Topic: Kanye West -- "Graduation"; Update: Listening party online for entire album!

[MysterD]

EDITED Post:
Listening party going on for Graduation. So if you want to hear it for yourself in its entirety, go here and listen!!!

Original Post:
Kanye West's Website has two versions of The "Can't Tell Me Nothing" Video on there -- the Original Version....

...And then an "Alternate version" of it w/ Zach Galifiankis. The one w/ Galifiankis is funny, actually.

Is anyone looking forward to Kanye's next album, Graduation, which is due out next week??

[Quemaqua]

No.

[Ghandi]

I liked his last album at first, but it got on my nerves after a while. I'll probably check this one out.

[Pugnate]

Rap music makes me violent. It makes me want to strangle the "artist". This mostly applies to Kanye.

[JacksRag(e)]

His pointless skits annoyed the shit out of me.  Does he know his target audience?  Or their intelligence?  Just stupid.

Having said that, though, I hope this album sells well.  Sells much better than 50 Cent's album.  If it does, 50 Cent will stop making his own albums.  Hallelujah.

[MysterD]

His pointless skits annoyed the shit out of me.  Does he know his target audience?  Or their intelligence?  Just stupid.

I did like Late Registration a lot, but I don't think it was as great as it was made out to be to most people. I think Common's Be was vastly superior.

Thank God, there are NO SKITS on Graduation.

On Graduation, West tries hard to address the problems on his first two albums, and succeeds: The new disc is tighter than Late Registration (fifty-one minutes long), with no skits (thank heavens) and less ornate production.

Having said that, though, I hope this album sells well.  Sells much better than 50 Cent's album.  If it does, 50 Cent will stop making his own albums.  Hallelujah.

Me too.

EDIT:
50's new album Curtis is not really much of anything, except an album full of decent beats -- listen for yourself on his MySpace, to the whole thing.

The producers -- such as Dr. Dre and Eminem -- held it down beat-wise for the most part, but that's really about it. Even Em's guest verse on "Peep Show" was quite disappointing.

"Straight To The Bank" and "Amusement Park" are just plain awful.

I think after listening to 50's very messy new album, this further tells me that Graduation is gonna stomp all over this.

[MysterD]

Oh yuh -- this is a much better album than 50 Cent's.

I think the worst song on the Graduation album here is "Drunk And Hot Girls," only b/c it has a delivery that'll make you really scratch your head -- yeah, Kanye and Mos Def sing this song for the most part, not rapping it.....yeah, that already sounds like it ain't gonna work...Them singing...and it doesn't. Good beat, though. They should've rapped it, not sang it. Okay, the bad stuff's out the way; that one track only b/c of the delivery.

Now, everything else on the album, turned out pretty good.

"Good Morning" is just a great way to enter the album. Nuff said.

I'm sure most of y'all already heard "Stronger", which is longer and has additional programming from Timbaland. Great song. And yeah, pretty much everybody has probably heard "Can't Tell Me Nothing," as well -- another very strong cut on the album.

"Everything I Am", gotta' love this very head-conscious and self-conscious song and the beat itself -- and, of course, the scratches from DJ Premier. Interesting enough, he opens saying, "Common passed on the beat/So I made it into a jam."

"Big Brother" is an interesting cut, as it's simply about how he looks up to Jay-Z, but also about some of the disagreements b/t him and Jay-Z.

Another stand-out cut -- "Flashing Lights" w/ Ye talking about how he's dealin' w/ the stardom and celebrity status he has. Another great beat, too.

Gotta' love the beat to "Barry Bonds". Also, Kanye put some pure fire in his voice in that track and delivered. Though, Lil' Wayne nonchalantly rapped effortlessly over it and he managed to also deliver on the track; not like Ye did, but it still worked well. And this one line Ye reflects on himself seems fitting, especially given the title of the song (the very egotistical Barry Bonds, who has a huge ego and head, literally), in a song about two big egos in hip-hop doing a collabo -- "My head's so big, you can't sit behind me."

W/ the chorus, "Champion" kind of reminds me a little of Jay-Z's "Lost One" -- but of course, this song is a hell of a lot more upbeat (sound-wide) and more positive than the depressing Jay-Z song.

All and all, pretty good album.

[gpw11]

I'd really like to see 50 Cent retire.  He pretty much represents everything wrong with rap.  The guy has horrible lyrics, sounds like shit, and the only thing that he has going for him is the fact that Eminem and Dre. do all his beats.  He's always been like that.  He won the lottery with whatever demo he did that impressed Eminem, and he did it again when people didn't notice that all "In the Club" was was a good beat with shitty rapping in front of it.  Why people kept on buying his CDs is beyond me.  Nothing of substance at all. You'd think that people like him would be the first to be unable to make anymore than one CD these days.  Download the single, and fuck off.

[MysterD]

So far, Kanye had sold more records than 50.