Lotus
09-01-2005, 11:20 AM
Yeah, so I'll do this track by track, kinda like Dave Wadding did for when Nellyville came out. I'll rate each song out of 10, and then I'll do some other shit. You'll follow along. Here we go:
1. Wake Up Mr. West- Just a skit. Same guy who did the intro for College Dropout. Kinda sounds like Cedric the Entertainer.
2. Heard 'Em Say ft. Adam Levine of Maroon 5- When I saw that this song featured somebody from Maroon 5, I cringed. But upon hearing the track, I felt better about it. This Levine fellow does a great singing job on the chorus and should probably abandon the whole whiny-emo bullshit, because this guy has a pretty good voice. Him and Kanye sound great together on the chorus. Kanye raps 2 verses on this one; 16 bars on the first and 20 (I think) on the second. Pretty good raps, though I kinda dozed off on the second verse (more about other shit than the song being boring).
Track Rating: 8.6/10
3. Touch the Sky ft. Lupe Fiasco- Beat is fantastic. Straight up. Horns are beautiful on this song. Plus Kanye flows very well on this song. And this Lupe Fiasco guy. Sounds kinda like Kweli. He's pretty good too. Wow. I've been typing sentence fragments this whole review. Anyways, I knew I'd love this song within the first 20 seconds; the horns really grab your attention. Oh, now that I think of it. Lupe don't really sound like Talib, just his first couple of words on the 3rd verse.
Track Rating: 9.7/10
4. Gold Digger ft. Jamie Foxx- This is a pretty funky song. Supposedly it gets a lot of radio play. But since we don't really have a good rap radio station in the bay area (only play G-Unit and Latino rappers, bad latino rappers, not the good ones), I wouldn't know. Anyways, the vocal sample is great for the song, and Kanye really flows well to the beat. Only thing is, the chorus is pretty sub-par. That's the only thing that takes away from this song.
Track Rating: 8.3/10
5. Skit #1- All the skits are pretty funny, and they're all relevant. All have a purpose.
6. Drive Slow ft. Paul Wall and GLC- When I first heard this song, I immediately recognized that the piano in this song is not Kanye's. He bit from somebody, as I knew I heard it in Slug and Dynospectrum's "Anything is Everything". And I got pretty steamed. But after giving this song a chance, I realized that Kanye made this beat a shitload better by adding horns and using a better drum loop. Almost impossibly, Kanye and Paul Wall top the beat with their rapping. They both equally sound more than perfect on this one. 3rd verse beautiful too. Perfect song.
Track Rating: 10/10
7. My Way Home ft. Common- I love this song. It's a shame it's less than 2 minutes. Because this could have been a classic-classic song. This song sounds like it's about to break into something else during Common's verse, but there really is no climax. Vocal sample is great in this song. Would've been nice to hear Kanye rap on it.
Track Rating: 9/10
8. Crack Music ft. The Game- Well, I shouldn't have really said ft. The Game, for he doesn't even rap on the song. He just says, "That's that crack music, n*gga, that real black music, n*gga" a couple of times. Mr. Cheeks had more of a role in Lil Kim's "Jump Off" than The Game has in this one. Anyways, the verses are very good in this song, and the vocals make this beat. Man, some of these choruses are simpler than A-B-C-1-2-3. I expected more out of a chorus from Kanye. But now that I think of it, it might be a good thing that the chorus doesn't take away from his verses and that they aren't so emphasized.
Track Rating: 7.7/10
9. Roses- Kanye's first verse on this song is beautiful. And the beat during the verse is perfect with a great vocal sample for the chorus. As usual, Kanye has great background vocals and samples. Another standout track. Not much else to say.
Track Rating: 9.2/10
10. Bring Me Down ft. Brandy- Great violin in this track. Not much Kanye rap on this one. Just one verse. But it's a great one. Wow, his verse is so beautiful, listening to it right now. I wish there was more than one verse. The percussion is perfect for the violin and piano in the song.
Track Rating: 10/10
11. Addiction- Wow. I love this beat. The 4-bar beat loop that he uses for a lot of the song is perfect. Just perfect. Like it's, wow. It's how I envisioned I would write the beat in the 4th bar of the loop, except Kanye made it sound better than I could imagine. The "make me smile" is so perfect for this beat. And of course, Kanye sounds great on this song. Kanye is a fuckin' genious.
Track Rating: 10/10
12. Skit #2- I've run out of things to say for these skits.
13. Diamonds from Sierra Leone Remix ft. Jay-Z- While I like the structure of the original "Diamond" better, the lyrics for this one pertain more to the subject. Kanye pretty much tries to explain what he meant by his original song. Like I guess people thought he was glorifying ice in the first one until the video came out, and now this song. But you can totally tell that Kanye got lazy and just cut and pasted his part of the second verse from the original, and cut and pasted the chorus from the original into this one. You can tell that they were recorded at two different sessions. Kanye's part in the second verse sounds so out of place. That's my only gripe about this though. Everything else is perfect.
