Kanye West - Late Registration
jamie on August 25th, 2005
After all the hype, Kayne West’s second album is due to hit stores next week. I got an illicit audition of the disc this morning, and while it’s a good listen, I have to say that I don’t hear anything particularly genius in it. I mean, how hard was it to sample Curtis Mayfield’s Move On Up? When he’s not sampling overly obvious sould classics, his production is solid work, but again- not the genius stuff that he claims he can produce. The guest list for this album is pretty impressive, featuring rap royalty like Jay-Z, Common, The Game, and Nas, and vocals from Brandy, Jamie Foxx (doing his impression of Ray Charles), and Adam Levine (from Maroon 5- who also appears on the Ying Yang Twins’ album U.S.A., released earlier this year). The much-hyped Levine collaboration, Heard ‘Em Say, really could have been an incredible, but the smooth jazz-and-piano feel is broken by a Moog-y bassline (perhaps in tribute to the recently deceased Moog?) seems to grind against the grain of the song. West also dropped the ball with his other guests: Common, The Game, and the incredible Nas. All three have more rapping talent in them than West could ever hope to, yet he tends to bury them in overbearing production. He should have taken a clue from Memphis Bleek, and just given them entire tracks to work on. Diamonds From Sierra Leone and Gold Digger are already radio hits, and I’m sure we’ll hear Heard ‘Em Say on the radio soon enough. The album will no doubt sell millions of copies, but it is a typical sophomore effort- laking in the quality that made his debut such a hit, and hopefully a learning step into a terrific thrid release.
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