Kanye West's June Takeover - 8th Solo, Cudi Collab, Nas, and More

[DukeDeMondo]

How dare you. I bet you'll be chanting "work this pussy" to yourself soon enough.

"What's This Pish?" more like.

Although I have to admit, I did laugh out loud at Mykki Blanco's "These banjee cunts can't take you!" first time I heard it. And maybe a couple of the other times I heard it too. 

[Z]

Quite liked KTSE on first few listen but it's the most "preview EP" vibe of the lot.

1. Daytona
2. Kids See Ghosts
3. ye
4. KTSE
5. Nasir


Things I take from it all are:
- The release format does hide that Kanye is a bit shorter on cool fresh ideas than he has been any time I can remember; TLOP, mess that it was felt a lot closer to being a proper great album than anything here
- His instincts as a producer and collaborator are still so good that that doesn't matter so much here
- Nas is done, he's by far the weakest thing here, after 6 years without an album it sounds like he was forced to do this one
- He's done Tayana Taylor a bit of a disservice by dumping her in the midst of these releases after a couple of years building her up
- ye ain't bad but whatever it replaced was undoubtedly going to be way better
- Kanye's rapping has mostly been pretty great across these
- I'd absolutely lap up two more Kudi and Pusha T releases like this, absolutely loved them

[Ja'moke]

Kanye apparently considering making 52 albums in 52 weeks: https://pigeonsandplanes.com/news/2018/06/kanye-west-52-albums-in-52-weeks

[Z]

Kanye apparently considering making 52 albums in 52 weeks: https://pigeonsandplanes.com/news/2018/06/kanye-west-52-albums-in-52-weeks

He seems to always say stuff like this and then do nothing? Remember turbo grafx 16?

[Custard]

Ye and Kids See Ghosts are fantastic records. Every time you count him out, he comes back swinging

He's clearly a bit of a knob, but fuck me, man's brilliant. What a body of work

[Ja'moke]

He seems to always say stuff like this and then do nothing? Remember turbo grafx 16?

True. But he said he was going to do 5 albums in 5 weeks, and did.

Obviously 52 is a ridiculous number, but I do think we're going to get more of these Kanye produced 7 track albums. Apparently he's working on albums for Chance The Rapper, Caroline Shaw and Abstract Mindstate.

[Z]

True. But he said he was going to do 5 albums in 5 weeks, and did.

Obviously 52 is a ridiculous number, but I do think we're going to get more of these Kanye produced 7 track albums. Apparently he's working on albums for Chance The Rapper, Caroline Shaw and Abstract Mindstate.

That's after 2 years of fuck all though.

I can see him being more productive with other people for a while, doing EPs instead of single tracks, but his manic wave directly after a major project tends to amount in fuck all.


Find it surprising how many write ups are calling this five album thing a failure, did they really expect two of them to be as good as Daytona and KSG in advance or are they just stuck to a particular narrative.

[Ja'moke]

That's after 2 years of fuck all though.

I can see him being more productive with other people for a while, doing EPs instead of single tracks, but his manic wave directly after a major project tends to amount in fuck all.

2 years isn't that long though, that's usually the standard time between album releases for most artists.

[Ja'moke]

Chance The Rapper confirmed he's working with Kanye on a 7-track album next month.

[Z]

2 years isn't that long though, that's usually the standard time between album releases for most artists.

Yep, and Kanye is undoubtedly more prolific than most acts when you consider how often he pops up on other things, but he tends to seriously overestimate what he can do and it all peters off once touring begins (would not be at all surprised if that coincided with a return to needing pain medication or something).

Kinda surprising there wasn't a Chance album among this batch tbh considering how mutually enthusiastic they'd be. Cannot see Chance keeping it to 7 tracks but that one'll happen for sure, definitely would rather a Kanye & Chance billed album than Chance produced by Kanye.



I know Kanye tends to repeatedly underwhelm live (his Glastonbury set stands out to me as an outstanding act of self sabotage considering the hits he had at his disposal and the guests he could've drawn in), but I'm really looking forward to seeing some live footage of Feel the Love. Gotta imagine a crowd would fucking lap up the gunshot drums.

Nasir reassessment: still think it sucks mostly, but Cops Shot the Kid is a great sample and the closest Nas sounds to engaged.

[Ja'moke]

I know Kanye tends to repeatedly underwhelm live (his Glastonbury set stands out to me as an outstanding act of self sabotage considering the hits he had at his disposal and the guests he could've drawn in), but I'm really looking forward to seeing some live footage of Feel the Love. Gotta imagine a crowd would fucking lap up the gunshot drums.

Kanye's Coachella set remains his greatest performance.

[up_the_hampipe]

Gotta imagine a crowd would fucking lap up the gunshot drums.

I think crowds are a bit skittish about gun sounds these days. There was a bit of panic when Eminem used gunshots at a concert recently.

[up_the_hampipe]

I think I can rank them now:

KSG
Daytona
Nasir
Ye
KTSE

Kids See Ghosts was an underwhelming listen for me at first, but I think I blame the shitty headphones I was using, or my shitty ears on that day. It has since become my favourite album of the year. Nasir is getting a real kicking on here, but I did love a lot of the production on that album. Nas himself is getting quite stale (I maintain that he has been making a lot of great music over the years while many people had written him off). Ye was the most disappointing release of the bunch, although still some good tracks, but nothing that will dominate the coming months like his previous solo albums. I hope we get to hear some of the music he made before he decided to change the whole thing (I'm assuming it was along the lines of his poopity scoop stuff, which I thought was pretty fun). Teyana Taylor's stuff wasn't really my jam, aside from that closing track. Pusha was an unsurprisingly strong opener, but he could have gone longer, he wanted to as well.

[Z]

Kanye on Kimmel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzXpJcwqYIg
The fuck is up with his voice?

[DukeDeMondo]

A "new" track - "XTCY" - appeared online a few days ago. It sounds like a demo, probably something he was working on for the album that was scrapped earlier this year. Photos of handwritten tracklists and things like this from around that time seem to support that. Plus it's got some of the scoopity pooping from "Lift Yourself" in. I dunno if it's any good or not, really, my head's up my arse and I can't hear it properly, but I think it's pretty good, maybe. I don't know.