preposterous horniness coalescing into a run of head-turning guest verses. But his Fantasy came true when he gave up the ghost of being loved in return for this talent. He was the monster who fucked the angel, bottle in hand, leering at the viewer. Pusha had to rewrite his show-stopping verse on “Runaway” four times because Kanye kept demanding “more douchebag.”
It’s not the only time on Fantasy that Kanye speaks through a collaborator; it’s Jay, after all, who admits his Achilles heel is a never-ending thirst for love. Kanye’s ever-expanding big-tent hip-hop had long been an attempt to fill the same need, but after turning insular on 808s, he does something remarkable on Fantasy. He expands the tent and the popular conception of hip-hop to a galactic scale while simultaneously disdaining his own need to do so. “I fantasized about this back in Chicago,” he says on the album’s opening line, then proceeds to dismantle the hollowness of celebrity for 70 minutes. He’s appalled at its excesses, gazing over champagne wishes and five-star dishes and feeling nothing. It’s an old story, and he can’t believe he fell for it. He fucks porn stars with an almost nihilistic detachment. The rush of “All Of The Lights” is tempered by a howl of pain for the recently deceased King Of Pop. There’s an MJ-like aspect to the album title, and to the way Kanye conceives of his talent as something separate and childlike, in need of protection against the corrupting powers of fame, the media, even his own temptations. The outlook is not good. He repeatedly fantasizes about killing himself on the album—a one-way ticket out of the famous life, albeit, paradoxically, not out of fame itself.
On “Blame Game,” he says it most plainly: “Somebody help.” Beneath all that excess is the realization that his fantasies from back in Chicago were hollow, that talent, fame, and love are not equivalently connected but perhaps directly opposed. “Runaway” gives in, fusing his best qualities with his worst, his talent for perfectionism with his capacity for self-destruction. “I’m so gifted,” he sings, with characteristic bravado, “at finding what I don’t like the most.” There’s always been a smallness to Kanye that fans intuit to his music. After Fantasy, subsequent albums adopted a sort of cackling disdain toward those very listeners; even the vibrant Life Of Pablo contains a quick schoolyard taunt toward those who want the “old Kanye.” My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy can often feel like a turning point, in this sense. If you want to hear the old Kanye, you go to Late Registration; if you want to hear the new Kanye, you go to Yeezus. If you want to hear both at the same time, overlapping, two self-images at odds with each other empowering an artist to raze grief, regret, shame, and what must have felt like near-universal antipathy—including from the standing president of the United States—you go to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
At least, theoretically. Make no mistake: All those Kanyes, new and old, big and small, angry and hurting, are, well, a lot. An album this maximal lingers in the memory for its most extreme moments: Nicki Minaj’s British accent, Chris Rock wailing about pussy, endless aquatic warbling about Kim Kardashian. One cannot experience “All Of The Lights” passively. But put it on again, even today, after everything, and something alchemical happens. The pieces reassemble, the cathedral comes back together, the spires become a part of the foundation. Oh yeah, you think, as delighted today as you were in 2010, a Raekwon verse. That really is just an old Pete Rock loop on “Runaway.” Kanye is funny, scabrously so, throughout; it’s the best he’s ever rapped. Like Graduation, it’s full of arena-rock incantations to wave your hands and sing along. You become a part of its power, toasting the other douchebags, drunk out of your gourd. Verses tumble over each other, one after the next, everyone goaded into their best work. What would Mobb Deep do? They’d make every hi-hat and snare clap matter, and then they’d rap their fucking brains out over it.