Track Rating: 8/10
14. We Major ft. Nas and Really Doe- The beat is pretty tight for this song. But that's getting very redundant by now. The piano is very nice, horns are great. Yup. Kanye's verses are pretty good, and Really Doe (or at least I think so, unless Kanye totally changed his voice) picks up where Kanye left off on the 2nd really beautifully. And of course, Nas is great as usual. Noone commercially seems to give Nas love. But I'll make another topic about that. Wait, maybe that is Kanye throughout the whole 2nd verse. Fuck. Anyways, partial points knocked off for it being so fucking long without any rapping over the last 3 or 4 minutes. And while I'm a huge fan of instrumentals, yeah. It sounds tight, but nah. Not when Kanye just decides to talk shit instead of just letting it play or rapping over it. Pulling a 50 Cent/Fat Joe on this one at the end.
Track Rating: 8.6/10
15. Skit #3- Turd Burglar.
16. Hey Mama- What stands out at the beginning of this one is not the beat, but Kanye's singing. You know, I'd call this whole ode to your mom shit kinda played-out, but I guess it's better listening to someone praising their mother than someone praising weed and bitches. Also kinda funny how Kanye says "Mommy" at times in this song. Hey, I haven't even mentioned the beat yet! Whoa! Yeah, it's pretty good. Probably his weakest so far, but it's not weak at all. Very strong, just not amazing.
Track Rating: 8.7/10
17. Celebration- "Grab a drink, grab a glass, after that I grab your ass". This song is pretty funny. Or at least that line. I feel this CD falling off a bit right now, after hearing "Louis Vitton Don" for the 1,000th time. The beat is pretty good. Solid, but Kanye's lyrics are pretty funny, so yeah. This is kinda a "WTF?" song though. Kanye must have been up in the clouds on some angeldust when he wrote this one. Still a good song though.
Track Rating: 6.3/10
18. Skit #4- Actually the funniest of the skits.
19. Gone ft. Consequence and Cam'Ron- Kanye's verse is great on this song. The chorus though, insane. Great great chorus. And Cam'Ron sounds really nice. Kanye and Cam'Ron is starting to become a dynamic duo. This Consequence dude is pretty nice too on the 3rd verse. This sounds like the other guy who was rapping on "They Say" featuring John Legend on Common's "Be" CD. But yeah, the beat is great for this song. And just when you think the song is over, it isn't. I'll leave it at that. Oh, and big-ups to Kanye for mentioning Common's and Sadat X's classic "One-Nine-Nine-Nine".
Track Rating: 9.3/10
20. Diamond from Sierra Leone- Of course, I know the most about this song. "Close your eyes and imagine, Vegas on acid..." Kanye's flow on this version is, well, unbelievable. Even the bullshit "if a stripper named Porsche gets tips from many men, then her fat friend, her nickname is minivan" sounds good. But the second verse is great. Just going off for 40 bars. The structure of this song reminds me of his "Last Call" from College Dropout, minus the 9-minute lecture on his life. "After debris settles and the dust gets swept off"- I like how the beat picks up there. And of course, the video for this song is the best rap video since, well, probably "Jesus Walks", though "Dreams" is a tight video. Oh yeah, guess who produced "Dreams"? Uh-hah!
Track Rating: 9.5/10
21. We Can Make It Better- The song starts off great. I love how the beat changes at the end of its loop. Sounds great. The beat itself, well Kanye's done much better, but how it changes is gold. The lyrics are :-\ , but that can be forgiven. There are some really funny rhymes too though.
Track Rating: 8.8/10
Other Thoughts: Kanye knows how to make an album. He's not just pulling songs out of his ass and throwing them on a CD. Though most of them have potential to be played on commercial radio, they all fit on the album. They don't sound thrown together. The only one that does is the "Diamonds Remix", and well, that's a remix, so I guess it gets a pass. Also, I love how he raps, I love his lyrics, and I love his style. Though the numerous Louis Vitton Don (sp?) references did get tiring after a while, Kanye is pure genius. He's the best thing to happen to commercial rap since Eminem came out. No jokin', pahtna.
CD Score: 141.7/160
EXTRAS:
+5 for knowing how to make an album flow rather seemlessly
-2 for the Louis Vitton Don references
+2 for skits that actually serve some kind of purpose
+3 for no filler tracks that just eat up time
CD Score (including extras): 149.7/160
For those that can't do the math (or don't want to) with your calculator on your computer, that's saying this CD is a 9.35/10, or thereabouts. But I'm not sure even that score does Late Registration justice. It's definitely the best CD released in 2005, bar none (for rap at least). I guess The Documentary would be 2nd best rap album. But yeah, if you're a fan of rap, commercial or non-commercial, you should get this.
