Kanye West pomo

Father stretch my hands pt 1&2

Desiigner – ‘Panda’

(LOD, 2015)

Pastor T. L. Barrett – ‘Father I Stretch My Hands’

(from Do Not Pass Me By, Gospel Roots, 1976)

Father Stretch My Hands’ takes its name and foundation from Chicago local legend Pastor T. L. Barret and pairs it with ‘Panda’ by Desiigner, a rapper so fresh his G.O.O.D. Music signing wasn’t made public until after the album premiered.

It’s the classic soul Kanye used to make his name, set to lyrics about how he’s lost his own. Addressing his relationship with his father, the song is the bookends of his career laid out in one moment, but really, it’s just West lighting the fuse.

Famous

Sister Nancy – ‘Bam Bam’

(from One, Two, Techniques, 1982)

Nina Simone – ‘Do What You Gotta Do’

(from ‘Nuff Said!, RCA, 1968)

Kanye West – ‘Wake Up Mr West’

(from Late Registration, Roc-A-Fella, 2005)

Kanye West – ‘Good Morning’

(from Graduation, Roc-A-Fella, 2007)

There is a lot to unpack with ‘Famous’, not least its headline-garnering lyric: “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / Why, I made that bitch famous”. But there are nuances within the production worthy of equal examination. Employing Sister Nancy’s classic rumination on sexism in dancehall ‘Bam Bam’ could be an assertion that his Taylor lyrics are playing into the insidious misogyny within in the music industry, inescapable even when you’re at the peak of fame; its use could also be about the dichotomous treatment of black and white stars of equal prominence — no matter what, it’s representative that someone is getting a bum deal.

Reggae influenced a chunk of Yeezus and this track pulls double-duty on bringing back references from that album. It closes with Nina Simone’s rendition of the Four Tops’ ‘Do What You Gotta Do’ — which Rihanna also sings on the hook — recalling his flip of ‘Strange Fruit’ on the similarly controversial ‘Blood on the Leaves’. He also makes reference to Late Registration and Graduation, with co-producer Swizz Beatz dropping “Wake up Mr. West” ad-libs (instead of his usual “Showtime!”), a mark that this project is reflective of Kanye’s work as a whole, instead of one specific sonic influence, as he can be prone to do.

Real Friends 

Whodini – ‘Friends’

(from Escape, Jive, 1984)

Whodini’s ‘Friends’, a classic in its own right, has been sampled famously by both MF Doom on ‘Deep Fried Frenz’ and as the drum loop on Nas’ star-making ‘If I Ruled the World (Imagine That)’. Here, Kanye flips the original’s playful approach to questioning the validity of friendly relationships by lifting its “Friends: How many of us have them?” hook refrain into a downcast meditation on supreme celebrity. It’s not, “How many of us have them?” in West’s world — it’s how many of them have forsaken him for favors, handouts and, well, laptops that he “use to fuck bitches on”?

30 Hours

Arthur Russel-  “Answer Me”

(from World of Echo, Upside, 1986)

It’s almost a given at this point that a new Kanye album will feature one sample you simply never expected to appear on a hip-hop record. He’s rapped over Can, Aphex Twin, and King Crimson and in turn given younger listeners an opportunity to explore something they may never have found on their own. Here Kanye rides a vocal loop like he would a classic soul sample, but the voice in question belongs to the utterly singular Arthur Russell.

The track ‘Answers Me’ comes from World Of Echo – FACT’s number one album of the 1980s. There are few singers with as much soul as Arthur Russell and the tragedy of his career is he was too ahead of his time for anyone to understand or appreciate it. Here — decades after his lonely death — West might finally help new listeners catch up to the man’s genius.

No more parties in LA

Walter “Junie” Morrison – ‘Suzie Thundertussy’

(from Suzie Super Groupie, Westbound, 1976)

Johnny “Guitar” Watson – ‘Give Me My Love’

(from Funk Beyond The Call Of Duty, DJM, 1977)

Larry Graham – ‘Stand Up and Shout About Love’

(from One in a Million You, Warner Bros., 1980)

Ghostface Killah – ‘Mighty Healthy’

(from Supreme Clientele, Epic, 2000)

While the primary backdrop for ‘No More Parties’ was created by super-producer Madlib in 2010 and seemingly left unused from the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy sessions, the intro is pure Kanye. Joining the opening of P-Funk musical director Walter “Junie” Morrison’s ‘Suzie Thundertussy’, la-dee-da-das from blues luminary Johnny “Guitar” Watson’s ‘Give Me My Love’ and vox from ‘Stand Up and Shout About Love’ by Sly and the Family Stone bassist Larry Graham, West weaves together a funk quilt that is both a nod to his soul sample past and evidence he’s learned how to advance the intricacies of his craft.

