……..oh it’s here? Well….shit. Let me pause my game. Persona 3 Reload and Like a Dragon 8 has been taking over my life. It feels like I haven’t written anything in a long time but it’s been only a couple of months. Very slow couple of months. But we here I guess. Um, so yeah. This guy. he drop that album we’ve been waiting for? A collab album with Ty Dolla Sign? I’m sure he’s gonna address some “things”? Right? Oh. *sigh* Ah man. What I can say at this point? Just a fall from grace. Sure he “apologized” for his actions and words about the Jewish community, praising Hitler, and millions of other things that will take forever to mention. I am still a fan of this dumbass? Sure. I feel like crying at times because we truly lost this guy for what he once was. He still always be one of my favorites of all time but still hurts for the shit he’s done/said in the past few years. Anyway, enough about me complaining and moping. We are to talk about music. So….New album! Am I Right? Are you excited!? Am I???
Meh. This rollout was pretty lame. Boring. Dull. All over the place. I know he delays his albums a lot, but I’m numb to it at this point. Back then I would be pissed but now I’m like “Well no shit he didn’t drop”. Now that it’s here, I wasn’t as excited as I would have been when albums like “Pablo” or “Yeezus” had dropped finally. Is the magic gone? I am getting too old? Or have I come to realize “my goat washed”? Well yes, he is but I’m still curious about what he does next, even though I know it’s gonna be a shitshow. A collaborative album with Ty Dolla Sign seems odd, Ty and Ye didn’t have THAT many songs together before this dropped but Ty is the king of features so it could work. So after I moaned and complained about Ye’s current state of mind, the actions, words, and the many delays…what do I think of the music? What do I think of the album?
It’s….fine. Good highlights, plenty of meh moments, song song structures are all over the place like the man’s mental state. Verses mostly range from bad to boring to “fine”. There are some good ideas to be had here but they fall flat from time to time. Ty Dolla does a lot of the heavy lifting, I think if he wasn’t on any of these songs, this album would suck in my opinion. As I mentioned earlier, like the rollout itself, it’s uneventful, dull, and painfully average once you move past that and get to the good things about this record. Maybe this album will grow on me later in the year but who knows?
One thing that stood out to me the most was the ones that I could tell were originally songs made for Ty Dolla. They had that vibe that they should’ve been on his next or previous solo albums but with a Ye added twist, it brought more life to the songs than it was originally intended. “PAID” is very catchy with the hook, I love Ty’s performance. The beat is wonderful, I can hear this shit in the next GTA game. Kanye is very high energy, his screaming Roxanne and rapping with the Elmo voice is goofy but works with the vibes that the song was going for. “DO IT” felt like some retro Ty with the YG feature and the unreleased Nipsey verse starting off the song. I never thought YG would work with Ye cause of his support of Trump but YG's tune has shifted. The production isn’t crazy, I like the bass and the vibrant synths though but overall it’s a fun track. “BURN” is the interlude before we get into the more insane cuts of the album, Ty’s vocals sound great, and have his cool summer feel to it. Kanye’s verse is ok and short to the point, I love the piano loop here too. It’s a nice change of pace and it helps the album.
We do get vintage Kanye here too. “TALKING” was the 2nd single leading up to this mess of an album. I know people shitted on this cause of his oldest child North rapping and taking over the first half and stealing the shine. You know damn well she wasn’t gonna rap a whole 16-bar verse with deep lyrics but I think for Ye as a father it was a great moment for him. She did, a lot better than Drake’s kid I’ll tell you that much. Ty comes in talking about raising his daughter and he sees a bit of her in himself and he how dealt with that. It’s such a switch cause his side is more darker while Ye and North’s was more upbeat. I love the hooks on both sides, the way James Blake's vocal chops into the sample isn’t perfect but it works with the tone of the song. Such a fantastic contrast between the two that shouldn’t work but it did. “PAPERWORK” delves into the “YEEZUS” arc and holy fuck. Who told Ye about the Brazilian phonk scene? I know it’s been blowing up in the last year or so cause of TikTok but it’s still baffling. The chords being super distorted with the loud-ass phonk bass works like magic. Kanye and Quavo sound great, Ty could’ve been more high energy but that’s fine. Overall a mindfuck of a track, it’s so good. Kanye should sample that Pac-Man Brazil song next.
