Kanye West Life of Pablo Review

Review

By: Patrick Dillon

Album: The Life Of Pablo (2016)
Artist: Kanye West

*Note: This review was composed before any change Mr. West may have put up on Tidal, I don’t own a Tidal account so I’m reviewing the version and track listing i got upon the records initial release.

  At this time, the majority of you have, in all likeliness, already listened to and re-listened to this record.  It’s pretty obvious that my thoughts aren’t going to sway anyones already established opinion (negative or positive) or encourage the very few of you who haven’t already given this thing a listen to check it out.  That being said I think there are a few virtues in waiting to review this particular album, my being very very lazy just happens to be one of them.  For one; the explosive slow-motion car wreck of Mr. West’s promotional efforts seems to have died down a little, at least to the point where his antics aren’t trending on the daily anymore.  Regardless of what you think of Kanye’s artistic merit, there is no denying that he’s a marketing genius.  There is no such thing as bad press and I'm pretty sure Kanye, like a certain presidential candidate, has an earth shattering orgasm whenever anyone happens to mention his name.  Another virtue in reviewing this album so late, is that this record confounded me at first listen. To be quite honest with a few exceptions, the first time i heard this album i hated it.  That’s not to say i adore it now however, but this is a record that certainly takes a few listens to pin down. Hell one cant be sure if Yeezy himself has this record pinned down.

I’ll tell you what he does have pinned down though, opening tracks.  Kanye’s openers very rarely let me down, and “Ultralight Beam” is no exception.  Needless to say its a huge track in typical modern Kanye form.  Though he’s never shied away from religious songs before (“Jesus Walks” being a prime example), this is may be his most overtly religious sounding song.  Gospel fits in with Kanye’s typical larger than life production better than i could have imagined, I love the way the more traditionally hip hop drum beat works with the pretty chord progression, very nice stuff. All that being said it’s not really Kanye who is the best part of his own song, that honor belongs to none other than Mr. Chance The Rapper.  I mean we already know Chance has a huge Kanye boner (“Good Ass Intro” is an homage to Kanye’s Freshman Adjustment 2 Mixtape Intro) but he really outdoes himself on this track.  His excitement to appear on a Kanye album really comes through and his verse is appropriately poignant and elated.  This track to me shows Kanye’s true talent as a producer and an organizer,  but unfortunately for Mr. West he also has to rap.

Now i don't think the “Oh Father Stretch My Hands” tracks are necessarily all bad, on the contrary i think there is a lot here to like (Can we all agree it’s nice to hear Kid Cudi actually sing something decent again?).  On “Part 1” the production for instance is surprisingly messy and the bass and drums are very muddy sounding.  For a producer whose usual M.O. is huge, almost orchestral, rap tracks these songs sound remarkably unfinished, witch i can dig!  What i can’t dig however is the obnoxious high hats and off kilter auto-tune.  Kanye can use better auto tune, we’ve heard him use better auto tune, he uses better auto-tune on this very record so why it sounds to dull and lifeless here is anyones guess.  Maybe it was to distract from the god awful, and now infamous “Bleached Asshole” lyrics, though thats far from likely.  Even though lyrically “Part 1” is far far worse, at least the beat and chorus are interesting, the same cant be said of “Part 2” witch just settles for tiresome filler (nice vocoder at the end though).  What also makes “FSMH” 1&2 so insufferable is that they’re sandwiched between two of the better tracks on the album.