The beat also includes “Shake that body / Party that body” from Ghostface Killah’s ‘Mighty Healthy’, a callback to West and Pusha T’s ‘New God Flow’. Morrison’s voice makes another appearance at the end, right before a peppering of canned crowd cheers from NBA Jam, begging the question: Did he really want to change the name from Swish?

Facts

Father’s Children – ‘Dirt and Grime’

(from Who’s Gonna Save the World, Numero, 2011)

Yoko Shimomura – Street Fighter II OST

(Capcom, 1991)

Before ‘Real Friends’ gave us a sobering reassurance of Kanye’s direction, ‘FACTS’ scared the living hell out of most of us. Was this what we were waiting years for? Still, we’re happy it made it onto the final tracklist, because few songs capture West’s current state better than this tightrope walk between thoughtful construction and impulsive mania.

The red herring intro of ‘Dirt And Grime’ by Father’s Children sets you up for classic dusty-soul-sampling-Kanye (that a red herring itself, the song is from 1989) but before the dust can settle we’re thrown into a wormhole of clashing contemporary rap tropes and hysterical shouts. There’s the endlessly referenced ‘Jumpman’ meshed with Street Fighter samples before we’re thrown back into ‘Dirt & Grime’. It’s a funhouse of a song in the truest sense — disorienting, upsetting and confusing, but bookended by a grateful glimpse at reality.

Fade

Mr. Fingers – ‘Mystery of Love’

(Alleviated Records, 1985)

Hardrive – ‘Deep Inside’

(Strictly Rhythm, 1993)

Rare Earth – ‘(I Know) I’m Losing You’

(Rare Earth, 1970)

Kanye has a grand history of flipping one perfectly-selected sample into a full-on hit (see: ‘Stronger’, ‘Gold Digger’ or Pablo’s previous ‘30 Seconds’), but ‘Fade’ shows him juggling three at once. The track splits itself between two house classics, one from Harddrive and another from Larry Heard’s (recently revived) Mr. Fingers project.

Kanye keeps himself (not to mention Ty Dolla $ign and Post Malone) balanced between the two with a vocal snatch of blues rockers Rare Earth’s ‘I Know I’m Losing You’ which gives the song its title, hook, and College Dropout-era vibe. He’s should take up plate spinning in the time off after this album. He’d be great at it.

Ultralight Beam

Natalie praying and she's only 4 years old- iamnatalie

otis- Jay Z Kanye west

This little light of mine- Traditional Folk

Late- Kanye west

Throwing Flashbang- Mike Motrasky

Right from the top, “Ultralight Beam” seems to signal to listeners that TLOP will be the anti-Yeezus. It even begins with a literal casting-out of devils: A recording of a young girl (apparently taken from Instagram), saying, “We don’t want no devils in the house! We want the Lord!”

The exorcism performed, the track quickly moves into the prophesied gospel: “We on an ultra light beam … This is a God dream … This is everything,” West sings. Though the track, a clear highlight, is packed with guests, the runaway star is Chance the Rapper. Even setting aside the rising star’s overflowing talent, featuring him at the top of the album was a brilliant bit of casting: Not only has Chance started combining hip-hop and gospel himself (the track also features gospel artist and past Chance collaborator Kirk Franklin), but he is a longtime Kanye superfan, for whom finally getting to work for West is itself a sort of religious moment. As Chance says, “I met Kanye West/ I’m never going to fail.”

Feedback

Talagah- Googoosh

This song finds another way to pun on the idea of the album as gospel: “Y’all heard about the GOOD news?”, referencing the origins of the word gospel in order to make a pun about his own GOOD Music label. West raps over a beat seemingly constructed from audio feedback, one of his best. The subject matter, meanwhile, is wide-ranging, with West telling listeners to “Wake up, nigga, wake up!” Is this a reference to staying woke? It’s hard to say, but, elsewhere on the track, West leaves no room for doubt about his allegiance to Black Lives Matter, rapping, “Hands up, we just doing what the cops taught us/ Hands up, hands up, and the cops shot us.”

Low Lights

So alive- Kings of tomorrow 

Low Lights” is essentially an extended intro to “Highlights,” with the two tracks returning to the same template set up at the top of the album: “Low Lights” is a jubilant one-minute intro that rejoices in God (albeit over melancholy piano chords, with DJ Mustard-style synth bass slathered on top), before “Highlights” brings things back down to earthly temptations.

Highlights

“Sometimes I’m wishing that my dick had GoPro/ So I could play that shit back in slo-mo/ Just shot an amateur video. I think I should go pro.” That begins to sum up the conceit of the song: for Kanye West, some nights are nothing but highlights.