“FUK SUMN” is where it shifts into songs that would sound insane in arenas. I never thought I could say that Carti, Travis, Kanye, and Ty Dolla would get together to rap on some production that JPEGMAFIA had his hands on. Peggy getting on his knees and begging to work with Kanye was a bit corny and contradicting but making money is more important than friends. Carti steals the show, this is his song now. Not cause he took the bulk of this song but he was the one that stood out the most. The Chimpunk vocals felt out of place, wasn't huge on that. Travis's guest isn't great but it's one of his better guest verses in a while. Ty did his thing here too, Carti and he made the song sound grand. “CARNIVAL” is another one that would sound great in an arena. Can’t believe they made Rich The Kid sounds good here, what the fuck man? Also, we still need to study how this dude gets all these connections. I love the stadium chant vocal effects on the hook, the production is sinister and dark, also Ty and Carti once again made this track their song. Outshined Kanye on his track, Kanye did have a couple of clever and funny bars but him comparing himself to Bill Cosby and R Kelly? *barfs*. It just sounds forced trying to be “LOOK AT ME I’M SO PROBLEMATIC!” Like bro, just stop. Still enjoy the song despite that garbage verse, a major highlight for the record.
“BEG FORGIVENESS” sounds like it could’ve been on “TLOP”, or “Donda” only major issue is the song is way too long. Chris Brown sounds like he was trying his best John Legend impression and vocal performance, to be fair it’s the chopped and screwed vocals that make it sound that way. Ty Dolla sounds great here even with his vocals chopped up too. The song is a bit repetitive in the first half but when the beat and tone switch to this evil gospel vibe helps the song to be enjoyable. Ty’s voice cracked but I could hear the passion, he needs his flowers sooner rather than later.
One of the major issues I have with this entire thing is the mixing ruins the album. I don’t wanna sound like that nerd emoji but god the mixing is even worse than TLOP when it first came out. “HOODRAT” is a perfect example. The repetitive vocal samples are fucking annoying, the way it blends and mixes into the track is peak dogshit, and also such a chore to listen to, I wanted the song to end already. Ye sounds like he’s rapping on a McDonalds drive-thru headset. “KING” which ends the album on a wet fart is another example of horrible mixing. Kanye's vocals sound even worse than he did on “HOODRAT”, also another main issue which ties into this song and some others one too, that the whole separating the art from the artist doesn’t work here at all when he keeps saying stupid shit about the Jewish community. This song, “PROBLEMATIC”, and also the own with Chris Brown, he’s doing the whole “I’m sorry for my words and actions” but it feels half-hearted and fake as fuck. Especially like I said, HE’S saying stupid shit about he’s not being “anti-semantic, I fucked a Jewish bitch” on the title track. By the way, no matter how many versions of this song we get, it’s boring each time. “BACK TO ME” is annoying as fuck, the Jay and silent bob hook is stupid, not funny, and didn’t laugh. Gibbs did have a solid verse but it didn’t help to salvage the track to be better.
Overall my final thought is I’m very indifferent towards this record. Like the album and the dude's mental state, I’m all over the place with this. I could go the way of praise and dickride Kanye and pretend nothing is wrong but also have people call me a terrible person and I am doing it for clout. Another way I go is I can shit all over this, “grift” my way into kicking someone down who’s an easy target, have some almighty, high morale ground and people will bitch at me saying I’m doing this for clout. Either way, it’s a lose-lose situation. Is the album unreviewable? Yes and no. People are always gonna have some opinion on art that’s made by a terrible person, it’s your choice to not listen to this. More power to you. The same goes if you do listen to this. We ain’t perfect people.
Honestly, it pains me to say a Kanye album is boring, he has dropped worse material than this but I just felt “meh” after the album finished. At this point , I rather have him just stick to producing. I rather hear beats from him than hear what stupid shit he says next. Without Ty Dolla’s getting “PAID” and actually putting effort here, this shit would be worse than Donda 2 and Jesus is king. This album does feel like Donda 2 with a better budget. I did say maybe this will grow on me but who knows? Overall just an uneventful and dull listen despite the highlights when you move past the bullshit.
Also, he ain’t dropping part 2 and part 3 *laughs*.
Favorite tracks: PAID, TALKING, DO IT, PAPERWORK, BURN, FUK SUMN, CARNIVAL
Least Favorite Tracks: HOODRAT, VULTURES
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