This is it. This is the real deal. I mentioned that College Dropout and Late Registration are masterpieces, but the record that truly deserves the title of Kanye's magnum opus, his greatest work, is My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. In 2010, Kanye had found Twitter, closed his blog, and redesigned his website. Before that he'd locked himself in a studio, away from the public eye, since the Taylor Swift incident in 2009. Over the course of the last months of the year, he released a series of free songs called "GOOD Fridays". Every single one of these songs was great. And then he dropped the album, and minds were blown. Critics gave it rave reviews-the best of Kanye's career. Why? Because it's unreservedly brilliant.
The first thing you hear on this album is Nicki Minaj's voice introducing the album, accompanied by soaring music in a combination that is absolutely beautiful. The production proceeds to be Kanye's best to date (and I do mean to date, not just up to that point), creating these dark, atmospheric beats that welcome you into Kanye's mind. If 808s is a glimpse into Kanye's mind, MBDTF is an entire tour. The album peaks at "All of the Lights", then again at "Monster", and again at "Runaway", and again with the closer "Lost in the World", each time threatening to overwhelm with the sheer scale and brilliance of it all. There's vocoder wailing. There's a section where the audio bounces from ear to ear, in different pitches. There's even a hip-hop piano ballad. The fact that he managed to merge together all of the featured singers on "All of the Lights" into a single voice is in and of itself an accomplishment, and he doesn't stop there.
The lyrics are also taken to the next level. Kanye takes his previous internal conflict between egotism and self-doubt and pumps it up to previously unexplored heights. Kanye's lyricism is better than ever, filled to the brim with brilliant, memorable lines. His flow, which I hadn't discussed before, is also at its best. On the aforementioned "Monster", Kanye spits out some of his best lines to date, plus he pushes Jay-Z, Nicki Minaj, and Rick Ross to the extent of their lyrical abilities. In fact, all of the featured verses display rappers at their peaks. Everyone who's voice is on this album is on fire.
Even more brilliant than that is the new shape of Kanye's persona. The fantastic beats surround him as he calls out all that doubted him in "Power" and "Monster", discusses powerful themes in "All of the Lights" and "Hell of a Life", and wallows in misery in "Blame Game" and especially "Runaway". It's a non-stop assault of everything that's been on West's mind since he locked himself up, and it's absolutely impossible to relate to. But that's the brilliance of it: Kanye isn't every man. There is only one Kanye West, and he's embraced that wholeheartedly now.
MBDTF also serves as the culmination of everything that Kanye had done to this point. The new sound is as soulful as The College Dropout, as grandiose as Late Registration, as glossy as Graduation, and as dark as 808s and Heartbreak. Through the album's bombastic highs and depressing lows, you can hear the eclecticism present in the broad palette of sounds Kanye utilized. Even more compelling is how the arrangement of the songs will place a dark, menacing track right after a soaring, bombastic one, never giving the listener room to breathe.
This is the work of an auteur. When he locked himself in that studio, he was a star who had fallen in the public eye. When he came out, he was something far less sane. It's in this state that his brilliance reached his peak, and he's yet to match the heights reached on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy-though not for lack of trying. Next we discuss Watch the Throne.
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