Kanye West: Worst To Best

hi everyone list the list Tano here the internet's busiest music nerd and it's time for a list Kanye West from worst to best what inspired this video is that earlier this year you may have caught that complex media the MCN for this YouTube channel came out with an article ranking Kanye West's projects from worst to best it was kind of controversial mostly because of the very low placement of late registration at the time I was thinking about doing some kind of response or stink piece about it but there weren't that many things that I disagreed with strongly like on a on a gut level uh in the article obviously the article was written from from a big Fan's perspective so uh that person had positive things to say about nearly every project there which is fine basically why I didn't really make a response because a lot of the logic behind that article seemed to be fueled by just more personal taste not really anything egregious uh within the article itself but uh still I thought the idea of doing this embarking on a list like this was a cool and an interesting idea so um I'm trying to do it myself here Cruel Summer uh this is really more of a various artist compilation not entirely a Kanye project I only include it here because uh uh it was included in the original list really more of a technicality uh my inclusion on this list there are some great singles on it but this is really just again a compilation that kind of masterminded by Kanye through the good music label and I guess it's it's good to throw here because it's an example of Kanye kind of dominating during a year when uh rap Crews clicks squads were the prevailing Trend and then immediately everybody's uh rap crew kind of dissipated because everyone found out how hard it is to manage and uh just keep a rap crew going because of all the competing Egos and Artistic Styles also varying levels of Fame and relevance everybody kind of has their own separate solo thing going to you know it it just comes down to everybody wants to be wuang but I mean after a while even wuang couldn't be wuang anymore because they all had to kind of go off and do their own separate things best tracks on this thing though mercy new God flow and also the Don't Like Remix hey yeesus yeesus yeesus Kanye's Worst Album in my opinion and for a number of reasons for one this is the rare moment in Kanye's career where he's not ahead of the curve he's not on The Cutting Edge instead on this album Kanye is trying to play catchup with the growing trend of experimental and Industrial hip-hop that had already been thriving and Reinventing itself for the past 2 years and it sounds like it with all the rushed kind of rickety not that adventurous instrumentals on this album The ridiculously overly simplistic Dumb lyrics pretty much everything Kanye does on this record pales in comparison to the new bold and Boundary pushing crop of artists who obviously inspired this album there are a few cool ideas and singles here and there uh black skin head is a pretty decent track even if this song at its core is Kanye crying about how the fashion industry won't accept him but ultimately this album on the whole is a miserable attempt at being experimental so much so that the after glove My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy couldn't convince the entire hip-hop industry to get on board with this album the best tracks on this album though being blood on leaves and bound two Watch the Throne Watch the Throne Watch the Throne this album was essentially the first leg of Kanye's post My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy Victory lap Cruel Summer being the second a lot of people at the time saw this collaborative album with Jay-Z as kind of being a a torch passing moment but I don't see it uh really as that because I feel like that torch from Jay-Z's generation to Kanye's generation had already been passed if this album does anything or did anything at the time it confirmed what we already knew that Kanye was at the top of his game and nobody on a solo level was really competing with him though this album in a sense was still kind of a uh Jay and Kanye trying to provide some Counterpoint some competition to uh the noise that little Wayne and Drake were making at the time because Drake was kind of this new exciting up and cominging face who was was starting to rival Kanye in terms of being a hip-hop artist with massive pop crossover appeal which if you followed Kanye's career that's one of the things that made him so special in the first place now this album did have a lot of shortcomings to it uh Jay-Z not being in his lyrical Prime there are some very gimmicky beats on this thing too there are even a few tracks that I think in the short time this album's been released have not aged that well like who going and stop me sounds like a bad dubstep remix of what could have been a good Kanye song and this album came a year or two late to be the Glamorous send off to the bling era of Hip Hop that I think it accidentally was and even Chuck D came out and I think made a very good observation of this album being so ritzy so glitzy to the point where it was kind of toned deaf still some of Kanye's best tracks are on this album The extravagance of this record does kind of make it a unique moment in his career and I would say there are more moments on this album than there are not where Kanye and Jay-Z bring quite a bit of chemistry to the table my picks on this album would have to be murder to Excellence and got to have it and up the the song about them being in Paris the life of Pablo the life of Pablo I think the life of Pablo is one of Kanye's most interesting albums he takes an incredible amount of risks on this record and the promotional roll out of this album was one of the oddest in the history of hip-hop but Pablo lands in the bottom half of this list because it's such a mess of an album especially when you consider the subpar mixing on the first version of the record that was released to everybody uh that that was not really alleviated all that much with the version that's more widely available now musically and thematically this record is all over the place you have tracks like ultralight beam which features a great verse from Chance the Rapper and is essentially like this futuristic gospel epic the very freaky skitso freestyle four that I think comes closer to making industrial rap music than any number of tracks from yeus and tracks like no parties in LA and real friends bring back the old Kanye that Kanye is joking about on the song I love Kanye there are some very bright and entertaining ideas on this album also some very uninspired ones too the line about Kanye getting some models [ __ ] bleach on his T-shirt uh will probably go