My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is Kanye’s best album, it is the defining piece of music in a catalogue littered with classic albums, singles, guest appearances and more resurrections than Bruno Mars’ ‘Uptown Funk’ beat.
Kanye West is, in fact, a musical genius, this generation’s defining artist, it’s not even something you can even really dispute at this point, but, you may not care, due to Kanye the person and that’s okay but you are doing yourself a disservice.
I remember the buzz about Kanye taking off, College Dropout had caught buzz, at this point you could still order CDs – yes CDs – from Amazon and have them delivered to your door. I threw it on in my car that night – yes cars had CD players – and instantly I was in, the pitched up soul samples dragged hip hop into its next evolution, around the same time I discovered 9th Wonder and the group Little Brother doing the same thing – I also thoroughly recommend you check their catalogue. But that’s not the point of this piece. Back to Kanye. Brief sidenote: how many times a day do you think Kanye says, “back to Kanye”, I’m going with at least three.
Late Registration was the second album you’d expect: bigger radio friendly hits, those horns on Touch The Sky will cause most to smile. My pick of the album, Diamonds From Sierra Leonne – where Jay Z rhymes Businessman with Business Man, in a way that would be whack if anyone other than Jay Z tried it – as well as tracks like the Brandy laced Bring Me Down and the personal Hey Mama.
Quick diversion, around this time through illegal streaming – shout out music sharing sites when they were a thing – I came across Kanye Live in Amsterdam, it had all the tracks from his first two albums, which was great, it had crowd interaction, it showed his ego mixed with personality and was enjoyable end to end. But it also had a section where he played beats he’d produced for others, it was at this point it became clear to me how omnipresent he had been in hip hop for some time. Jay Z, Talib, Alicia Keys, Common was back and popping purely because of Kanye, Dilated Peoples, Scarface, he was everywhere, the journey to him defining a musical era was well on it’s way. Late Registration is a classic, but My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is his best album.
Let’s talk about Kanye the person, he’s brash, he’s full of ego, he wants you to talk about him. He has 100% come across as crazy on various platforms, he’s rushed Taylor Swift on stage – shout out to Old Dirty Bastard the original stage invader – he’s said some of the dumbest shit of all time on Twitter, deleted it, then come back a year later without warning and said it all again.
He drips insecurity with his boastful claims and need for your validation, he committed the sin of all sins and married a fucking Kardashian. You probably hate him because he is everywhere, his opinion is asked on world issues, he regularly proclaims his own brilliance, but realistically name me a hip hop artists who doesn’t. He messes up your nice neat shopping thoroughfares as international students camp out to buy his shoes and sell them at a profit, his kids are named after directions and fictitious characters and none of it matters, because he is a musical genius. He has defined this generation’s sound, then redefined it, and I am here for anything he releases.
Back to the music. His third album was safe, he made music-by-numbers, it had hits, it was enjoyable, but it was safe. His mother passed away due to complications from plastic surgery he paid for, killing them with kindness indeed, and he got all that out on 808s and Heartbreak, a brave musical experiment that would have killed a bunch of careers, that was not for me. Which brings us to the defining moment of his career and the album that will stand the test of time.
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is Kanye’s best album. It gives itself away from the moment it begins, in fact you probably knew it before then, the mini-movie released for Runaway, the way that key strikes repeatedly before the drum hits, the way you smile when the sample lands. This is musically deep, the beats are luxurious and heavy and even typing this I want to put the album on right now.
This has pure hip hop tracks, Power, Monster – the latter introducing Nicki Minaj to the world with a scorching verse “50 thousand for a verse no album out”, So Appalled. But where this album shines is in its depth and the pure layers of sound that hit you from the production, All of the Lights thunders in, Devil in a New Dress, Hell of a Life… there isn’t a skip moment on this release start to end. And perhaps most importantly in the world of singles and digital playlists, this is an album, something you take in start to finish.
This will be the album that defines a legacy, that we play our kids and tell them about the good old days, it may not even be Kanye’s best lyrical performance, he certainly comes across his least brash. He’s not here to tell you he’s the best or his music is phenomenal, he has reached that point in his career where he lets the music talk for him.
Things Kanye says make people uncomfortable, things he does make us question his mental state, he dropped Lift Yourself this week, a track on which he rhymes scoop with poop on a beat that sounds like he stole it from Edan. None of it matters, okay Lift Yourself is awful, it might matter. Thirty years from now people will be playing My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy to their kids and explaining why it’s brilliant, and how Kanye shaped the direction of music and popular culture multiple times. If you haven’t heard it leave your preconceptions at the door. If you have, throw it back on and remind yourself why you love it.
