Kanye West - Dark Twisted Fantasy

^^ 2+2 = 5

i mean, maybe it would feel more like that if those songs came out back when they were actually recorded. but it sounds like ... i dunno. a collection of tracks recorded over the past four years. some v good, some ehh

It just sort of makes sense given where Ye is these days and where p4k is these days.

this is otm

also carles is otm

let me flip the script on u all-- the 10.0 is pitchforks "statement score"

I don't even get what's that ambitious about MDTF itself - I get that the marketing, the good fridays, the multiple cover arts, the huge guest lists are ambitious etc., but what is 'musically ambitious' about this album?

lol at calling sir luscious leftfoot ambitious when it's by the same guy that made aquemini and stankonia

hell, even idlewild was more ambitious

I think that's what a lot of people have been arguing already itt, max

yeah i didnt read the thread

andy k's review is great

I don't even get what's that ambitious about MDTF itself - I get that the marketing, the good fridays, the multiple cover arts, the huge guest lists are ambitious etc., but what is 'musically ambitious' about this album?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:33 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

http://www.allmusic.com/album/my-beautiful-dark-twisted-fantasy-r2055009/review

agree about big boi, it's just a straight-up good album, and i can't deny that alex has a point about ambition/"importance"/etc.

hey max:

can we keep the number of ppl on ilx that post as fake carles to under 2

― J0rdan S., Monday, November 22, 2010 3:22 PM (7 hours ago) Bookmark

Andy's one of my favorite R&B/hip-hop critics, but I don't care for sentences like "Whether loved or loathed, fully enjoyed or merely admired, this album should be regarded as a deeply fascinating accomplishment." I mean -- "No."

Nothing exemplifies its contrasting elements and maniacal extravagance as much as “All of the Lights.” Rattling, raw, synthetic toms are embellished with brass, woodwinds, and strings. It’s a celebration of fame (“Fast cars, shooting stars”) and a lament of its consequences (“Restraining order/Can’t see my daughter”). Its making involved 42 people, including not one but two French horn players and over a dozen high-profile vocalists, only some of which are perceptible.

so Kanye is the broken social scene of rap

I get that the recording process was ambitious, but it doesn't sound ambitious, is all I'm sayin

deej is right about big boi -- i think that you have to love it in spite of its staleness

im not posting as fake carles i am just saying, real carles is otm

i am posting as fake jhøshea

so Kanye is the broken social scene of rap

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:37 PM (7 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

so ... do u or do u not get why this wd be a 'pfork album'??

the big boi album is like "break glass in case of there being no critically acclaimed southern rap album"

this album sounds prety ambitious dude

the polyphonic kanyree

igi deej

I get that the recording process was ambitious, but it doesn't sound ambitious, is all I'm sayin

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:37 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i dunno, rap music w/ huge instrumental suites & written as an exploration of the self & celebrity & ego & etc etc it all strikes me as rather unambiguously ambitious

whether or not u think that is a 'good thing' is up to you

i think this record is, at the v least, pretty fascinating, if not in a way that i find to be very replayable

AMG review is excellent and way more efficient than that endless p4k tract (which come to think about it, fits the album perfectly)

the big boi album is like "break glass in case of there being no critically acclaimed southern rap album"

― J0rdan S., Monday, November 22, 2010 10:39 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol. 1 for the sticker

I've been arguing that p4k had to give this a 10.0 from the beginning, fwiw

i dunno, rap music w/ huge instrumental suites & written as an exploration of the self & celebrity & ego & etc etc it all strikes me as rather unambiguously ambitious

whether or not u think that is a 'good thing' is up to you

yes

yeah - Rev, re: Jon Brion = artsy etc.... I mentioned the narrative, not because i necessarily think it's valid, but because i think it's KANYE's narrative. I think Miri Ben-Ari's arrangements on College Dropout are frequently way better than Brion's (with the exception of Gone, which is still one of my three favourite Kanye tracks, if not my absolute favourite. Gorgeous wonderful stuff.) But Kanye has always had a very explicit desire to go 'beyond' hip hop (which is stupid, for many many reasons) but him working with Jon Brion comes from the same impulse that leads to sampling King Crimson or Yes or Elton John or working with Bon Iver. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but all of it strikes me as part of that desperation for critical adulation (and popular adulation) that kanye has/had. even now that it's curdled to some extent.

lol. 1 for the sticker

― challop and a muff (deej), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:40 PM (45 seconds ago) Bookmark

i think i like my other zing -- 'only built 4 pazz & jop' -- better

nitsuh otm, andy k otm, tom ewing otm, basically, is how i break it down, to an extent.

atm, samosa, j0rdan & deej otm: hard to fathom it sounding merely ordinary to anyone

That's the thing -- BB's album doesn't sound at all stale or canned to my ears. The good to great songs take a good musical idea and expand it within three to four minutes. I know it's a false dichotomy, but very little on MDTF startled me like the stuttering bullfrog thing on "Shutterbug" (I know, I know -- it's been attempted on "The Whole World") or the juxtaposition of guitar and percussion on "Tangerine" or Jamie Foxx's bit on "Hustle Blood."

There's just something very condescending about BIG! ARTISTIC! STATEMENTS! being praised by rock critics, seemingly only because it's a language they can understand.

I'm probably closest to Ewing and ship.

while we're choosing softball teams I'm with alfred and ship and lex

as long as I'm in outfield with lex

one of you is the catcher

There's just something very condescending about BIG! ARTISTIC! STATEMENTS! being praised by rock critics, seemingly only because it's a language they can understand.

― altered boners (rennavate), Monday, November 22, 2010 11:44 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

absolutely! but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. anyway, i do think there's plenty here worth keeping, ambition aside.

The 42 people involved thing just makes me think of the scene in Walk Hard where dude has a whole studio full of people trying to male the Sgt Peppers of cutting yr brother in half with a machete.

Also I thought max was the og fake carles?

andy's review best aligns w/ my viewpoints

the 42 people thing makes me think of phil spector stuffing 42 guitarists in a room, except that actually sounded good

That's the thing -- BB's album doesn't sound at all stale or canned to my ears. The good to great songs take a good musical idea and expand it within three to four minutes. I know it's a false dichotomy, but very little on MDTF startled me like the stuttering bullfrog thing on "Shutterbug" (I know, I know -- it's been attempted on "The Whole World") or the juxtaposition of guitar and percussion on "Tangerine" or Jamie Foxx's bit on "Hustle Blood."

― look at it, pwn3d, made u look at my peen/vadge (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:43 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i think compared to a lot of other rap out this year, this stuff really wasnt all that novel.

im the og real carles

i dunno, rap music w/ huge instrumental suites & written as an exploration of the self & celebrity & ego & etc etc it all strikes me as rather unambiguously ambitious

whether or not u think that is a 'good thing' is up to you

yes

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, November 23, 2010 12:41 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

i love the big boi album when it's just rap music and not wacky novel ideas, & i love the prog retardation & excess of mbdtf more than the parts that resemble more closely rap music

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:56 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

smh @ there being a difference

yes its ambitious for rap music but is it ambitious for 'music' as a collective whole?

― ＿|￣|○|￣|○|￣|○ (dayo), Monday, November 22, 2010 10:56 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

what other music (right now) is more ambitious than rap/r&b? i'd say nothing -- so i'd answer 'yes' to this question

also that

idk, I'm just curious by what metrics does this sound ambitious, and the evidence you presented only make it sound ambitious within the landscape of rap

except it is rap. so, wouldnt it be more ambitious than a non-rap artist doing the same things, but without u know rza beats & john legend cameos & groupie poems?