down in history as one of his worst the song part two is really just a glorified Panda remix and there are still a number of tracks on this thing with the rushed feel of the album that come off kind of haphazardly slapped together and don't really sound like they know what they're doing or they know what they want to be wolves being probably the prime example still though that rawness that unpredictability that lightning in a bottle quality that this album has does make it a unique moment in Kanye's discography even if it does end up being being kind of a double-edged sword for the record some of my favorite tracks on this album include uh famous ultral Light Beam feedback facts and real [Music] friends graduation graduation graduation Kanye's thirdd album here is one of my personal favorites if I was basing this list merely on my personal preferences I would have probably placed it higher but part of my my logic going into this list is that I wanted to talk about Kanye's albums not just from the perspective of hey I like this one I like that one this is what makes this one special but also uh I I kind of rank these albums in uh level of importance and relevancy and significance to Kanye's career as a whole I think this album was really good for the time it was released but there are reasons I didn't put it higher after The College Dropout and late registration Kanye was looking to challenge himself shake things up try something different and potentially push his career to the next level by fully embracing the sounds of Pop WAP I would even say that he innovated within that sound with a handful of the songs here uh namely Cuts Like flashing lights and stronger by Tastefully incorporating Elements of Dance music and electronic music the issue is that a bulk of this album right now sounds so dated because it just reeks of The Bling era that it was born out of which in retrospect seems like kind of an odd move considering that late registration and The College Dropout were so great because they were a breath of fresh air from that Prime examples of tracks that did not age well on this album being a Barry Bonds with little Wayne the good life with T Payne and never mind hot and drunk girls because that track was just awful upon the release of this record however for its time this album was nothing short of a success for Kanye and while there were some hip-hop purists who were kind of griping about him uh kind of doing a bit of a departure from his trade Mark sound this album proved that Kanye's talents were extending and could extend beyond the hip-hop Universe which he would continue to do with album after album after album some of the best tracks on this album in my opinion are flashing lights good morning everything I am Big Brother an amazing autobiographical track from Kanye and I don't think he gets enough credit for the homecoming track with Chris Martin on this album because for its time that was a weird feature that was a weird collaboration for a hip-hop artist to do very uncool for a hip-hop artist to do that kind of feature and the song went over really well Kanye's continue to to prove himself as as being a hip-hop artist who has way more eclectic tastes than a lot of his contemporaries 08s and heartbreak 08 and heartbreak 08s uh very much the opposite of graduation in that upon its initial release this album was widely misunderstood disliked by very many people a lot of people assumed that this was Kanye's complete departure from hipop that everyone's assumptions that they were pulling out of what Kanye was doing on graduation had been confirmed but little did anybody know in 2008 that what Kanye was doing on this record would be the the shape of hip-hop to come less than 5 years later because Kanye's hyper emotional and autotune balladry on this album would down the road translate into artists like Drake in future now whether or not the genius of this move was entirely Kanye's is Up For Debate because kid Cy was a co-writer on at least a few tracks on this record but Kanye taking huge amounts of inspiration and ideas from his contemporaries and proteges is nothing new at this point no ID rhymefest Travis Scott but being early to the party doesn't necessarily mean that Kanye did this sound best uh since 2008 this style has had a lot of time to mature and smooth out and I think gain more of a pop appeal there are a few moments on this record that did not age all that well like see you in my nightmares where Kanye goes toe-to-toe with Wheezy to see who has the worst singing voice rarely does a song embody its title this much and the track RoboCop fills Kanye's quota for horrifically corny song idea that made the cut of the album anyway but some of 808's most pivotal tracks I think still serve as a blueprint today for a lot of the very tuneful trap that's climbing the charts right now even if the artists making it aren't fully aware of that and the song amazing with Jeezy even teases toward the sound that Kanye would be delivering to us with My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy this isn't a perfect album but it's one of the most cuttingedge moments in Kanye's entire discography and also a very glamorous and melodic Adventure through Kanye psyche during a time when he was going through a lot of personal turmoil due to losing the most important person in his life his mother somehow he soldiered through this extravagant pop epic and densely packed it with raw emotions so raw that they made up for a lot of Kanye's vocal shortcomings the best tracks on this thing in my opinion heartless welcome to heartbreak amazing bad news Love Lockdown and coldest winter late registration it's late regation late registration one of my personal favorites in Kanye's discography even if there isn't that much to say about it in light of of what we already knew about Kanye at the time and heard from Kanye after The College Dropout this album may be in a lot of ways a refined reiteration of many of the sounds that we heard on his debut but this record is super important because it showed that Kanye had commercial viability he wasn't just a one album Wonder singles like gold digger made him what he is today and confirmed that Kanye's style had chart power without him having to water it down or sell it short this record is like 10 years old at this point it still sounds great it's most likely going to go down as one of Kanye's most timeless efforts and that's all thanks to the great fundamentals that Kanye came into this album with the very funny and clever onliners in terms of phrase and his verses the great production on this thing laced with bright inspiring Soul samples and smooth Jazzy Loops good featur list raw personality great messages on some of these songs very personal deep cuts