My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Kanye West.

Album: My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West

Artist- Kanye West

Background:​

After a barrage of legal and public image controversy over Kanye’s mental state, the album was created during the time Kanye spent in Oahu, Hawaii. He said that overworking led to his controversial outburst at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, his disgust with its ensuing media response, and why he stopped recording for 2 years (2008-2010). He was supposed to go on tour with Lady Gaga to promote his album “808’s and Heartbreak”, but cancelled without any notice at all. Before the album released in its entirety, Kanye released 4 singles that remained on the album, “Power”, “Monster”, “All Of The Lights” and “Runaway”. The album was recorded in four different studios in Hawaii, California, and New York.

Review:​

Dark Fantasy :

The spoken word is done by Nicki Minaj, an American-Trinidadian based rapper, known for tracks like “Anaconda”. The track is produced by RZA, Kanye West, & No I.D. This song includes a chorus that samples “In High Places” by Mike Oldfield but is sung by Justin Vernon and Teyana Taylor. Teyanna is a Pharrell Williams Protege, who made an appearance because she was a “fashion friend’ of Kanye, and getting into the studio to sing for a part in the album. Justin Vernon is a very important factor in this album, popping up a generous amount of times on this album. Kanye uses clever word play and references all throughout this whole first verse. My personal favorite line from the first verse is “I'm just a Chi-town nigga with a Nas flow”. Nas is a New York City based rapper, who has created albums like “Illmatic” and “It Was Written”. Kanye West and Nas have collabed before, on Kanye’s 2nd studio album “Late Registration” on a song called “We Major”, and then again on a tape called “Hip Hop is Dead” by Nas, called “Still Dreaming”. Despite him claiming Chicago as his own city, Kanye West is actually from Atlanta, Georgia. Kanye moved from Atlanta to Chicago when he was only 3 with his mother after his parents were divorced. His father, Ray West, was a black panther and was one of the first black photojournalists at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The chorus where The next verse isn’t as good, but it still remains consistent with the previous verse. He does have clever word play and also includes call backs. One of the lines that caught my attention after a few listens was “The plan was to drink until the pain over, but what's worse, the pain or the hangover?”. I think Kanye is trying to block out his problems with drinking, but realizes numbing them with alcohol will only make it worse.


Gorgeous :

The second song of the album includes an intro done by Kid Cudi, known for songs like “Day ‘N’ Nite and Raekwon, known for being a Wu-Tang Clan member and having solo tracks like “Ice Cream”. The chorus is handled by Kid Cudi, and the first verse by Kanye West has lines like “I treat the cash the way the government treats AIDS, I won't be satisfied 'til all my niggas get it, get it?”, and “Face it, Jerome get more time than Brandon”. Both lines have something to do with black people, the first line one being about AIDS. The government is thought to have created aids, on 4 different races; African-American, Latino, Non-hispanic white, and Asian people. The second line means that if a black man and a white man both commit the same crime, the black man will get more time because of racial injustice. The second verse talks about Kanye’s then-infamous Ralph Lauren polos, which he was known for wearing “As long as I'm in Polo, smilin', they think they got me, but they'd try to crack me if they ever see a black me”.This song includes a lot of lines about black people and how they people view them and Kanye West himself as well. The 3rd verse also has lines about black people and how he is treated, while subtly cracking a joke at the same time, “'Cause they same people that tryna blackball me, forgot about two things, my black balls”. To be blackballed means that you are rejected from joining a club, that could mean that he had to work in order to make it into the rap industry. The next verse, done by Raekwon, includes him subtly flexing his clothing, by dropping brand names like Louis Vuitton and Nike. The final moments of the song is the chorus sung by Kid Cudi.

