Like most of Kanye's work, the album is a mixed bag. I'm not sure if it lands on the good or bad side though. Few things I am certain about so far: 1. It certaintly isn't as ambitious as his last two records, especially the production is a lot more straight forward and honestly also a bit underwhelming. However, it works really well for some songs. 2. The album cover is fucking hideous. 3. It's derivative of a lot of things going on right now in the popular hip hop world. 4. The use of autotune is still jarring(the ending of FML is just horrible) 5. Kanye is still doing Kanye. 6. Feedback sounds like a Yeezus leftover track. 7. I Love Kanye is a funny and genuine moment on the album, surprisingly.
Yeah, I've always personally found Yeezy's other albums to be spotty and kind of inconsistent, always with a few songs that don't grab me. "Yeezus" is the major exception for me
this album will be VERY HARD to beat for Album of the year. This album is fantastic and might even be better than everything from 2015. I'm only on my third listen now but so far but I’m blown away for the most part. After 2nd listen: Classic Songs: Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 2, Waves, FML, Real Friends, No More Parties in LA, Fade, Wolves Love: Ultralight Beam, Famous, Feedback, Low Lights, Facts Like: I Love Kanye, Silver Surfer Intermission, 30 Hours, Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1 Average: Highlights [first half trash, second half amazing] Dislike: Freestyle 4 Currently my favorite album of the year and will probably stay that way. Favorite songs: 1. Waves [How was this almost cut from the album?????] 2. FML [These two songs are like literally perfect] 3. Fade Fantastic job Kanye. The features are on point too. Who thought a 2016 Cudi feature would be any good? Kanye brings out the best in everyone. Some of the lyrics are subpar but that's my only complaint for this album and the bad lyrics are honestly sparingly.
disappointed that we didn't get sia and vic on wolves. as good as the album version is, that original version was phenomenal imo.
I was pretty let down by this album. I loved Yeezus and thought some of the songs went really hard. I'm In It, Hold My Liquor, and Blood On The Leaves especially were A+. There are two songs that I like a lot, 30 Hours and Real Friends, and three that I think are ok, Waves, Famous, and Wolves. There's a lot of nonsense filler content, like the Freestyle, Kanye Loves Kanye, and the Silver Surfer track. And a whole lot of unnecessary autotune. This isn't the type of hip hop that I enjoy, so I thought the album was one of his worst. The songs seemed all over the place with ridiculous samples and stuff that didn't fit into the tracks. Maybe that's what some people like, though.
I urge everyone to listen to this album with the following tracklist: [thumb]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ca5SQ0eUMAAiAkq.jpg:large[/thumb] With Lowlights playing before Highlights, as it supposedly used to be an intro to Highlights and part of that track. So: 1) Ultralight Beam 2) Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1 3) Pt. 2 4) Freestyle 4 5) Famous 6) Lowlights 7) Highlights 8) Feedback 9) Fade 10) FML 11) Real Friends 12) Wolves Notes: - "Freesytle 4" works well after the first three tracks and introduces the "crazy artist plot", if you will, that's found throughout the album. I think that particular element works really well after the first three tracks. - "Fade" works well enough after "Feedback", as the samples in "Feedback" play a melody that is quite similar to the bassline in "Fade" - "Wolves" should have been the ending to this album, like it always has been (until that last revision). The way this particular tracklist is built up, you can almost hear a gradual sense of desperation in the lyrics, ending in "Wolves" with Kanye pretty much saying that he's lost. Taking another look at the title and assuming this album is about Kanye's life and his carreer, the life of a crazy artist losing his way, I'd say the album makes a lot more sense with this particular tracklist. It's almost as if this album describes Kanye's struggle trying to stay sane. It's a cry for help, almost (which makes me believe that's the meaning behind the title "So Help Me God"). In a way, seeing him add more tracks, change the tracklist and the album title over and over again proves this: he's lost. Whether or not he worked that into the album itself is uncertain, but very possible. Of course, this doesn't make any of the music less generic. Nor does it make any of the garbage lines less horrible. But I feel like this tracklist provides much needed context and makes things flow a bit better. Heck, I might be imagining things and looking into this way too much, also very likely. But the album becomes likable for me with this in mind, so I'm just gonna pretend this is the real tracklist and forget the other one ever existed. The way it was released: 4/10 The tracklist I just described: 6/10
This album is actually alright, but I waited all this time just for ONE song off this album and he managed to mess that up. Why'd he make it worse? Doesn't even make sense. "Ima fix wolves" better mean putting Sia and Vic Mensa back in. That aside, I like Wolves, Real Friends, FML, and Feedback, don't care about the rest. I don't think this is AOTY material though, this isn't anywhere close in quality to some 2015 Hip-Hop AOTY contenders like TPAB. Not sure if I like it more than Yeezus, but it doesn't hold a candle to MBDTF and 808s. I'd give it a weird rating like 6.8/10, it's almost close to being a really good album, but it's too congested and unfocused, even nonsensical at times.