too like roses and addiction and crack music those tracks on this album are some of the best in my opinion in addition to uh diamonds from sier Leon heard him say hey Mama and gone my beautiful doctor is f okay I get it I I can already hear the people typing I can already see the eyebrows raising at my placement of this album because uh my review of this record is probably one of the most infamous reviews to to to have ever been written in this decade but again if I were making this list purely on Personal Taste uh that this would be a little bit lower late registration and graduation would be a little bit higher maybe the life of Pablo would be a little bit higher too but truth be told my overall opinions of this record have not changed all that much so re-reviewing it which I constantly get requests to do uh wouldn't really make sense at this point so while this record hasn't really grown on me on a personal level all that much since it's initial release the importance that this album holds in Kanye's discography becomes more and more apparent every year simply put My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is Kanye's entire career getting a second wind probably the biggest Second Wind any hip-hop artist has ever received in their career to the point where it's almost like he hit the [ __ ] reset button and I think it's the second win that Kanye's career needed not that I think it was on life support or anything but had Kanye not made the Grand return to rap music that he did on this album I really think he would have been done for because after 808's a lot of the hip-hop industry had kind of counted him out a little bit which he immediately made them regret doing uh with this album This Record is also Kanye's long awaited meditation on Fame which at the time seemed to mean a great deal to his fans even if to me a lot of it seemed like very empty and like a lot of what he was saying was just him referencing this completely madeup tabloid lifestyle that he he wasn't leading but clearly wanted to lead and went on to lead the song Dark Fantasy I think will go down as one of the best opening tracks of the decade the track power is easily one of Hip Hop's most excellent and grandiose singles this album's opulence is really something to behold and I appreciate it as one of the most ambitious moments in Kanye's career even if I still do hold to my opinion that this thing does really fall apart in the second half about as fantastically as the album starts I think though my favorite tracks on this thing Dark Fantasy power uh monster oh and uh gorgeous can't forget gorgeous which leads me to my number one spot my favorite record in Kanye's discography that would have to be The College Dropout maybe that has something to do with me being around and remembering when Kane released The College Dropout and remembering what a breath of fresh air he was to the music industry at large maybe it had something to do with me being in college when this album came out but I still do really feel that this album stands as one of the best artistic statements in Kanye's entire discography again a lot like late registration Kanye came into this record with great fundamentals a cool concept sound and theme that ran through a great deal of the record I know this doesn't seem like a big deal but the skits were very colorful and entertaining and added a lot of character to the album keep in mind this is during an era in hip-hop where skits were notoriously shitty and often ruined in album Kanye's lyrical style his sense of humor his personality the fact that he just came off like himself he wasn't trying to put anything on he wasn't trying to convince you he was something that he wasn't he wasn't trying to put up this tough guy facade either he wasn't pandering to his Cult of Personality he he didn't have one yet Kanye's whole dissection of how people perceive College how people just mindlessly go to College without thinking about why they're doing it or what they're trying to get out of it showed a connection to and an understanding of what average people are going through which Kanye hasn't really showcased in a long time also it's it's been a while since Kanye's come off this likable too and I'm not trying to imply that that by saying this is my favorite Kanye record this to me is his most important album because this is him at his Inception his amazing and wave creating entrance into the mainstream I'm not trying to imply that everything is just kind of gone downhill from here because for the past 13 years or so there's never been a dull moment sure Kanye's had his his highs and his lows which I'm sure will continue to be the case but that turbulence is part of what makes him such an interesting artist to begin with of course Kanye's production on this thing is fantastic consistently the Beats on this thing are emotionally charged they're inspiring they're uplifting Jesus Walks still one of his most amazing songs other favorites on this album really it's it's almost all the tracks on this thing but I guess if I had to pick uh we don't care all falls down obviously Through the Wire school spirit breathe in breathe out new workout plan and finally get them high and I guess that's going to finish the video right here that'll round the video out that is Kanye West from worst to best in my opinion again sort of a combination of uh what I think is the most relevant and important moments in his career uh fused with you know what are some of my personal favorites too I didn't just want to do a very indulgent personal list I think uh I'm I'm pretty proud of this list I think uh I came to the best conclusion that I could um sort of trying to balance objectivity and subjectivity I guess if you could even do such a thing but uh there you go that's that's the list right there thanks for watching Everybody Tran have you watched this video I hope you did because you're at the end of it and what did you think of this list did you love it did you hate it why what do you think I should list next and um your your number one you the best okay cool Anthony fantano Kanye West links next to my head subscribe to the channel other videos forever

Channel: theneedledrop

Views: 3,258,112

Keywords: album, review, music, reviews, indie, underground, new, latest, lyrics, full song, listen, track, concert, live, performance, update, the needle drop, anthony fantano, vlog, talk, discussion, music nerd, kanye west, graduation, late registration, complex, chance the rapper, hip hop, rap, gold digger, college dropout, yeezus, the life of pablo, tidal, watch the throne, cruel summer, 808s and heartbreak, my beautiful dark twisted fantasy

Id: APoGyJqeeKw

Length: 20min 9sec (1209 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 13 2017