Power :

“Power” was one of the singles released by Kanye West ahead of time, before the album dropped. This song has remained one of his best and most popular works in his discography. Power was produced by S1 and Andrew Dawson with the help of the executive producers for the album. The song has a lot of energy to it, creating an energetic energy within you almost. This song itself has so many punchlines and even a diss to Saturday Night Live, which famously hosts many famous actors and artists. “Fuck SNL and the whole cast, tell them Yeezy said they can kiss my whole ass”. Saturday Night Live has hosted Kanye in the past, and famously also in 2018, where he said he was harassed for wearing the “Make America Great Again” Hat, done by Donald Trump, the 45th president in the United States. Kanye in the next verse talks about another president, Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States. “They say I was the abomination of Obama's nation”. Obama was gifted 2 pairs of Kanye West’s Yeezy by Adidas. I personally don’t understand why that line was used but, it somehow makes sense in its own way. As the song goes on, it takes a very dark turn, as Kanye references a suicide attempt. “Now this will be a beautiful death, I'm jumping out the window, I'm letting everything go.” Kanye West lost his mother, Donda West, from a liposuction-related death. This was one of the songs that really made this album a classic so many years after it’s release date.

All Of The Lights (Interlude) :

The interlude is just an instrumental consisting of the cello and piano. Despite this, it’s a great way to introduce the song, All Of The Lights. It's almost like a break from the song before.

All Of The Lights :

All Of The Lights is one of the staple singles released and leaked before its album release date. All Of The Lights was produced West himself and co-produced by Bhasker. 14 artists voices were used for background vocals: Alicia Keys, John Legend, The-Dream, Drake, Fergie, Kid Cudi, Elton John, Ryan Leslie, Charlie Wilson, Tony Williams, La Roux, Alvin Fields, Ken Lewis, and Rihanna, who handles the hook as well. Despite being leaked, it made the album. The first verse mentions Michael Jackson, who died the year prior on June 25th, 2009. “Something wrong, I hold my head, M.J. gone, our nigga dead!” the rest of the song tells an incredibly dark tale of a man who commits domestic abuse, goes to prison and has his daughter is under a restraining order so he can't see her. Kanye West’s verse wouldn’t be the only song that touches real life subjects that talks about struggling. Fergie, a California native known for being a part of the “Black Eyed Peas”, an alternative hip hop collective. The song ends with her verse, then The - Dream sings the outro which is the chorus, wrapping up the end of the song.

Monster ft. Nicki Minaj, Rick Ross, Jay Z, & Bon Iver :

The intro verse is rapped by Rick Ross, a former parole officer turned to a rapper known for songs like “Purple Lamborghini” and “Hustlin”. His opening verse included a self depreciating line where he calls himself a ¨fat motherfucker¨ . He also references how Kanye West samples other songs in his beats, despite this song not having a sample. Kanye takes the chorus and says “Gossip, Gossip, nigga just stop it. Everyone know i'm a motherfuckin’ monster.” This line has significance because Kanye ran on stage at the VMAs in 2009 when Taylor Swift won the award for best video. He said that Beyonce has best video of all time and received a high amount of hate for this incident, and the term ‘Monster’ comes from how the media made him look. After the chorus ends, Kanye says in the first line of his verse that he’s the “The best living or dead hands down”. This line has a lot to do with the debate that who is the greatest rapper of all time, many siding Tupac, Notorious B.I.G, Nas, or even Andre 3000. Another significant line is “Do the rap and the track triple double no assist”, Kanye produces his own beats, sometimes with others and also raps. Despite this, he doesn’t own his masters. Kanye ends the verse with a joke, but also clever word play; ”My presence is a present, kiss my ass”. The mic is then passed to Jay-Z, the owner of Roc Nation, which holds many big name artists like J. Cole, Jaden Smith, Lil Uzi Vert, Rihanna, and more, and on top of this, he is also a hip-hop culture mogul. Jay Z spits a rather revealing line about his past in his New York “None of you niggas have seen the carnage that I've seen, I still hear fiends scream in my dreams” , which could mean that he has experienced many things in his adolescence growing up in New York City, that being the drug addicts that he could have once dealt to. The next verse goes to Nicki Minaj, a female rapper known for songs like “Anaconda” and being affiliated with YMCMB, a mega-rap group which consisted of Drake, Lil Wayne and DJ Khaled. In her opening verse, she talks about one of her friends “With a bad bitch that came from Sri Lanka”.Nicki’s friend M.I.A. was born in London to Sri Lankan parents and moved to Sri Lanka when she was six months old. Nicki is also featured on M.I.A.’s “Teqkilla.” She and Nicki are known for collaborating with each other. She later on asks a request for Kanye West that later on creates on another album. “I think me, you, and Am should ménage Friday”. “Am” is Amber Rose, Kanye West’s ex-girlfriend, who had split in July of 2010, a few months prior of this albums release. It’s often said that the reason why Kanye made this album so perfect is because of the emotional state he was in at the time. The album known for being emotionally made, “808s and Heartbreak”, was the album before this. It was his worst selling album and was highly unpopular with the rap fans because it was a different sound from him. The final touches of the song come from Bon Iver, an indie group based from Wisconsin.