I didn’t expect to love “Famous”, in fact with all the things i heard about it prior to the album’s release i was going in with very low expectations, needless to say i was very pleasantly surprised.  Bb-B-B-BB-BBB-B-B-AAANNGER ALERT!! With two audacious samples on one track, Nina Simone’s “Do What You Gotta Do” & Sister Nancy’s “Bam Bam”, “Famous” easily could have crumbled under its own weight, fortunately  what we get here is easily the most fun  track on the album.  Nina’s vocal melody is of corse gorgeous, even though Rihanna’s vocals aren’t always my favorite, though the clear winner amongst the two is the excellently implemented “Bam Bam” sample at the beat change.  Even the now infamous Taylor Swift line i thought was funny even if it was thrown in to blatantly appease the click bait horde. The album actually continues a small quality streak with “Feedback”.  I really dig the almost industrial beat and Kanye comes of hilariously cocky if not as full of contradictions as he always is. Despite a few lyrical short comings i really think this is a great track, though i don't really understand or like the whole Ghetto Oprah part at the end.  Though he says he’s been “out of his mind a long time” the only real moment on this or really any Kanye album that even hints at genuine psychosis is “Freestyle 4”.  This may be the rawest we’ve ever heard Kanye (witch Kanye die-hards are sure to appreciate)  as he comes off truly manic and abrasive, he sounds unhinged spouting delusional nonsense.  Its nice (maybe nice isn't the right word, how about interesting) to actually hear a genuinely weird moment  from Kanye considering so much of this album, and his last album, were just shallow attempts to try and sound as weird and challenging as he does here.

Freestyle 4 rests in-between probably the weakest tracks on the album, not including the supposedly endearing “I Love Kanye” (Major digression but i really liked “I Love Kanye” at first listen as it was supposed to be a cute clever freestyle but a lot of the magic was really taken away when i watched Saturday Night Live stench posted a week before and in his supposed impromptu freestyle battle with Kyle Moony he just says the same thing even before the record was released! so its not a freestyle? Thats fine Kanye has never been good at freestyles but then why bill it as a freestyle? Thats what makes the whole track charming, now it just seems a little too calculated for me..whew sorry back to the review) , “Highlights”, “Lowlights”, and “Waves”.  Full disclosure “Lowlights” may just be my least favorite track on this record, this faux artsy pretentious go nowhere no substance bullshit goes on for like a minute and half to long and for some reason just pisses me off to an unbelievable degree. It’s Uninteresting even at the beginning, pointless even as a segue, and really doesn't say much of anything.  “Highlights” doesn’t fare much better as it’s really just heinous filler, the beat is nothing really special or noteworthy, and it’s not like Kanye has much of anything to say anyways.  I like the orchestral synths, and at leaf the auto-tune sounds good again but they're really not enough to save the track from just being meh, even if Kanye’s verse isn’t horrible.

Which brings us to “Waves”, why anyone (let alone Kanye) is still giving Chris Brown work is beyond me.  Even putting aside his being a horrible human being, he’s just really not interesting as a singer anymore, hell he’s not even on key the majority of the song!  If Kanye really had to fight to prove he had the right to use Waves as a title (even if it didn't even end up being the albums title) then this track is all the evidence you need to the contrary, despite the unnecessary “Silver Surfer Interlude” later on.  And does this mean at one time this song, this bland lifeless song, was the albums title track?!  But I digress, after all two of the best tracks on the album appear immediately afterwords.  “FML”, and “Real Friends” are in all honesty my favorite tracks here, and at least provide a sort of safe haven for lyrical quality, or at least competency.  “FML” is gorgeous, and here is where Kanye’s auto-tune balladry really shines in the opening, only of course to tag in the The Weeknd halfway into the track.  Tesfye’s feature fits perfectly with the really spacious production, this is an almost minimal stark track and the synths toward the end really surprised me, they almost sound like they belong on an art rock record Hudson Mowhawke really killed it here.  Kanye shouts his verse and really brings a palpable sense of urgency.

The melancholy vibes really continue with “Real Friends”, while its unfortunate that probably my favorite song on this whole record was released months before as part of Kanye’s G.O.O.D. Fridays, but whatever its still a great track.  I really like the watery and ethereal production here, he keeps the beat spacious and simple here and it sounds just great.  The track itself is almost reminiscent of the same “Old Kanye” Mr. West joked about earlier in the record.  I can definitely appreciate this more introspective side of Kanye as opposed to a lot of the nonsense he seems to be saying on the rest of this record.  I even like Ty Dollar $ign’s singing here i really cant say enough nice things about this track.  “Wolves” on the other hand has me torn, i don’t dislike this track, in fact i like a lot of the biblical themes and the beat is ok, i like descending synth lines, i just think for all the potential this track has it comes off as just boring.