Despite the new new Kanye’s claims that he’s going to “George Lucas” his older albums, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is still all of ours. If it’s about fame, then it’s about us. But it’s the final album on which Kanye conceived a unified audience. We have seen, in the past two years, his ugliest and least interesting work—a populist hell-bent on polarization. He may still return to old form, or at least find his footing on whatever transformations still ensue. But it seems likely that we will always look at My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy as his high point, if only because it is so entirely designed as such. Kanye’s primary contribution to pop music is his conception of hip-hop as its final form, capable of swallowing and assimilating anything in its path, and when mapped to the terror and ambition of Fantasy he created something unprecedented. Pop music this big is rare; the list of albums that reach as wide as this one does and succeed includes Rumours, Thriller, Purple Rain, Nevermind, and not much else—all albums about fame, and all tragedies, in their way, on a long enough timeline. The tragedy is not that Kanye became the person that he has become. It’s that he knew he would—that it is the nature of fame in America, a fantasy he yearned for and a disease no one survives.
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Instead, he collapsed into himself. In 2007, his mom died, and he went through a prolonged breakup with a long-time girlfriend. Rapping, never his strong suit, failed him; he started singing over bleak ambient tones. In 2009, the Taylor Swift thing happened, and the Hov-quoting president that Jeezy foretold declared him a jackass. South Park got him, and it got to him. West went into exile, and he went through yet another breakup, this one more public than the last.While I feel somewhat sorry for him during these years, shit happens. We wouldn’t have this current Kanye situation if people stopped praising him like a god.
I mean it’s hard and he has issues, but also he is super rich and has every possible way to get help available to him. There are tons of people with these same issues that figure out how to get by while holding down a job that might pay terribly. They might even have kids to take care of while doing all this. His mom died, he had a breakup and he’s bipolar. This is not unique.
His mom died, he had a breakup and he’s bipolar. This is not unique.Exactly, which was why I added “shit happens”.It’s in the past now. All we can do now is stop feeding his ego.
and a car accident that broke his face. people are not all the same you know, things might affect them indifferent ways. not acknowledging that it’s pretty silly
He is super rich and has every possible way to get help available to him.
The fact that he’s super rich also means he’s got an army of hangers-on feeding him absolute constant bullshit and reinforcing his worst habits. That kind of signal-to-noise ratio is difficult for people in a healthy mindset to deal with, and it’s pretty clear Kanye’s mindset is a million miles from healthy at this point. It’s difficult to get actual, proper help when you have hundreds of people saying you don’t need it and hundreds more saying they can help you in a bunch of different and frequently opposing ways. You see the same thing all the time when people who need therapy and medication go to the internet for assistance instead.Basically, all the money in the world can’t help the fact that his first lines of personal support are the Kardashians and a bunch of people he’s paying.
And at the same time he’s an adult and has abilities to make his own decisions. I can’t think of him as a victim, he’s just an asshole that surrounded himself with assholes with his own free will.
Someone can be an asshole and still be in a situation that deserves empathy. Severe bipolar disorder is a hell of a thing to deal with just by itself, and “well he’s an adult and has money” absolutely brushes off what it is, how it manifests, and how it needs to be treated. The only difference between Kanye (and Britney Spears, who basically had this same implosion over a decade ago) and other people with severe bipolar disorder is how public the symptoms are. That doesn’t make him unique, but it does make him worthy of the same empathy afforded to anyone else going through the same shit.
You’re defending him real hard. Britney Spears doesn’t call herself a genius god and tell everyone to vote Trump.
You’re defending him real hard. Britney Spears doesn’t call herself a genius god and tell everyone to vote Trump.
Someone can be an asshole and still be in a situation that deserves empathy.
I’m saying that having lots of money and “being an adult” doesn’t negate the effects of an extreme manic episode on someone with a tenuous support group. Kanye being a ego-driven jackass doesn’t mean his mental illness somehow doesn’t count and he should have just bootstrapped his way out of it.
I don’t think he should “bootstrap his way out of it”. I think he’s a bad person.
Having a mental illness also doesn’t mean you’re exempt from being responsible for your actions
Empathy is not the same as approval or dismissal of bad behavior.
To be fair, she did tell everyone to support George Bush…
meh, might make it harder. Sometimes when I’m in a spiral I try to surround myself with people who tell me the opposite(but eventually I start pushing away the people I care about and it clicks), he’s got a whole world of people to tell him he’s doing alright.
