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91Weighed and measured, Graduation is easily the best rap album this year.
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Musically, at least, it's the most accomplished thing he's ever done.
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Every single track offers up its momentary pleasures--choruses that make you say yeah on songs you've already found wanting, confessional details and emotional aperçus on an album that still reduces to quality product when they're over.
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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.
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90West crosses genres with wilful and speedy abandon, taking the listener on an epic quest where the journey is just as enjoyable and unpredictable as the destination.
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Chicagoan West innovatively samples Elton John ('Good Morning'), imports Coldplay's Chris Martin for the 'Homecoming' hook, and plays to Young Jeezy's ad-libbing ability on 'Can't Tell Me Nothing.' Lyrically, West sticks to his "I'm so self-conscious" tip, but unlike 50, he knows his rhyme schemes.
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The bliss that does surface on Graduation is all in the grooves, which range further than West has ever gone before.
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87While it might not be as substantial a record as we're used to hearing from him, it is his greatest leap forward, and further proof that few are as skilled at tracing out the complicated contours of pride, success and ambition as he is.
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West's writing and delivery has improved since "The College Dropout," though they're still marked by both a cleverness and a clumsiness.
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Fascinatingly flawed, Graduation finds an imperfect man seeking, and occasionally finding, perfection in his music.
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Graduation is neither as bold nor as scattered as "The College Dropout," and it's neither as extroverted nor as sonically rich as "Late Registration." Kanye still makes up for his shortcomings as an MC and lyricist by remaining charmingly clumsy, frequently dealing nonsense through suspect rhyme schemes.
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80West's third album is memerizing and alienating, like all the purest forms of pop culture. [Nov 2007, p.114]
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80Still, the music is never timid or conventional. Only as a lyricist does West sometimes disappoint.
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80West delivers another failsafe collection of sharp, soulful songs, exposing his new affinity for synths and electronic drums while adding new lyrical ground to that campus-sized ego.
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The best track on this typically polished but ultimately quite disturbing album (the back-to-basics self-examination of 'Everything I Am') is a brave attempt to confront such uncertainties head on.
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80An impressively creative hip-hop album that will hopefully inspire West's peers to try new sonic avenues.
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80He sounds less like he's pushing to create something epic, and at that he succeeds--as good as Graduation is, it doesn't have the larger-than-life presence of "Late Registration." It's more manageable, more everyday.
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Feb 9, 201170Nearly every song on Graduation is memorable for both its hooks and its overall sound.
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70The album lacks the flab of previous efforts and, where he's been guilty of hiding behind guests before, the contributions are (perhaps inadvisably in retrospect) kept to a minimum. Sadly though, the grandstanding and chest beating take their toll on both Graduation's aesthetic and the listener's patience.
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70While another concise and accomplished release from an immensely talented rapper, it fails to really deliver the one thing Kanye's always excelled at: beauty.
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Per Vulture, the Curtis-shaming Graduation "has better songs waiting in the wings. Bonus: No Jamie Foxx!"
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Grating bouts of narcissism aside, Graduation contains killer pieces of production: 'Stronger' uses Daft Punk's 'Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger' to practically revive Eurodisco, while 'Champion' snarkily snatches its hook from Steely Dan's 'Kid Charlemagne.'
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Graduation is neat, tidy, formal, but lacking in personality.
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Thing is, though, that for every failure Graduation puts me through it has many a saving merit that only the nigh witless audacity of Kanye West could afford
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West's vocal mediocrity wouldn't be so glaring if the production were more of a diversion. There are no truly tragic compositions on Graduation--though the droning ''Drunk and Hot Girls'' could have been half as irritating at twice the speed--but most of the music just seems uninspired.
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Despite its five or six great tracks, Graduation feels more and more like the work of a follower, not a leader.
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60The album sounds squashed and claustrophobic, but lacks the sense of play that still characterises his clever, incident-packed rhymes. [Oct 2007, p.106]
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60Graduation is mercifully skit-free, but it still feels insubstantial to West. [Oct 2007, p.95]
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Like a good term paper, much of Graduation sounds great in theory but flounders in its execution.
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Graduation is worth note in the sense that it offers proof Kanye isn't on the five-year plan (The College Dropout registered in 2004), but I'm sort of looking forward to hearing the next album built around the disillusionment of his first entry-level position.
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At heart, he's still a producer not a rapper (which explains how badly he hits the mic at times, more on that later). He's got that hit-making part down pat... it's just that he can't make good hits anymore.
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40Graduation is consistent, yes, but it's consistently boring.
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User score distribution:
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Positive: 117 out of 135
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Mixed: 7 out of 135
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Negative: 11 out of 135
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10By far one of Kanye's best albums. And definetely one of my favourites too.
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10