But you don’t even know the meaning of boring until you hear the last half of the next track “30 Hours”.  The real tragic thing about this song for me is that i really enjoyed the first half, i really did.  I like Kanye’s flow here and even what he’s saying (that ex-girlfriend line was funny)  and i can even dig the beat but come on people this goes on for way, waaaaaayyyy too long.  Did you know Andre 3000 is on this track?  Neither did I at first cause Kanye just has him do fucking BACKUP VOCALS.  Are you serious? you're going to spend a good two minutes jerking yourself off (we all know you cant free style or ad-lib well) when you could have actually utilized Andre FUCKING 3000??  God dammit if that isn’t the most quintessentially Kanye thing he does on this album.  This song is an unfinished mess, he’s not being real, he’s not being “off the cuff”, he just being uninteresting and wasting my time.

Luckily on “No More Parties in L.A.” he actually does utilize the people he's working with and with those people being Madlib and Kendrick Lamar he certainly should be.  I like the way Kanye comes in for a second and then Kendrick just snatches the first verse, and its not bad although surprisingly I think Kanye actually has the better verse here even if its a little similar in tone to “Real Friends”.  The beat of course is fantastic, though Madlib rarely disappoints, the soul samples are great and i love the guitar and keyboard riffs.  It’s a great track but its not as mind-blowing as one might assume looking at the individuals involved.  I really wish the album ended here though, I think it would have been a much better ending than what we ending up getting with “Fade” which barely features Kanye on it at all, (and what the fuck is Post Malone doing on here? ) its probably not a horrible song but as a closer its horrendous.  Its just poorly written even if the house samples that make up the beat are at times interesting. I guess the only track I failed to mention is “Facts” and this too came out before the record, though this version is a million times better than the initial release.  At least the beat is great, it actually makes listening to Kanye rap about a beef no one cares about bearable and his flow isn’t terrible either.

I hear a lot of people asking: “What Pablo do you think Kanye is?”, “What do you think the album means?”, “How do you think it all relates, whats the point?”.  And thats exactly it, i don't think there is a point, I'm sure Kanye wants his fans to endlessly theorize and really dissect something thats not even there.  He may be an asshole but anyone who really thinks this record is some grandly planned out statement may even look like a bigger asshole.  It takes more than a few passing references to the name Pablo on a few tracks to actually put together a concept piece and this sure as shit isn’t a concept piece.  I find it hard to believe theres even a concept in its sloppiness and eclecticism, but hey if you really want to put the work in to try and “Figure this album out” by all means go for it.  Manny and i were talking last night about how Roger Ebert once said “If you have to ask what it symbolizes, it didn’t.” and i really think that fits this album nicely.  As a collection of tracks though i cant help but enjoy this record despite what it may seem like after reading this review.  I think the major problem i have is that at first i wanted to “get it” until i realized theres really nothing to “Get”.  While i don’t think this album is necessarily great, i do think its a worthwhile listen, it contains some absolutely fantastic songs as well as some very forgettable songs but i think ultimately there more to like here than hate and whats good here really is very good.  I don’t even think Kanye himself knows exactly what to make of this record, hence its existence in a state of eternal flux, Its not the return to form i think a lot of people were hoping for but hey maybe we’ll get that in four years as presidential thank you present, i sure hope so.

Favorite Tracks: “Real Friends”, “FML”, “Famous”, “Freestyle 4”, “Feedback”, “Ultralight Beam”, “No More Parties In L.A.”

Least Favorite Tracks: “Lowlights”, “Waves”, “Fade”

6.5/10