FWIW one of the main definitions of clinical depression is showing all of the symptoms and still not being able to help yourself. In the case of being bipolar it’s either due to delusion during the mania or disillusionment during the depressive. No, Kanye is not unique.. he is typical! Money doesn’t buy your way out of bipolar disorder. (I agree that everyone else should stop putting him on a pedestal, though)
And the whole “bipolar as artistically aspirational genius cult figure” thing is pretty typical as well.Not for nothing, but I went through over a decade of heavy treatment and trying on dozens of medications to get my bipolar 1 under control, and it’s still a daily thing trying to keep stable, so maybe I’m a little bitter in thinking that Kanye should fucking shape up and be a better, uh, spokesperson for lack of a better term, what with him being the most visible openly bipolar person on the planet? Because what finally kicked my ass into sticking to the therapeutic program was the realization that if you romanticize your bipolar disorder it will kill you. But then I take a deep breath and think, “Yeah, it is probably very hard to address those kinds of issues when you find yourself with your parents gone in an oasis where the palm trees are your spouse and their family who all are essentially in the business of peddling delusional romance and the cool clear water is half hypebeast half thinkpiece but all attention, and any reality check especially at this point is gonna crash you something hard to begin with, but you have enough money to keep stretching it out, so. . . .”So I can’t hate Kanye, but I’m pissed off at him for getting himself tangled up in something so, as you said, typical. Archetypal, even. God, this is a fucked up situation.
rich does not equal healthy nor happy, particularly when wealth comes with fame. history is the proof. people are different, you cannot generalise especially when mental health is involved. too complex
“He is super rich and has every possible way to get help available to him. Therefore, I get to make fun of his ongoing problems and shortcomings and not feel bad about myself! I’m still a great person…”
not acknowledging that it’s pretty sillyYou’re right, everyone is affected differently. But you’re not acknowledging that Kanye has openly refused to get help for a lot of his problems.
A car accident that happened over 15 years ago. Deal with it. He turned that into the single that propelled him into a huge hit, and a subsequent career that we are seeing on the front pages of celeb-tracking internet and print media all the time. Yep. He’s damaged and can’t move on.
I can’t help but think of him as Bojack Horseman.
Don’t you dare make me think less of Bojack Horseman like that!
If there’s anything we know from Kanye and countless rich/famous people before him, it’s that being rich enough to find solutions to your problems doesn’t mean you’ll have the self-awareness and motivation to do something about them. In fact, it often means you have more resources you can put towards ignoring those problems.
it’s that being rich enough to find solutions to your problems doesn’t mean you’ll have the self-awareness and motivation to do something about them. The keyword being ‘motivation’. He’s acutely aware that he has problems. He talks about them on a fairly consistent basis.
Yeah, people give him way too much leeway for the fact that his mom died. Shit, people still bring that up as an excuse for him now. And it’s like, yeah, it’s definitely sad when a beloved relative dies. But it also doesn’t give you a pass for being a misogynistic xenophobic asshole for the next two decades.
I mean it’s hard and he has issues, but also he is super rich and has every possible way to get help available to him. There are tons of people with these same issues that figure out how to get by while holding down a job that might pay terribly. They might even have kids to take care of while doing all this. His mom died, he had a breakup and he’s bipolar. This is not unique.People keep saying this. What does it mean?
It’s his fault for not spending his money right if he has ongoing problems, is that what you’re saying? Money solves literally everything, and if not it must be a YOU problem? Just admit it: You say things like this to justify making fun of a bipolar person’s antics by focusing on his income as a cure-all-diseases magic wand he must not be using right. As far as excuses go, it’s pretty good, but I still think it’s wrong.
He’s thought of himself as a god for almost 20 years, before he became a household name.
Other than white guilt tripping 35 yr old male music writers, nobody listens to Kanye West
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You gotta love how near-unanimous public disapproval has only made them double down. They really don’t care.
Thank you for this. I was just talking with someone about how great he is when he has that combination of thunder and focus. I really feel like MBDTF is his black obelisk.
