Kanye West Albums Poll

dropout. hands down

Yep.

graduation, fools

my fave is def college dropout- probably in my top 5 of the decade- but i think late registration is undoubtedly his masterpiece, albeit a flawed one.

Graudation

Too much filler on the other two. If both of those were also trimmed down to forty-five minutes of the best music on each, I'd go with Dropout.

as backwards as it sounds, i kinda think it would take away from late registration if he had pared it down. i think 'roses' and 'celebration' for instance blow but the album wouldn't seem the same to me if it wasn't as bloated and overblown.

I've played Graduation more often than the other two when they were originally released, so that one.

Jordan OTM about Late Registration. also, at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding, it really is his best-produced album, and probably also his best/least embarrassing as MC.

G>CD>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>LR

Jordan, I feel the same way about the bloat on Dropout, and probably would for Registration if it weren't for the fact that I hate about 70% of the music on it.

lately i've been having trouble, idk, respecting (maybe not the right word-- maybe appreciating) graduation as the follow-up to late registration. graduation just seems kinda flat to me, the beats are way less interesting and nuanced than late reg, which apparently was kanye's aim but it has really started to underwhelm me {talking about songs like "i wonder" or "everything i am" or even "barry bonds"). i guess i feel like nearly every song on late registration is either spectacularly great or a spectacular failure, so graduation just feels almost too normal coming from him.

(nb i don't say this as a late reg stan nor a graduation hater-- in fact i got a bunch of letters telling me to do things like jump off a bridge when i only gave late reg 3 1/2 stars in a review i wrote for my hs paper, and i listened to graduation the other day and did not not enjoy it)

rev i was talking about the bloat of late reg, but feel the same way about dropout as well

(disregard this if you saying dropout was a typo)

Graduation is where he learned all Jon Brion's tricks.

The problem with with Registration is that it's all parsley, no steak.

at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding
at the risk of invoking '05 Jon Brion dickriding

??

AT THE RISK OF INVOKING '05 JON BRION DICKRIDING

are you bristling at the use of the phrase dickriding or what?

the whole phrase was just funny. nevermind.

well there was an awful lot of "Kanye has taken hip hop production to a bold new place by hiring an adult alternative guy to do string arrangements" type press going on when that album dropped, but I still do think they did some great work together.

The thing that was way fucked up about that is that Miri Ben-Ari's arrangements on the first album were much better.

but I still do think they did some great work together.

-- Alex in Baltimore, Tuesday, February 19, 2008 12:27 AM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

i think it'd be crazy to insinuate otherwise (not everything is great obviously, but there's some show-stopping stuff that he wouldn't have pulled off/dreamed of w/o brion [i.e. extended version of "we major"])

"We Major" is awful.

I do have to give Brion credit for some cool touches and for the fact that Graduation probably would sound way different if Kanye hadn't nicked all his tricks, but dude really fucked up a potentially good album.

Actually, I take that back, it's probably much more Kanye's fault Late Registration sucks than Brion's.

what tricks did he 'steal' for graduation?

i mean i think a large majority of people who think that the kanye/brion collaboration ended up as trash never like kanye in the first place (w/ the exception of rev i guess)

All his weird synth bits and whatever I'm not feeling articulate at the moment so if you'll excuse me. Actually, pre-Brion any use of synths in Kanye's music felt rather poorly integrated into whatever else was going on ("Breathe In, Breathe Out", anyone?), whereas that hasn't been the case since.

we listened to Graduation at a little after work party tonight. It was my first time hearing the whole thing. I didn't hate it, but the Jackson 5, which we put on after, sounded like fucking rock n roll, compared to lifeless egomaniac sucking the air out of the room.

See, that's exactly what Late Registration sounds like to me.

I should also say that "not as good as the Jackson 5" is a weeeeaaak-ass criticism, because really, what is?

after a 10 hour deliberation?

I had to sleep on it.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Graduation is the most concise and pleasurable to hear all the way through, even if it has ten times less to say than the first two. It brings out the best in Can, Daft Punk and Chris Martin. Maybe T-Pain, too. And no awful skits.

I went with Graduation, just ahead of Dropout. I really love the singles on the first record but it's tough for me to find the endurance to listen to it all the way through...and a good record shouldn't be an endurance contest (yeah, obvious, I know). Graduation is still fun, though I guess we'll see how things stand in a few years.

Y'all are crazy. Who cares if there's less fat if there's also way less meat?

I would argue that there isn't any less meat than on Dropout and certainly far more than on Registration.

OK, but "I Wonder" and "Drunk and Hot Girls" are squirrel meat or some shit like that.

I can see why people hate "Drunk and Hot Girls", even though I love it, but why the "I Wonder" hate?

I...don't...know...why...any...one...WOULD...mind...him...rapping...like...THIS...for...the...whole...fucking...SONG...

College Dropout is more consistent, but Late Registration has his highest highs. I voted for Late Registration.

xp: haha, okay point made

people voting for graduation are insane

i still credit kanye tho cuz the only reason i'm hating on it is because it's less interesting than his pretty fascinating previous albums

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

boo

Oh like Late Registration isn't awful.

woulda voted Late Registration if i'd seen this

I feel like Graduation, for all the press of it being a 'leap' or whatever, is really a very logical step forward. It's kinda a boring and flat step forward, like Sarge said, but it's the big, gooey orchestral sound he picked up from Brion and letting it play out on Toomp's 1000-foot-tall-synths. Manages to sound cold and warm at the same time. Figure it's the leap from the organic warmth of LR to the uncanny digital-emotionalism thing of Grad that made everybody go "wow out of left field," but it really wasn't.

And I'll take orchestral over relentless cold synths any day.

The boring orchestral pomp of Registration sounds colder and flatter than anything on Graduation, although I'm not sure who's claiming the latter as some sort of huge leap. (It is a logical step forward. "Cold and warm at the same time" is a good description, btw.)

I just realized I have this very weird thing about getting more irked about people liking music I don't like by musicians I do like than over people liking musicians I don't like.

Dude, somehow you fit 5 "I"s into that little sentence. Kanye would be proud. :~)

woulda voted Late Registration if i'd seen this

same here.

a lot of the tracks on college dropout were better/less produced on the promo.

promo? you're saying there's an alternate mix of college dropout out there?

Yeah, there was an advance of the album floating around all through 2003, and it was only right before the official release that Kanye did a bunch of last minute recording and added all those skits and some new songs (Spaceship, We Don't Care, Get Em High, School Spirit, Last Call), dropped some old songs (Keep The Receipt, My Way, Home), and changed some tracks (re-recorded Workout Plan, dropped the Lauryn Hill sample from All Falls Down, added a 2nd Jay verse to Never Let Me Down). I think the final version's an improvement, but both are very good and very flawed IMO.