So Appalled ft. Jay-Z, Pusha T, Cyhi the Prynce, Swizz Beatz, RZA :

The beginning is done by Swizz Beatz, a producer known for working with artists like Lil Wayne, Drake, Pusha T, Kendrick Lamar, Young Thug, and many more artists. When swizz says ‘middle finger in the air if you don’t really care’ there’s a pause at the ‘If’ that the engineer never fixed. The first verse is delivered by Kanye, and references Donald Trump, a man who owns Trump Entertainment Resorts and is worth 4 Billion dollars, turned president in 2016. “I'm so appalled, Spalding ball, Balding Donald Trump taking dollars from y'all”. My personal favorite line from this verse is “Niggas be writing bullshit like they gotta work”, Kanye is appalled not only by what these rappers are rapping about, but their average rapper lifestyle as well.The next verse comes from Jay Z, who appeared on the track before “So Appalled”. Jay kicks off his verse with “How should I begin this? I’m just so offended, how am I being mentioned by all these beginners?”. There is no saying exactly who he might be coming after. Jay later on says ¨I went from the favorite to the most hated, but would you rather be underpaid or overrated? Jay Z started out as a young, hungry rapper, people loved that. As his popularity and status grew, more people hated him, so he became someone people hated to love. The next verse is from Pusha T, a Norfolk , Virginia native where he grew up, selling drugs with his brother, No Malice. “Success is what you make it, take it how it come ,a half a mil in twenties like a billion where I'm from”.Success all depends on someone’s mentality, what’s successful to one person may be unsuccessful to another. Half a million in 20s may seem like very little to someone who has 20 million dollars. Since Pusha was a dealer, the half a million in 20s may show that he has made many sales, almost running an empire just off selling drugs. In the same verse, he drops a disrespectful line. “Them kilos came, we gave Bobby Brown jaw.” Bobby Brown is the husband of the now deceased Whitney Houston and a drug addict. Pusha T mentions his jaw because his jaw was left crooked after a mild stroke from heroin in 2001. The next verse comes from Cyhi The Prince, who wasn’t supposed to be on the song, but fits right in with the other featuring artists. One of my personal favorite bars from this entire song actually came from Cyhi, when he said “I met this girl on Valentine's Day, fucked her in May, She found out about April, so she chose to march.” The wordplay he used to make this line, and align it with the months, was to me, very clever and really well said. The last stretch of the song is given to RZA, who really didn’t even have a verse and even makes the final chorus sound bad in my opinion, this is the one part I personally don’t like about this song.