Think he broke down after his mom died. And never was put back again. I think he had a depression or something like this. And never learned to manage it.And did he not say , he was off his meds because his mind was clouded with them?while i dislike his views, and do not care 1 bit for his wife ( or her family) ( who i think are just trash in a nice fake body/dress). I do hope this ends well. Because most of the time, celebs like this do not end up well. so i hope for his family he gets a good foundation he can live his life on.
What “tragedy”? The man shouts “get God” and “think for yourselves” and you think HE’S THE ONE WHO HAS FALLEN?The modern left is the tragedy. The monolith that is the black vote is the tragedy. Praising God, well that’s a blessing. Get on board.
People are so up their ass over this doofus.
I don’t see why we can’t save all the fond retrospectives for a time when someone might have reason to miss him.
“People are so up the ass about this doofus”Says person acting up the ass over so called “doofus”
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was such an amazing album. Who knows how high he could have risen had he not tragically died later that year. RIP my dear Mr. West
I hate reading and hearing about Kanye West. He is a major doofus.BUT, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is the greatest album of the last decade. It is a towering achievement, and represents the high watermark of hip hop in the last 10 (probably 20) years.To me, the people denying that he at the very least did not have moments of exceptional genius are just as obnoxious as Kanye himself over the past several years. Guess what, modern music history is littered with savants and assholes with huge egos but genuine artistry. Lennon was a primo douche and was self-righteous enough to consider himself a god. MJ was a pop maestro and eventually lost his mind before resorting to criminality. I do not understand what makes Kanye so different.
“BUT, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is the greatest album of the last decade. It is a towering achievement, and represents the high watermark of hip hop in the last 10 (probably 20) years.” A-hem.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Pimp_a_Butterfly
A friend hosts a Meetup to watch arthouse/foreign films. Recently his choice was 8 1/2. I was excited, because I usually share his taste, and I know Fellini is an acknowledged great, and I still have his work to discover. But 8 1/2 just bored the living shit out of me. I know about its historic influence and I could recognize technical skills in the shots and so on. But I was checking my watch like once a scene, thinking about what I could do later that night. I know people who swear that Tom Waits sucks and that everyone’s just having some pretentious gag by pretending he’s any good. I think they’re way off about that. But what are you gonna do?Plenty of people with mostly good taste told me, “Sure, Kanye’s a fucking dipshit as a person, but he really is a musical genius, you’ve got to give his shit a chance.” And this year, I did. He was in top ten rotation in my music library for the first six months of 2019. And it was only ever forced effort. I didn’t give a goddamn about any single track I heard from any of his albums. Every single thing about it just reeked of fucking try-hard, pretend-this-guy-doesn’t-suck-ballsack-skin douchebaggery. Eventually I deleted all his tracks and hope I never have to hear any of them again. But again, what are you gonna do? Nothin’. In the end, we all just think our taste is good. But fifty million Elvis fans *can* be wrong, I say.
I mean, you’re not wrong.
I agree on 8 1/2. And Tom Waits. And Kanye. I agree sooooo much about Kanye. I’ve tried too, on multiple occasions over the years, and I just can’t enjoy that awful, awful music.Tom Waits, on the other hand, could play a stove-top and I’d want to hear it.
Wait…you said…
Yes, I said…?
You…said that Tom Waits sucks but that Tom Waits could play a stove-top and you’d want to hear it. Just saying
Ahhhhhhh I can see why you thought I said that. But Charlie said s/he thought people who think Tom Waits sucks (and that his fans are having a pretentious gag) are “way off” – and I agreed. In other words, I agree that Tom Waits DOESN’T suck. In fact I think he’s awesome.He also said 8 1/2 was boring and that Kanye’s un-listenable (to paraphrase). I also agree with those sentiments.Cool?
> I hate reading and hearing about Kanye West. He is a major doofus.I love MBDTF, but every time I read about Kanye, I throw up in my mouth a little. OK, a lot. His music is amazing, but honestly I think a lot of his lyrics suck, including on this album. His pain and his fame aren’t interesting to me. But it’s nice for the world that at least he channels it into some pretty fantastic art. Now let’s never speak of him again.