1. Wake Up Mr. West- Just a skit. Same guy who did the intro for College Dropout. Kinda sounds like Cedric the Entertainer.
2. Heard 'Em Say ft. Adam Levine of Maroon 5- When I saw that this song featured somebody from Maroon 5, I cringed. But upon hearing the track, I felt better about it. This Levine fellow does a great singing job on the chorus and should probably abandon the whole whiny-emo bullshit, because this guy has a pretty good voice. Him and Kanye sound great together on the chorus. Kanye raps 2 verses on this one; 16 bars on the first and 20 (I think) on the second. Pretty good raps, though I kinda dozed off on the second verse (more about other shit than the song being boring).
Track Rating: 8.6/10
3. Touch the Sky ft. Lupe Fiasco- Beat is fantastic. Straight up. Horns are beautiful on this song. Plus Kanye flows very well on this song. And this Lupe Fiasco guy. Sounds kinda like Kweli. He's pretty good too. Wow. I've been typing sentence fragments this whole review. Anyways, I knew I'd love this song within the first 20 seconds; the horns really grab your attention. Oh, now that I think of it. Lupe don't really sound like Talib, just his first couple of words on the 3rd verse.
Track Rating: 9.7/10
4. Gold Digger ft. Jamie Foxx- This is a pretty funky song. Supposedly it gets a lot of radio play. But since we don't really have a good rap radio station in the bay area (only play G-Unit and Latino rappers, bad latino rappers, not the good ones), I wouldn't know. Anyways, the vocal sample is great for the song, and Kanye really flows well to the beat. Only thing is, the chorus is pretty sub-par. That's the only thing that takes away from this song.
Track Rating: 8.3/10
5. Skit #1- All the skits are pretty funny, and they're all relevant. All have a purpose.
6. Drive Slow ft. Paul Wall and GLC- When I first heard this song, I immediately recognized that the piano in this song is not Kanye's. He bit from somebody, as I knew I heard it in Slug and Dynospectrum's "Anything is Everything". And I got pretty steamed. But after giving this song a chance, I realized that Kanye made this beat a shitload better by adding horns and using a better drum loop. Almost impossibly, Kanye and Paul Wall top the beat with their rapping. They both equally sound more than perfect on this one. 3rd verse beautiful too. Perfect song.
Track Rating: 10/10
7. My Way Home ft. Common- I love this song. It's a shame it's less than 2 minutes. Because this could have been a classic-classic song. This song sounds like it's about to break into something else during Common's verse, but there really is no climax. Vocal sample is great in this song. Would've been nice to hear Kanye rap on it.
Track Rating: 9/10
8. Crack Music ft. The Game- Well, I shouldn't have really said ft. The Game, for he doesn't even rap on the song. He just says, "That's that crack music, n*gga, that real black music, n*gga" a couple of times. Mr. Cheeks had more of a role in Lil Kim's "Jump Off" than The Game has in this one. Anyways, the verses are very good in this song, and the vocals make this beat. Man, some of these choruses are simpler than A-B-C-1-2-3. I expected more out of a chorus from Kanye. But now that I think of it, it might be a good thing that the chorus doesn't take away from his verses and that they aren't so emphasized.
Track Rating: 7.7/10
9. Roses- Kanye's first verse on this song is beautiful. And the beat during the verse is perfect with a great vocal sample for the chorus. As usual, Kanye has great background vocals and samples. Another standout track. Not much else to say.
Track Rating: 9.2/10
10. Bring Me Down ft. Brandy- Great violin in this track. Not much Kanye rap on this one. Just one verse. But it's a great one. Wow, his verse is so beautiful, listening to it right now. I wish there was more than one verse. The percussion is perfect for the violin and piano in the song.
Track Rating: 10/10
11. Addiction- Wow. I love this beat. The 4-bar beat loop that he uses for a lot of the song is perfect. Just perfect. Like it's, wow. It's how I envisioned I would write the beat in the 4th bar of the loop, except Kanye made it sound better than I could imagine. The "make me smile" is so perfect for this beat. And of course, Kanye sounds great on this song. Kanye is a fuckin' genious.
Track Rating: 10/10
12. Skit #2- I've run out of things to say for these skits.
13. Diamonds from Sierra Leone Remix ft. Jay-Z- While I like the structure of the original "Diamond" better, the lyrics for this one pertain more to the subject. Kanye pretty much tries to explain what he meant by his original song. Like I guess people thought he was glorifying ice in the first one until the video came out, and now this song. But you can totally tell that Kanye got lazy and just cut and pasted his part of the second verse from the original, and cut and pasted the chorus from the original into this one. You can tell that they were recorded at two different sessions. Kanye's part in the second verse sounds so out of place. That's my only gripe about this though. Everything else is perfect.