Devil In A New Dress Ft. Rick Ross :

This song was made by Bink!, a Grammy winning hip hop producer who is noted for his work with Roc-A-Fella Records artists. This is also the only track that Kanye himself doesn’t have any production credit. The chorus is handled by Kanye West. In the chorus, Kanye talks about how his girl is so attractive that it’s making him think sinful thoughts, and that the way she looks should be a sin itself. The first verse comes from Kanye, who also has another verse after this one. My favorite line in this verse is when he says “What happened to religion? Oh she lose it”. “Losing religion” is American phrase that means to lose your civility and to be at your last straw. Ironically, Kanye West 8 years later, dropped a religious album titled “Jesus Is King”, a mainly gospel album. Kanye also raps the second verse, this one in my opinion is much smoother and is also notably longer than the first. A bar that catches my attention every time I heard this song is “Don't leave while you're hot that's how Mase screwed up”, which has different meanings depending on the way you look at it. To start off with one many people don’t know about, Ma$e and Kanye have both broken their jaws, but in completely different scenarios. Ma$e broke his jaw due to a fight at a club when the Wu-Tang Clan’s entourage met face to face with Ma$e’s entourage, a man named I-Cham, despite the rumors being that Ghostface Killah being the one that broke his jaw. On the other hand, Kanye broke his jaw after leaving a Los Angeles recording studio after a late-night session when his rented Lexus collided with another car , hospitalizing him with a fractured jaw. Another meaning this line could have is Ma$e leaving the rap game early, while he was still successful to become a pastor, even after his album, “Harlem World” that sat at #1 and sold 175,000 copies in its first week of being released. After this verse is over, there is the instrumental interlude, performed by none other than Mike Dean himself. This guitar solo that rips through half the song almost acts like a divider between Kanye’s verse and Rick Ross verse that is arguably the best featuring verse on this song. Speaking about Rick Ross, after the guitar solo is done, Rick Ross comes crashing in, with such fluidity that it just insinuates into the end of the solo. My favorite bar from this verse is when he says, “When it comes to tools, fool, I'm a Pep Boy; When it came to dope, I was quick to export; Never tired of ballin' so it's on to the next sport”. The first bar is a reference to Pep Boys, an automotive company that does auto repair, and which of course, has tools, but not the kind Rick Ross is talking about knowing how to handle. The second bar, is talking about his quickness to transport drugs, despite being a correctional officer before taking on the rapping career which he now has. The final bar, talks about balling, which is often seen as being rich. Rick Ross says he’s onto the next sport, which can mean that he is going from activity to activity because he’s never tired of getting money. The outro of this song is the guitar until the last second, where it then interludes the next song.

Runaway Ft. Pusha T :

This song was produced by Kanye West, Emile, Jeff Bhasker and Mike Dean, which is heavily sampled. This song has 38 seconds of the same E, B/Eb, C#m, A piano chords being played in the beginning. This is also known as the “Heartbeat” of this song. The bass and vocals come in after the 38 seconds of the solo heartbeat introduction is done, the vocals being from a sample from Rick James’s live “Mary Jane” performance in 1981. The chorus comes after “Ladies And Gentlemen” sample, which is an introduction for James Brown at the Apollo II. What lines really speaks to me from this entire chorus is, “Let's have a toast for the douchebags; Let's have a toast for the assholes; Let's have a toast for the scumbags; Every one of them that I know ; Let's have a toast for the jerk-offs that'll never take work off”. In essence, these things could have been used to describe Kanye during this time period. Most notably, Kanye ran on stage at the VMAs when Taylor Swift won an award for best video of the year, saying that Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time. This could be an apology from Kanye, reflecting on the people who he might have hurt in his past, and he could be recognizing his own flaws in his personality. The first verse is short, but does not fall short of having meaning. Kanye says “See, I could have me a good girl, and still be addicted to them hoodrats”. This line pertains to his ex-fiance, Alexis Phifer, but they split after Kanye’s mother, Donda West, died of a heart attack. After they broke up, he went on to date former stripper Amber Rose. The next part of this song is the bridge, which is filled in by Kanye West and Rick James vocals. The bridge to me seems like Kanye is talking to someone, to run away from the tragedy that is his life. The bridge carries onto Pusha T’s verse, who has already appeared on this album. The line that really sticks out to me is when Pusha said, “You should leave if you can't accept the basics”. This line differs from Kanye telling his girlfriend to run away for her own good, where Pusha tells the girl to suck it up and accept that he will mistreat her but will live in luxury. The last line of the feature ends with Pusha saying “I’m just young, rich, and tasteless, P!” This makes Pusha sound ignorant because of the seriousness of the delivery of this line. The verse immediately after this line is short and very impactful to the tone of the song. The highlight for this verse for me is “I don't know how I'ma manage, if one day you just up and leave”. This stands out for me because when Kanye’s mother died, he separated from his girlfriend, crashed a victory speech and got slandered by media harshly. I feel like all of his controversial moves around the time, were due to the fact that his mother died and he didn’t know how to get over it at the time. The outro, roughly half of the 9 minutes and 7 seconds of this song, is a very important part not only to this song but to the rest of his career. Instead of using an instrument to finish off the song, Kanye uses a vocoder to make his voice sound like a guitar. The vocals processed through a vocoder really do add on the emotion of this song, which to me is like the cherry on top.