But… his music isn’t amazing. He’s a certified garbage mc and an average producer regurgitating other lesser known already done hooks. I agree with pretty much everything you said but the “music is amazing” part is a head-scratcher. MBDTF wasn’t the best hip-hop album of last 2 dacades… Hell, it wasn’t top 5 of 2010. The original poster is a lunatic: “high watermark of hip hop in the last 10 (probably 20) years.”… that’s frankly, hilarious.
Whatever you say. Just realize it’s odd that you consider OP a lunatic when it’s the most commonly held opinion. We’ve just seen Pitchfork put it at #2 album of the decade, StereoGum at #4 (though they put Yeezus at #2) and Pitchfork Reader’s Choice at #1. And that’s with 9 years to sit and think about it.I could scream all I want that Thriller or the Abbey Road or [insert great album here] isn’t great, but at the end of the day it’s the populist that decides that.
MBDTF is, by far, the best Kanye’s ever rapped, and the production is unreal.Which 5 2010 rap albums would you take over it?
The best Kanye’s ever rapped is a low bar. In a strictly hip-hop sphere… What about the production of that album makes it unreal? Is it produced better than Big Boi’s album from 2010? Is it edgier than Earl? Danny Brown’s rapping on Hybrid is fundamentally better front to back than anything on MBDTF. Is it more entertaining than Shut Up, Dude! or Sit Down, Man? Radical?Not to me.
Oh, Kanye’s rapping is a dealbreaker for me on pretty much everything he’s done other than College Dropout, Late Registration, and MBDTF.However, the way he marries vocals and production into a cohesive whole is unparalleled this side of the Native Tongues, while his ear for creating incredible pop hooks is up there with Dre’s.The dude’s music may be neither fish nor fowl, but he’s an absurdly talented fusion act.
lmao, you assume this white AF comment section listens to anything but that one Wutang song they heard in their youth.
Something tells me you hit the nail on the head more so than anyone will give you credit for…
De gustibus non est disputandum.
De gustibus non est disputandum.Sed disputo. Disputo.
First, fuck yourself. And, second, if you honestly believe there are five 2010 hip-hop albums better than MBDTF, you have shit taste. And, I doubt you can even name five hip-hop albums from 2010. I’ll let that silly sentence pass due to latent hyperbole.BUT – “[A]n average producer regurgitating other lesser known already done hooks.”You gave it up here. This is literally the worst take on Kanye’s music I’ve ever read. I don’t even know where to begin. I think I’ll settle with saying you’re incorrect, and refer you back to my first point (fuck yourself).
Hi, Kanye.
Fuck myself? That’s how passionate you are about Kanye West? LOL. OK.At least you replied with some good points and insightful takes. Forget the fact there is a response in thread where I answer your impassioned pleas. I also don’t think you know what hyperbole means.Carry on Kanye Bro.
Yes, I can confirm you’re reading that correctly. Fuck yourself. Pardon me for not floating through this whole thread to read your other hot takes. It’s hyperbolic to state that Kanye is a “certified garbage mc” and an “average producer” without expounding. I’m not passionate about Kanye West. I am merely stating what the prevailing position is regarding MBDTF; namely, that it is a great fucking album and it should be appreciated as such. If you disagree, that’s fine. Enjoy hanging in the minority and listening to those five other hip-hop albums you referenced from 2010, if they exist.
I agree the thread is huge. At the point of your response it was 7 replies deep. That’s a tough sell for even the most avid reader. I didn’t even reply to you.I did expound. I said that Yeezus is a lazy remake of Government Plates… I said that no one considers Kanye one of the best lyricists of all time… how can a mc be the “high watermark” of “hip-hop” of the past 20 years and only be average? Is Puff Daddy a “high watermark” for you too? Probably.Don’t worry, the author of this article has your back. He’s removed (not even greyed) a couple of my posts because I don’t think Kanye West is a genius but instead a rebranding huckster. Go figure. I live in Columbus. I know how bad the taste in music is in this town. It’s confirmed here.The fact you don’t know the other albums tells me everything I need to know about your knowledge and the weight of your opinion. Had you said best rapper in Pop music I might have given you a pass. However, the way you’ve framed it makes you look like an idiot.You sound like Kanye West fan… take that however you’d like.
