Amazon.co.uk Review
What do you do after youve reinvented a genre? Well, going on
Graduation, the third full-length artist album by hip-hops most famous Noughties auteur Kanye West, you hunt across the pop landscape for fresh sounds ripe for plunder. Most obviously, theres Daft Punk, whose track "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" forms the vocoder foundation to "Stronger". But Kanyes learnt more from the robots than this straight steal would suggest--indeed, a good proportion of
Graduation sounds informed by their vintage synthesisers and noveau 80s feel. Elsewhere, theres much to suggest Kanyes pop ambitions have no sign of waning: the opulent "Good Life" rolls along on a hook snatched from Michael Jacksons "PYT (Pretty Young Thing)", while "Homecoming" follows Jay-Zs lead and borrows the vocal talents of Coldplays Chris Martin. The albums not without the occasional goof--"Drunk and Hot Girls", a boozy tale set to the tempo of an Eastern European drinking song, is something Outkast could more comfortably handle. But thankfully, theres also numerous moments where Kanye simply does what Kanye does best. "Cant Tell Me Nothing" is a sleek, swaggering statement of self-assurance, while "Everything I Am" kicks off on a battle tack but gradually softens, the sound of a man balancing power and responsibility: "Last year Chicago had 600 caskets," muses Kanye, "Man, killings some wack shit". --
Louis Pattison
CD Description
Kayne West follows 2004's 'The College Dropout' and 2005's 'Late Registration' with the aptly titled 'Graduation', his third full-length studio album. West's showmanship and lyrical style has been compared with the likes of P.Diddy and Jay-Z, while he has a host of production credits to his name. Trademark orchestral strings, eclectic samples and huge beatsaccompany cleverly written lyrics of good times and bad, which are delivered with a sense of urgency, yet with the easeof an artist at the top of his game. Singles include 'Stronger', which includes a loop borrowed from Daft Punk, and 'Can't Tell Me Nothing'.