Hell Of A Life :

This song has a very dark, nightmarish, heavy feel to it that creates a Psychedelic Rock type of feel. This song is produced by Kanye West, Mike Caren, Mike Dean, and No I.D. Kanye wastes no time to start the first verse of this song, and drops some lines about his girlfriend, then Amber Rose by saying “I think I just fell in love with a porn star, turn the camera on, she a born star”. This line ironically, does come true in the future. On May 24th, 2014, Kanye married Kim Kardashian, a woman whose father defended OJ Simpson in court, and is also famous for shooting a sex tape with Ray J, so Kanye quite literally, married a porn star. The chorus is more instruments than actual lyrics, so the vocal chorus is short. The last line of the chorus is “Grab my hand and baby we’ll live a hell of a life”. This could mean that Kanye wants to lead this girl to a fantastic life, and a life in hell, or simplified, just sinning. After the chorus, the second verse follows. The second verse is short, but does have some wild lines. One that does catch my attention is “Well I guess a lotta niggas do gang bang; And if we run trains, we all in the same gang”. This reference gang banging, which doesn’t fall too far from Kanye’s life in Chicago. In “Drive Slow”, on Late Graduation, Kanye says “a school full of Stones; He nicknamed me K-Rock so they would leave me alone,'' Stones, being Black Stones, a popular gang in Chicago. To run a train is to have several men to have sex with the same woman. In my opinion though, I feel as if the third verse is the most ironic yet the best verse of this song. The first line of this song is “One day I’m gon' marry a porn star”, and he did end up getting married to a pornstar, Kim Kardashian, starring with Ray-J. The last bar of the song is also very complex and has an array of meanings, when Kanye says, “How could you say they live they life wrong?; When you never fuck with the lights on”. Fucking with the lights on could refer to paparazzi flashes, and having the camera flashes surrounding them and being criticized for doing certain things, like having sex with someone. Lights is a very significantly seen subject on this album, the lights could be the popularity around Kanye’s name around this time due to his controversies, or simply his fame in general. The light in this instance, could be people shining their moral spotlights on Kanye, showing his negatives higher than his positives. The outro follows after the refrain of this line. Kanye starts to lower his tone, and says “I think I fell in love with a porn star; And got married in a bathroom”. This could be Kanye realizing that being in love with a pornstar is more of a fantasy than it seems. The outro is truly a weird thing to me. The outro is Kanye jerking off in the bathroom as he takes deep breaths and shuts off the porn 10 seconds before it switches into the next song, which could be out of embarrassment because of the tone of the next song.