As a total aside to our larger argument, I love Government Plates. Good shit.As far as 2010 goes, I could entertain an argument that Sir Lucious is just as good or better than MBDTF. But, I would not agree. I think Drake released one of his big early tapes in 2010 too, and that certainly is not in the same arena. Can’t immediately think of any others so I guess ya got me. You’ve never even seen me before, bub. How do you know I look like an idiot? Seer!
Yes, moments of genius… All of the Lights and Monster are indelible… But it’s a lousy album with a bunch of one-listen novelty filler
Devil in a New Dress, Gorgeous, and Runaway (in particular) are all super impressive.
Kanye is a genius and I know that because he said so. Relentlessly.
nah, Kanye is garbage with a lot of producers and marketing behind himhe’s got a good ear as a producer but he’s no MC
Anyone who doesn’t think Dark Fantasy is one of the best albums of the past 20 years is wrong. It should be included in the list of albums you put there as penetrating pop culture and should be remembered for a long time. In a time where people think more about individual tracks than albums, it’s absurd how many amazing tracks are all contained in that one album.I’m glad you spent a few lines praising the build up to the album with all of the fantastic singles he threw out there leading up to it. I still remember the SNL performances from this album.
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is a masterpiece. There’s no two ways about it. It’s the work of a genius producer toiling at his peak, and—mock me for it, but—I say that without irony. It’s a shame that it’s led us (and him) to this point, and that he eventually became who he became. I wish he’d had someone around to keep him balanced (and off the Trump train), but…well, damn, he didn’t, and with the amount of fame, power, and money he currently has at his disposal, likely he never will. Guess we’ll always have those first four albums and some tracks off his later works. When he’s on, he’s on.
I will also add (in unison with the author) that Kanye raps his ass off on MBDTF in a way he’s not done before or sense. And, the lyrics are top-notch. Power, Gorgeous, Devil in a New Dress, etc., are all fantastic.
* before or since […]Christ.
“Top-notch” if you hate actual poetry perhaps.
he even gets an incredible verse out of Rick Ross on Devil in a New Dress – a verse that does not sound like, well, literally any other Ross verse
Sure but Ross’ verse on ‘Monster’ is Hall of Fame Rick Ross lazy.
no doubt, but it’s just an 4-line intro to get us hyped for Kanye coming in – I don’t think that verse really needs to be good. he gets the spotlight for 2 minutes on Devil and it’s pretty much a turning point on the album, so there was a lot of pressure to deliver that verse – and he fuckin’ nailed it
You’ve gotta expand your Rick Ross collection, you’ve obviously missed some gems:
well stated!
Why? How? Prove it.
The greatest trick ever pulled is Kanye convincing everyone that this was a good record. A few good tracks and a LOT of boring garbage, “boo hoo I’m a douche” lyrics, and everyone is like “oh so deep”. Runaway is an underwritten bore. I hate this record, even more so because folks seem to think it’s the greatest thing ever.
Yep. It has all to do with timing. Each of his albums at that point were better than the last one, and after 808s & Heartbreak he could have released an album of his own farts and gotten at least a 9.1. MBDTF is a glorified EP, with four or five classics and the rest being the hip-hop version of boring prog rock. Like, go back and force yourself to listen to “So Appalled,” “Devil in a New Dress,” or “Blame Game” in their entirety and try not to fucking fall asleep.
I’ve gone back and listened to “So Appalled,” “Devil in a New Dress,” and “Blame Game,” and … yup … still great. I had forgotten just how great they are, so thanks for the reminder!
