#269 Kanye West, 'Yeezus' (2013)
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I’ve always had a complicated relationship with Kanye West. Not personally, of course, we’re not mates. For the most part, I’m not a fan of his music and don’t terribly care for him as a celebrity, but there have been some songs over the years that I’ll concede to liking. A prolific musician, ‘Yeezus’ is his 7th album in 8 years (if you count his collab album with Jay-Z). The album was very collaborative, and quite stark production-wise, in comparison to his older releases and described as being “very raw” by one of its many producers. West started the recording process in the loft of a Paris hotel, which led the recordings to be very simple with minimal bass so as not to overpower the room’s poor acoustics. As you’d expect, West would receive constant compaints from the neighbours as the sessions would last through the night. West would get his collaborators to all work on the same songs separately. They would go away, work on it, come back and critique each other. He would then choose the best elements from each producer. Engineer, Anthony Kilhoffer remarked that it was like art class. West had set parameters on the sound, with one main one being no “bass wobbles” as you’d hear in Dubstep.
15 days before release, West brought in super producer, Rick Rubin to strip down the music to make it more minimalist. Rubin cut it from a 3 and a half hour album to 40 minutes. Daft Punk were amongst the producers on 4 tracks, including massive single, ‘Black Skinhead.’ Speaking of singles, the second single and last track on the record, ‘Bound 2,’ features my favourite Kanye lyrics, purely because they are so insanely bizarre and Kanye, they make me laugh every time I hear the song; “I wanna fuck you hard on the sink/After that, give you something to drink/Step back, can't get spunk on the mink.” The video features a topless Kim Kardashian riding on a motorbike with West. Second favourite lyrics from opening track, ‘On Sight,’ “She got more niggas off than Cochran.” Clever wordplay from Yeezy. There’s also a great sample of Nina Simone’s ‘Strange Fruit’ on ‘Blood On The Leaves.’ Overall, I didn’t mind this album as much as I thought I would. I found it amusing, if anything. The dude is talented, no doubt ,definitely doing things that no else is. I’m sure we’ll hear from Yeezy again later.
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