Blame Game ft. John Legend :

The blame game refers to people arguing on who is blamed for a negative action, and which usually is a back and forth with the couple. In this case, Kanye is arguing with his ex, Amber Rose or with his fame in general. In my opinion, the lines in this song portray more towards his ex than to anyone else who can be in question. The chorus is sung by John Legend, who is a part of Kanye’s label, G.O.O.D Music. The sung chorus matches the emotion Kanye is attempting to show in this song, which is how he loves said woman in this song but she doesn’t feel the same way toward him. The first verse is Kanye in the bathroom, which could be where he was in the end of Hell Of A Life. The standout line in the verse is “On a bathroom wall I wrote "I'd rather argue with you than to be with someone else", I took a piss and dismiss it like "fuck it" and I went and found somebody else”. After listening to the ending of the last song, Kanye wants to stick with his girl and continue to argue instead of trying to venture new love with someone entirely new, but he eventually does the opposite and gets in a new relationship. During the second verse, Kanye’s voice changes frequently towards the end, going from low pitched to high pitched, then back to his regular voice. This could correlate with Kanye’s emotional state after the separation. Despite all the bars that could catch the listeners ear in this verse, the 2 that often times I listen back on. The first one is “You should be grateful a nigga like me ever noticed you”. This is what makes me think that when he wrote this song he was referring to Amber Rose, because before they were together, she was a stripper who didn’t live a luxurious life, but after Kanye came into her life, everything became better for her. As seen in the end, she even learns how to treat a man after splitting from Kanye. The other line that can also be directed toward her is “ You always said, Yeezy, I ain't your right girl”. This could allude to why they couldn’t be together, Kanye being an emotional person and Amber being a hood chick. They were polar opposites, but attempted to stick together. The interlude is a poem written by Chloe Mitchell, a poet who has also written for Rihanna, who rose to fame from Tumblr. The line that usually gets me is “With so much of everything, how do we leave with nothing?”. Kanye leaves the relationship, with all of the love that he put into it, only to get nothing in return, which leaves him hurt. Instead of hearing John Legend on the chorus, we hear Kanye take it, and do it well too. The outro of the song, is Kanye being worried about his ex, who is somewhere that isn’t with him. Kanye says “when the phone called it just rang and rang, You ain't pick up but your phone accidentally called me back, and I heard the whole thing.” which builds up towards the skit in the end, which is performed by Chris Rock and Salmas Kenas, Chris Rock being “New Dude” and Salmas playing as “The Girl”. There are many things from this section alone that are not only funny but also throws even more shots at Amber Rose, seems like she doesn’t get a break from Kanye in this song. First, the new guy says “This is some Cirque du Soleil pussy now! Shit!”. This could be leading back to Amber being a former stripper, because Cirque du Soleil is a Canadian company who sets up acrobatic performances all over the world. The next line that creates almost an ironic feeling is when Chris Rock says “I'ma thank him. I'ma buy the album, I'ma download that motherfucker”. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy leaked early, and the new dude wants to thank Kanye by actually going out and buying the album, despite it being already online for free, or being bootlegged. The final line that adds a sad mood to the rest of the song is when the New Dude says “Where'd you learn to treat a nigga like this?”. After showing Amber how to treat a man while dating him, she in return treats her new man with respect, and even gifts him a watch. I think that Kanye is trying to show that he showed her how to do things right in a relationship. “Yeezy taught me” is what the girl says who taught her the things she knows, basically showing that Kanye has taught her well.

Lost In The World Ft. Bon Iver :

The intro to this song is sampled from a song called “Woods” from the Blood Bank EP released by Bon Iver. After lead singer Justin Vernon and DeYarmond Edison split from their band, he secluded himself in a cabin in the woods in Wisconsin in 2007 for three months, creating their popularly acclaimed album “For Emma, Forever Ago”. The same behavior could also be seen by Kanye, who took a 2 year hiatus to record this album in several different locations, but most famously, Hawaii. In the years leading up to this album, Kanye had lost a lot of things, including his sanity,his fiancee, and his mother. When both Kanye and Justin sing in the chorus “I'm lost in the world, been down my whole life”, it could be used to describe the both of them, both suffering many hardships in their life. There is only one full Kanye verse in this song, but it has a lot of major takeaways. My favorite line from this verse has to be “Lost in this plastic life, let's break out of this fake-ass party, turn this into a classic night”. Plastic is toxic, obnoxious, and artificial, all things that can be used to describe the world we live in, depending on your viewpoint. Kanye wants to break the chain in essence and do something different that’s adventurous. After this verse, there is a Pre-Chorus, where we hear vocals from a new voice, the voice being Elly Jackson, who fits in almost perfectly, and matches the “lights’ references that have been occurring all around the album. “Run from the lights, run from the night, run for your life”. The lights signify Kanye’s struggle with fame, because everyone should know that Kanye is not perceived as an angel by everyone. The bridge interludes into the next song, by Gil Scott Heron saying “Who will survive in America?”, which is also the title of the outro.