It's growing on me. I didn't like it at first because of the lyrical content. I get tired of hearing the sexual innuendo, especially after listening to something as lyrically good as MBDTF or College Dropout. Best song is Ultra Light Beam, where Chance fucking killed it.
Album was dope. Far better than Yeezus imo. Wolves, Famous, Ultra Light Beams and Real Friends are sooooo good. Hope this isn't a Tidal exclusive.....
If you guys haven't heard the new version of Wolves go find it now [or the original if you want to call it]. Frank Ocean, Vic, and Sia! CDQ leaked today. So much better than the album version, I replaced the album version with this new version. I assume this was the fixing that Kanye talked about.
Yeah, I think it is. A lot of people were outspoken about how much "Wolves" changed and I think Kanye caught on to that.
A lot of y'all have been oddly silence. Voice your opinions. I'm feeling a light to decent 6. Great: FML, Real Friends, No More Parties in LA, Ultralight Beam Good: Pt. 2, Wolves, I Love Kanye, Famous, Feedback Mixed/Average: Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1, Highlights, 30 Hours, Waves, Fade, Facts Bad/Awful/Filler: Silver Surfer Intermission, Freestyle 4, Low Lights
I feel called out. To be honest, I'm lost. I don't know yet. All I know is "FML" is my favorite song. Because Kanye AND The Weeknd? God damn.
The Best: Ultralight Beam No More Parties in L.A. Real Friends Fade The Good: Famous Waves Wolves Facts (Charlie Heat Version) I Love Kanye The Average / Filler: Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1 Pt. 2 30 Hours Feedback FML Silver Surfer Intermission Low Lights Highlights The Bad: Freestyle 4 Some Thoughts: This is definitely Kanye's weakest album to date, but it isn't necessarily a bad album. It seems to me that Kanye was in a rush to get the album out as soon as possible, and in doing so, it isn't really that refined (much like Yeezus, but the material here just isn't as strong). A lot of people have cited how this album can't decide what it wants to be stylistically, which really doesn't bother me. If the songs themselves were better, I feel like people wouldn't hold this complaint. There are no outright bad tracks on the album (Freestyle 4 aside), there's just a lot of mediocrity that could have been improved on. One thing that really caught me off guard was the new version of Facts, a track which I intially despised. Here, it is vastly improved, with a instrumental that really fits the track. It's pretty crazy how just a change of instrumental can change up a song so much. The Life of Pablo is a very middle-ground album, but the highs of the album make up for the more mediocre tracks that litter the album. As you can above, I really liked Fade, but it is a very weak closer to the album. If Wolves had been moved to the end of the record, this album would have ended on a much higher note. SCORE: 3.25 / 5
30 hours had such a great potential, it's a shame that Andre 3000 wasn't on more of it. This seems like a recurring problem throughout the album, whenever there is a great moment, it is over too quick.