For the most part, this possible first single (West has said that he and Young Thug will perform the song on Saturday Night Live on Saturday) maintains that jocular tone throughout, with memorable lines like “I bet me and Ray J’d be friends,/ if we ain’t love the same bitch./ Yeah, he might have hit it first/ Only problem is: I’m rich.” A reference to Rob Kardashian and Blac Chyna’s sexercise regimen also suggests that this verse was recorded in the last two or three weeks. Of course, West has been making sexercise jokes since the first album, and he ends the song with another new workout plan.

Freestyle 4

Human- Goldfrapp
Remember when I said that TLOP isn’t all the anti-Yeezus? This “freak dream” would have fit right in on that album and marks the beginning of TLOP’s turn toward more nightmarish material. Like Yeezus’ “I’m in It,” this freaky sex fantasy is a mix of horror sounds (hear those Bernard Herrmann-esque strings?) and explicit lyrics (here they’re mostly about getting it on in public). Surely some fans will, as West later puts it, “miss the old Kanye.”

“I Love Kanye”
This charming a-cappella interlude finds West speaking directly to (and for) his fans, as he addresses those who have been disappointed with West’s Yeezus-era sourness and aggression and want the cuddly, soul-sampling Kanye back. He returns to that friendlier mode here, while offering no apologies for his recent work. As he says at the song’s highly quotable closing:

What if Kanye made a song about Kanye

Called “I Miss the Old Kanye”

Man, that would be so Kanye. That’s all it was, Kanye.

We still love Kanye, and I love you like Kanye loves Kanye.

Waves

Fantastic freaks at the dixie- Dj Grand wizard Theodore
According to West, the late addition of this song is the reason the album got delayed an extra day, but the wait was worth it. Another uplifting/vulgar track in the vein of the Chance collaboration that opens the album, “Waves” finds West mixing braggodocious bars (“Step up in this bitch like/ I’m the one your bitch like”) with a more somber message about death, or the legacy of relationships: “Even when somebody go away/ the feelings don't really go away/ That’s just the wave.”

FML

Hit- Section 25

Though the title of this one puns on the teen-slang acronym for “F--k my life,” make no mistake: This is a dark song that finds West pondering self-destruction. It’s only appropriate, then, that West also gets an assist from R&B’s leading poet of self-destruction, the Weeknd, who sings the titular phrase on the chorus, “Wish I would go ahead and fuck my life up/ Can’t let them get to me/ And even though I always fuck my life up/ Only I can mention me.” West even makes mention—not for the first time—of the anti-depression and anti-anxiety drug Lexapro, something with which he seems to have personal experience. Before, he complained about the side effects, and this time he talks about what happens when you go off it.

Wolves

Walking Dub- Sugar Minott 

This is another one we’d heard before—both at Yeezy Season 1 and on SNL’s 40th anniversary special—but unlike “Real Friends,” it’s changed a lot. The most notable change is that in place of the old verses from Vic Mensa and Sia, the song now features a new verse from West and an outro from longtime collaborator Frank Ocean. That new verse—delivered over the same blend of heavy, ominous-sounding bass and soaring (howling?) falsetto that anchored the original track—fleshes out the song’s central metaphor. In it, West imagines himself and wife Kim Kardashian as the rap game Joseph and Mary, before worrying about his two children: “Cover Nori in lambs’ wool/ We’re surrounded by wolves … Cover Saint in lambs’ wool/ We’re surrounded by the f--kin’ wolves.

Consumption – Kanye’s latest album is ‘The Life of Pablo’ was initially only released on ‘Tidal’ where it received over 250 million streams in the first 10 days, Tidal is owned by good friend of Kanye’s, Jay-Z. the demand for the album was huge and a lot of people played by the rules and signed up for Tidal, but a lot of people also pirated the album and this is what eventually lead Kanye to release it on Spotify and Apple, this is after first saying in a tweet that his album will never be on Apple. After the release on Tidal Kanye kept changing and updating the album by changing the order of songs & uploading new versions of the album. Although you can now stream the album from various places you can’t buy a physical form of the album.

Creation – Kanye when making a song does not follow the normal conventions of rap songs. The convention is that you just have the vocal and the instrumental and that’s it. This is where Kanye is different, he doesn’t just use the instrumental and vocal he fits everything else in, all different sounds and samples. He loves to sample the vocals from choirs in the background. Kanye orientates his songs around the human voice. He also has been known to switch up the order of a traditional hip-hop song this can be seen in the track ‘runaway’. The most recent song that contains the mix of vocals instrumentals and samples is ‘Ultralight beam’ on TLOP. It contains samples from 5 different songs.

Performance – with the newest album ‘The Life of Pablo’ came a tour named ‘Saint Pablo’. As for his videos, they are mainly contemporary but are rather striking and recently have had more meaning to them than just the lyrics.