Who Will Survive In America :

This track has nothing from Kanye, but is rather a metaphor for the entire album. Every single line has importance, from start to finish, references something from the album itself. The person who is speaking the words, is Gil Scott Heron, and has been used in Kanye’s music before, being also sampled in “My Way Home” on Late Registration, which samples his song “Home Is Where the Hatred Is”. The few lines that catch my attention are “We learned to our amazement, the untold tale of scandal, two long cencenturies buried in the musty vault, hosed down daily with a gagging perfume”. This line pertains to the history of America, and how its sins are attempted to be covered up. There will always be some new controversy, whether that is systematic racism, police brutality, discrimination, or much older problems, like the killings of indigenous people of America, slavery and hanging innocent black people. Nothing will ever change and we stand aside to attempt to ignore our country's problems, only to be faced with it once again. Another line that could also have a significance is “The youngsters who were programmed to continue fucking up woke up one night, digging Paul Revere and Nat Turner as the good guys”. Kanye uses this to show that society builds us to be passive and become brainwashed to believe the media before the real truth. The Paul Revere & Nat Turner line are used as two revolutionaries, who both fought against someone; Revere against the British to protect and serve America , and Turner against the whites to free slaves. The claps in the end conclude the song and the album, but have a larger significance. The applause is quiet, which could mean that it was done in a small setting with only a few people around, to show that no one who wasn’t openly involved with the revolution truly cared about it. The rest of the people are starving for the fame that Kanye wants to ignore. The applauding could also bring the fantasy setting of this album to a halt, meaning that the woman and everyone else that was portrayed in the album were only a mere mirage of Kanye’s fantasy. Nonetheless, the outro leaves the listener with no solid answer of what it could be, but rather with more questions than they originally had in mind.

Final Thoughts:

Favorite Track(s): ,Lost In The World Feat. Bon Iver , Runaway Feat. Pusha T & Devil In A New Dress Feat. Rick Ross

Least Favorite Track: Hell Of A Life

Samples Used Throughout :

Dark Fantasy samples In High Places by Mike Oldfield feat. Jon Anderson (1983) and Cinderella from Revolting Rhymes (1990)

Gorgeous samples You Showed Me by Enoch Light and the Glittering Guitars (1969)

Power samples Afromerica by Continent Number 6 (1978), 21st Century Schizoid Man by King Crimson (1969), It's Your Thing by Cold Grits (1969)

Monster samples On the Bus from Napoleon Dynamite (2004)

So Appalled samples You Are - I Am by Manfred Mann's Earth Band (1979) and Think (About It) by Lyn Collins (1972)

Devil In A New Dress samples Will You Love Me Tomorrow? by Smokey Robinson (1973)

Runaway samples Expo '83 by The Backyard Heavies (1971), Mary Jane (Live) by Rick James (2001), Introduction to Star Time! by James Brown (1968)

Hell Of A Life samples Iron Man by Black Sabbath (1970), She's My Baby by The Mojo Men (1966), and Stud-Spider by Tony Joe White (1970)

Blame Game samples Avril 14th by Aphex Twin (2001)

Lost In The World samples Soul Makossa by Manu Dibango (1972), Comment #1 by Gil Scott-Heron (1970) and Think (About It) by Lyn Collins (1972)

Who Will Survive In America samples Comment #1 by Gil Scott-Heron (1970).
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom