Life Of Pablo thread

white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
The sound quality on this livestream leaving a bit to be desired but already confident in saying this album will at least be Top 3 'Ye LP status. Not ready to sign up for that Tidal trial tho.
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  • ketanketan Warmly booming riffs 3,095 Posts
    i'm looking forward to hearing it.  want to read the credits too!  

    apparently young metro did a beat.

  • foefoe turo de la peira 196 Posts
    here you go
    http://vk.com/kanyewest

    edit:nevermind, tracks are gone now

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    Impatiently waiting for the mastered version but this making me kinda whet 



  • DocMcCoyDocMcCoy "Go and laugh in your own country!" 5,913 Posts
    There's a live rip doing the rounds elsewhere, but I'll sit tight for the mastered version.

    The MSG show was amazing in a rap-meets-Zoolander kind of way. Judging from some of the video clips people were posting, if you were streaming it, you got the better end of the deal once they sorted the buffering issues out - the audio in particular was crisp.

    Kanye is still the most polarising artist in modern music.

  • ketanketan Warmly booming riffs 3,095 Posts
    DocMcCoy said:
    Kanye is still the most polarising artist in modern music.
    He must also be the single most effective musician troll on the internet.  Like, better than Drake and Reh Dogg combined.



  • DuderonomyDuderonomy Haut de la Garenne 7,778 Posts
    white_tea said:
    Impatiently waiting for the mastered version but this making me kinda whet 



    Love the beat, not really interested in what Joel Campbell has to say. Does he ever release instrumentals?

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    DocMcCoy said:
    There's a live rip doing the rounds elsewhere, but I'll sit tight for the mastered version.

    The MSG show was amazing in a rap-meets-Zoolander kind of way. Judging from some of the video clips people were posting, if you were streaming it, you got the better end of the deal once they sorted the buffering issues out - the audio in particular was crisp.

    Kanye is still the most polarising artist in modern music.
    This photo caption alone from the NYT contains an unprecedented amount of celebrity trolling:

    "Kris Jenner, center, sat with, counterclockwise from lower left, 50 Cent, Karlie Kloss, the Balmain designer Olivier Rousteing, Melanie Griffith, Lil’ Kim, her granddaughter North West, Khloe Kardashian, Lamar Odom, Kendall Jenner, Kourtney Kardashian, a guest and Carine Roitfeld."

    Like how in the world is Melanie Griffin sitting next to Lil' Kim? Kanye saying to everyone, Yes we're plastic. So?

    That said, listening to some rips and the livestream last night, some of the name-dropping in the lyrics was getting to be a bit much, even from a tireless Kanye defender like myself.

  • para11axpara11ax No-style-havin' mf'er 398 Posts
    So, Martin Shkreli is trying to buy this album for $10M?



     


  • RAJRAJ tenacious local 7,779 Posts
      


  • foefoe turo de la peira 196 Posts

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    Trying to place the Portishead sample from "Freestyle 4" and it's Goldfrapp. I am so dumb! Nice strings tho.

    Listening to it all first time around while reading about Scalia (RIP), and wondering if this is real life.

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    It defies easy categorization for me because the music is that gorgeous maximalist sound a la MBDTF and yet some of the rhymes seem so tossed off. 

  • DocMcCoyDocMcCoy "Go and laugh in your own country!" 5,913 Posts
    I hear you. The references to Blac Chyna and Rob Kardashian would seem to suggest that the tracklisting wasn't the only thing finalised at the 11th hour.

    The Guardian went to town with their review. Alexis Petridis did about 3000 words on it, but I took one look at the pull quote and thought, you can miss me with that, mate; "You can see why his immodesty rubs people up the wrong way". Righto. All it serves to do is to remind me what a load of pointless shite this hot-take culture is. So much of the media is in thrall to this idea that being first is more important than having something worthwhile or considered to say about whatever's under discussion. I'm sure if you went to Alexis Petridis for his thoughts in even a week's time, you'd get a different response, even if not substantially so.

    There's a tedious predictability to the commentary that accompanies each new Kanye album, in particular the stuff that comes from people who appear to take little more than a passing interest in rap, yet who somehow still feel entitled to arrogate to themselves the role of deciding what's wrong with the music and what it needs to do in order to pass muster with decent-minded small-l liberals. It's hilarious how people like to act that self-aggrandisement, performative displays of excess and a tendency towards heightened reality didn't exist in rap before Kanye. I must have somehow missed that period when it was the preserve of humble, self-effacing dudes making low-budget rap songs about driving for UPS, working as a substitute teacher or throwing a party for their daughter when she had her braces removed.

    I've only had time to listen to it once so far, not including hearing it on the MSG stream. On first impression I like it, although it's not as instant as Yeezus, which I thought was fantastic pretty much immediately. The second half is really strong, despite it being the half with the more familiar material (or perhaps because of that, come to think of it). At times it feels as if 'Ye himself is simply one of the bigger names amongst a cast of thousands rather than the Star of the Show. Certainly it seems he's moving more towards the more traditional producer role, a la Dre or even Quincy Jones, roping in whoever he thinks is most capable of Actualizing His Vision. It's making for some pretty extraordinary records, I know that much.

  • RAJRAJ tenacious local 7,779 Posts
    para11axkicks79

  • kicks79kicks79 1,333 Posts
    I like Waves, Real Friends, 30 Hours and No More Parties in LA.
    But i can't tell if thats just because everything else is sub par.


  • JuniorJunior 4,853 Posts
    I don't know, it really saddens me to say this but I'm struggling to make myself listen to this. I don't think he's ever made an actual bad album yet but I'm just so tired of hearing about fucking Kanye that I may actually be at the point where I can't be arsed to listen to the album itself.

    It's not even hatred of the Kanye persona, his bravado and bullshit has never bothered me, it's just actual media induced fatigue.

    Edit: Ok, quiet Monday morning at work so I broke and decided to give it a listen but Youtube are too fast at their game these days....Managed to catch about four songs though and I must admit I like what I hear. It's not incredible but it's not too shabby.

  • para11axpara11ax No-style-havin' mf'er 398 Posts
    Here is a fascinating firsthand account from a "model" sharing her experience in Kanye's recent fashion show / album listening party...have a read:

    http://themuse.jezebel.com/i-was-an-extra-in-kanye-west-s-fashion-show-and-it-was-1758758736



  • caicai spacecho 362 Posts
    Junior said:
    I don't know, it really saddens me to say this but I'm struggling to make myself listen to this. I don't think he's ever made an actual bad album yet but I'm just so tired of hearing about fucking Kanye that I may actually be at the point where I can't be arsed to listen to the album itself.

    It's not even hatred of the Kanye persona, his bravado and bullshit has never bothered me, it's just actual media induced fatigue.
    I know exactly what you mean. I felt the same way when yeezus was released. I'm half way through my first listen of Pablo and it's a much better listen than yeezus. Maybe I've managed to avoid Kanye-in-my-psyche enough in the last few months to be able to enjoy it or maybe it's cause the music is better.. Not sure yet. 

  • KineticKinetic 3,739 Posts
    I'm not really feeling it so far.

  • ostost Montreal 1,375 Posts
    This fuckin' cornball samples Hardrive and Larry Heard classics and still manages to make a turd.
    staxwax

  • JuniorJunior 4,853 Posts
    cai said:
    Junior said:
    I don't know, it really saddens me to say this but I'm struggling to make myself listen to this. I don't think he's ever made an actual bad album yet but I'm just so tired of hearing about fucking Kanye that I may actually be at the point where I can't be arsed to listen to the album itself.

    It's not even hatred of the Kanye persona, his bravado and bullshit has never bothered me, it's just actual media induced fatigue.
    I know exactly what you mean. I felt the same way when yeezus was released. I'm half way through my first listen of Pablo and it's a much better listen than yeezus. Maybe I've managed to avoid Kanye-in-my-psyche enough in the last few months to be able to enjoy it or maybe it's cause the music is better.. Not sure yet. 

    Yeah fair enough. The irony is I don't even follow or read any of these pieces but still feel like I've been swamped by it - not quite sure how that happened.

    Finally got to listen through to the full thing on Bandcamp of all places (shhhh) and it's not bad but not for me. I think MBDTF was the singular point where my current tastes and Kanye's music crossed and I haven't really felt the same level of appreciation for any albums before or after (even his revered early output was always very hit and miss for me). There's a lot of the more RnB stuff on here, particularly in the first half which leaves me pretty cold and I was waiting for something to hit me but it all sort of just drifted by leaving little impression.

    There's some decent production on there (30 hours is lovely) but I just don't think I want to hear him rap anymore - Yeezus really killed that for me and now, even when it's not bad, his delivery still makes me feel like he's delivering horrible clunkers and shit like the model/asshole lines just leaps out. Plus, pretty much every song follows the same formula of repeated chorus by guest star, some irrelevant verses from Kanye and then pitter out to end.

    I may find more to enjoy through repeat plays but, the whole album feels so throwaway it's not calling me to spend more time with it. I really don't think it's bad as such but I just don't find anything particularly exciting or new in here so why spend more time with it?

  • Reynaldo82Reynaldo82 NorCal 73 Posts
    It's a clusterfuck no doubt, in a gospel vein, which is pretty much Ye's lane. He's competing strongly against the Republican primaries for mind share. There are about 12 songs that I'll keep in rotation for a couple months.

    (Reflexive hate is a bad look, btw.)

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    Still marinating on it, but overall getting the sense that Kanye himself doesn't even know whether he's joking or not anymore - that he's entering a Tron-style world of his own creation, and there's like another Flynn, an evil one, running the show. I always gave him the benefit of the doubt on his outsized boasts, and this latest record seems at once very vapid and yet with moments that are transcendent. He's really pushing the envelope with how much anal bleaching we really want to hear about, and not sure how much longer I'm gonna ride with him on that journey. Also, Chance maybe a little too earnest and agree with a few people that he was the weakest element on "Ultralight Beam." Also also, maybe I'm tripping or it's my torrent but not hearing much of either Young Thug or Andre 3000 on their respective guest spots. 

  • KineticKinetic 3,739 Posts
    Ha! Where the hell was Andre on this?

  • SIRUSSIRUS 2,554 Posts
    foe said:
    anybody got a reup?

  • CBearCBear 902 Posts
    I've been thinking on the whole this is not a bad album. I'm digging some of the tracks. I asked how people felt about it at my poker game a couple days ago. Out of 9 people, 9 people said they hated him so much that they would never listen to his music no matter what.

    Can you get past hate of a man and be able to listen to his music without letting that hate affect your opinion of the music? There's a ton of bastard people who's music I enjoy.

    I think he's really crazy. I'm not riding for the dude, just trying to take the album as an album regardless of who made it. 

  • SIRUS said:
    foe said:
    anybody got a reup?


  • staxwaxstaxwax 1,474 Posts
    why the hell did pitchfork give this a 9? fucking ridiculous by any measure - somehow these guys are intimidated by this asshats 'innernet relevance'

    this seems overly forgiving but still fair:



    personally i could never listen to this mega douches output - Id just as soon listen to a donald trump country album. i will examine the reception to gauge the state of popular culture.



    'visionary toddler'


  • DawhudDawhud 213 Posts
    The two tracks he did on SNL I almost immediately hit fast forward once the auto tune was enacted.  GTFOH 
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