Track Rating: 8/10
14. We Major ft. Nas and Really Doe- The beat is pretty tight for this song. But that's getting very redundant by now. The piano is very nice, horns are great. Yup. Kanye's verses are pretty good, and Really Doe (or at least I think so, unless Kanye totally changed his voice) picks up where Kanye left off on the 2nd really beautifully. And of course, Nas is great as usual. Noone commercially seems to give Nas love. But I'll make another topic about that. Wait, maybe that is Kanye throughout the whole 2nd verse. Fuck. Anyways, partial points knocked off for it being so fucking long without any rapping over the last 3 or 4 minutes. And while I'm a huge fan of instrumentals, yeah. It sounds tight, but nah. Not when Kanye just decides to talk shit instead of just letting it play or rapping over it. Pulling a 50 Cent/Fat Joe on this one at the end.
Track Rating: 8.6/10
15. Skit #3- Turd Burglar.
16. Hey Mama- What stands out at the beginning of this one is not the beat, but Kanye's singing. You know, I'd call this whole ode to your mom shit kinda played-out, but I guess it's better listening to someone praising their mother than someone praising weed and bitches. Also kinda funny how Kanye says "Mommy" at times in this song. Hey, I haven't even mentioned the beat yet! Whoa! Yeah, it's pretty good. Probably his weakest so far, but it's not weak at all. Very strong, just not amazing.
Track Rating: 8.7/10
17. Celebration- "Grab a drink, grab a glass, after that I grab your ass". This song is pretty funny. Or at least that line. I feel this CD falling off a bit right now, after hearing "Louis Vitton Don" for the 1,000th time. The beat is pretty good. Solid, but Kanye's lyrics are pretty funny, so yeah. This is kinda a "WTF?" song though. Kanye must have been up in the clouds on some angeldust when he wrote this one. Still a good song though.
Track Rating: 6.3/10
18. Skit #4- Actually the funniest of the skits.
19. Gone ft. Consequence and Cam'Ron- Kanye's verse is great on this song. The chorus though, insane. Great great chorus. And Cam'Ron sounds really nice. Kanye and Cam'Ron is starting to become a dynamic duo. This Consequence dude is pretty nice too on the 3rd verse. This sounds like the other guy who was rapping on "They Say" featuring John Legend on Common's "Be" CD. But yeah, the beat is great for this song. And just when you think the song is over, it isn't. I'll leave it at that. Oh, and big-ups to Kanye for mentioning Common's and Sadat X's classic "One-Nine-Nine-Nine".
Track Rating: 9.3/10
20. Diamond from Sierra Leone- Of course, I know the most about this song. "Close your eyes and imagine, Vegas on acid..." Kanye's flow on this version is, well, unbelievable. Even the bullshit "if a stripper named Porsche gets tips from many men, then her fat friend, her nickname is minivan" sounds good. But the second verse is great. Just going off for 40 bars. The structure of this song reminds me of his "Last Call" from College Dropout, minus the 9-minute lecture on his life. "After debris settles and the dust gets swept off"- I like how the beat picks up there. And of course, the video for this song is the best rap video since, well, probably "Jesus Walks", though "Dreams" is a tight video. Oh yeah, guess who produced "Dreams"? Uh-hah!
Track Rating: 9.5/10
21. We Can Make It Better- The song starts off great. I love how the beat changes at the end of its loop. Sounds great. The beat itself, well Kanye's done much better, but how it changes is gold. The lyrics are :-\ , but that can be forgiven. There are some really funny rhymes too though.
Track Rating: 8.8/10
Other Thoughts: Kanye knows how to make an album. He's not just pulling songs out of his ass and throwing them on a CD. Though most of them have potential to be played on commercial radio, they all fit on the album. They don't sound thrown together. The only one that does is the "Diamonds Remix", and well, that's a remix, so I guess it gets a pass. Also, I love how he raps, I love his lyrics, and I love his style. Though the numerous Louis Vitton Don (sp?) references did get tiring after a while, Kanye is pure genius. He's the best thing to happen to commercial rap since Eminem came out. No jokin', pahtna.
CD Score: 141.7/160
EXTRAS:
+5 for knowing how to make an album flow rather seemlessly
-2 for the Louis Vitton Don references
+2 for skits that actually serve some kind of purpose
+3 for no filler tracks that just eat up time
CD Score (including extras): 149.7/160
For those that can't do the math (or don't want to) with your calculator on your computer, that's saying this CD is a 9.35/10, or thereabouts. But I'm not sure even that score does Late Registration justice. It's definitely the best CD released in 2005, bar none (for rap at least). I guess The Documentary would be 2nd best rap album. But yeah, if you're a fan of rap, commercial or non-commercial, you should get this.