I 100% agree with you. I think Runaway is pretty great, but I think the rest is mediocre to bad. I understand that taste is subjective, but Kanye is a terrible singer (he even sounds bad when he’s autotuned), his lyrics are atrocious, and to me a lot of what people hail as genius is just overstuffed, over-produced nonsense. Yes, he’s trying a lot of stuff that other pop and hip hop artists are NOT trying, but he gets a lot of credit for being bad at things that other composers, singers, lyricists, and musicians are tremendously good at.
I’d argue that he’s good at scouring trends and regifting it to the public and that’s about it. A lot of great hip-hop albums were released in the spring of 2010… needless to say, a lot of those kanye ideas that artists were “NOT trying” were in those releases. Just like Yeezus sounds like lame ass version of Death Grips’ Government Plates and everything clumsily recorded in the red for “artistic effect”. It’s pretty much straight wankery.
Well said. I agree, and I didn’t mean to imply Kanye invented recording techniques, composition styles, or anything like that. A better way to put it is exactly what you said: he repackages other people’s innovations and sells them to a mainstream audience.
I don’t hate MBDTF, but I feel the same way about it I do Mulholland Drive: an auteur’s absurdly overrated “masterpiece” that might be more accessible and palatable than their other work, but is easily their least personal and therefore ultimately most uninteresting. “Hell of a Life,” “Blame Game,” and “Lost in the World” is a great three-track run that feels like an honest reckoning with the perils of addiction and celebrity. The rest I could take or leave. “Runaway” is indeed a cloying, self-pitying song.This feels especially weird given that Kanye is is my favorite artist. I sometimes wonder if I’m just being a contrarian hipster as per usual, but your comment at least validates my dislike of it.
I’m not much of a Kanye fan but I thought Yeezus was way better than this one.
A few good tracks and a LOT of boring garbageKanye’s body of work in one sentence
lol at all the butthurt folks in the comments
Is the 2019 essay going to be about how Kanye went from creative director of the Pornhub awards to gospel icon in a year’s time?
Silly man, you think there’ll still be an AV Club in a year.
He absolutely needs someone to reign him in at this stage, which is why he’s still killing it as a producer, probably as good as he’s ever been, just this past year with Teyana Taylor, Pusha, Nas, and Kids See Ghosts.
Agreed. I didn’t listen to Daytona until right after Jesus is King came out. I’d listened to Ye last year, which was boring, and I listened to it again right after Daytona. How the same person produced both albums in the same timespan I have no idea. Ye is such a mess in every single way. It’s so messy and drags despite being less than 30 minutes long, I can’t even describe it contextually to Kanye’s other albums because Kanye has never been so off with his production or just plain… lost.Yet, Daytona is one of the tightest albums of the decade. Not even taking Pusha T’s flow or wordplay into account, just acoustically the entire thing is classic. Astroworld will be considered classic too, but the sound will still always be dated to the mid-late 2010’s. Daytona surpasses that. So to realize that Kanye produced both Ye and Daytona within the same year is so indicative of the fact that he needs to step back (and I’m talking purely musically, his opinions/words are trash) and just produce. He really has nothing to say lyrically anymore. Produce and let younger, more relevant artists learn from you and rap/sing over your beats. There’s nothing to lose there.
I always felt like this was the album where he realized he couldn’t rap about real life anymore, only about being a rich douche.
I said this in another comment, but I don’t think Kanye has anything to say anymore. He needs to step back and produce for younger, more relevant artists.I feel like this is something a lot of artists who are popular now are going to run into as we increasingly rely on the rap aesthetic of bitches, money, hoes and inject that into other genres. Eventually, you don’t sound relevant to your audience. You lose what made you popular. Even Taylor Swift is running into that issue, with her music basically being a meta commentary on her celebrity, rather than what made her famous—stories about boys, her life, etc….It is interesting that Beyonce experience the opposite of this. Rather than become more artificial and formulaic, due to the very nature of how the music industry works and where she started as an artist (her music being heavily controlled by people other than herself as she was so very young then), she is able to create music that is actually an expression of herself. Curious to know where that goes, as I’ve had the feeling for a while that after her joint album with Jay-Z, she won’t sound very interesting anymore. Could be proven wrong, but not sure what else she will have to say.
Definitely. I mean, even as obnoxious rich people, artists can find things that touch on the human experience. Your example of Beyoncé is perfect. Like you said, she’s able to capture that freedom of expression and use it to touch on things that impact her as well as her audience. I just feel like the majority of America is feeling annoyed with billionaires so bragging about your wealth isn’t going to win you as many fans as it may have in the early aughts.
Anticon. Anticon. Anticon.
May Kanye West find happiness and integrity in faith, for his children, his wife, and himself, even if 100 million former fans are disappointed.
Mr. Purdom: You wrote this with targeted precision. Thank you for this
little trip into a world where West’s writing and performing is regarded
almost as highly as Kanye believes it to be himself. You help to
perpetuate the dream of it being worth a damn, all while further isolating those who can’t see beyond the delicate, glossy and projected shell. You had me going there, almost appreciating a perceived deeply deliberate meticulousness in his work. You could probably represent the devil himself in court.
Every guest lyric on this album is perfect. Nicki, Pusha, Rick Ross, CyHi, etc.
I don’t think one could over estimate the roll sleep deprivation has had in Kanye’s mental health issues.
Counterpoint: MBDTF wasn’t even the best album of November 2010… and surely wasn’t a top 5 hip-hop album of 2010… forget the rest of the windy hyperbole tacked onto this fraud. I seriously judge people harsh as shit when they cite Kanye as a genius. Next, let’s talk about Lil B and act like he’s got talent. I’m sure it’s the same crowd.
what’s your best album of november 2010? and top 5 hip hop albums for 2010?
delete
I really hate Kinja
https://babylonbee.com/news/liberals-clarify-they-only-want-black-voices-heard-when-theyre-saying-liberal-things
Ive been saying it since it’s release and I’ll say it again now: This album is totally AWFUL every time JayZ shows up for a verse. He sucks hard on this one, and takes the life out of every track he appears on, while he appears on it. Momentum killer.
Goldwater Effect is in play, I know, but I’ve long suspected Kanye is bipolar and needs to be on meds. He actually tweeted about the subject last year, and said he couldn’t make Twisted Dark Fantasy or Watch The Throne if he was medicated.
First off, not true. And second, let’s be honest, you haven’t been doing that for a good long while, Ye.
A Kanye article by Clayton Purdom? Hard pass.
Hi Clayton, Off topic, but could you kindly remove the photo of me in your ‘full of regret” dancing baby article from AV Club. I’d be forever grateful to you. -Michael
Other great 2010 Pop Culture: Inception—It’s drawn a bit of a backlash, but I still think it’s a great piece of blockbuster art.Community—It debuted in 2009, but most of its run was in this decade. And, in 2010, the show aired 2 of its best: “Modern Warfare,” its great action movie parody that they kept trying to top but never could; and “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas,” the Christmas special parody that launched a 1000 Christmas special parodies. Toy Story 3—Nobody really wanted it, but then it came out. And, we all realized that we really needed it. The Social Network—The movie so good it made Mark Zuckerberg cool for a short while. Lady Antebellum-“Need You Now”—Maybe the last great country song of all time.
Jonathan Franzen – Freedom–Franzen’s 2nd Great American Novel.
I now feel in tune to the times.
Well I’m not really good at music, but I prefer Yeezus over My beautiful dark twisted fantasy, MBDTF sounds for me like a mess honestly, Yeezus is more cohesive and has really underappreciated songs like New Slaves and Send it up.
First time I listened to this album 10 years in-sorry but hip-hop/rap is total crap except for Paradise Don’t Come Cheap by New Kingdom-the only masterpiece in this loser genre. A total POS album by a junior high level artist with a reading and writing comprehension level of a 6th grader-trust me-I used to “try” to teach reading to these miscreants at Jefferson HS in Portland OR at the turn of the century-to quote my students “My Bad”. He reminds me of all them.