My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy Image
  • Summary: Breaking traditional mainstream hip-hop guidelines, Kanye West's latest release features epic raps and long instrumental variations for his most innovative album to date.
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 41 out of 43
  2. Negative: 0 out of 43
  1. Apr 20, 2011
    100
    My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is genuinely a great record. [Feb. 2011, p. 108]
  2. 100
    Like Picasso, he acknowledges that the chief enemy of creativity is good taste--which is just as well, since it's not a quality with which he seems over-burdened on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. For which we should all be thankful.
  3. Dec 7, 2010
    60
    Kanye's ...Dark Twisted Fantasy is also the densely-produced work of a clearly erratic soul.

See all 43 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 23 out of 255
  1. This is an album that deserves the acclaim it is getting through the press. It has some pretty awesome transitions between tracks and some pretty cutting edge stuff for a "mainstream" rap album. I actually think a lot of "mainstream" fans are going to resist this album, and for that, and the risk-taking that Kanye is taking, I give this CD a 10. Expand
    • 7 of 7 users said yes
  2. This has good backbeat rhythms so I can't play it down completely, but perfect 10? Really? Critics giving this 100? Really? LIke the cover, the lyrics are not really anything new - mostly pornographic, ghetto rap - parents beware. Fbombs, Nbombs, etc. etc. -which are repeated hundreds of times throughout (for shock value!?!?, to show their real grittiness?. Not really shocking, not really cool either. Expand
    • 2 of 18 users said yes
  3. This album is a blatant ripoff of Moby's sound and production techniques, most notably from Play and 18. Kanye does a competent job of copying that style, and then proceeds to ruin it by putting aggressive, angry, insanely self-obsessed rapping over it. We're not talking Eminem-style intensity or originality in rapping style either. West can conjure interesting lyrics, but his rhythmic delivery is quite average. I must admit I'm a fan of the video, and supposedly he directed it, but it's clear much of the credit needs to go to the director of photography. Kanye employs a bunch of strange imagery regarding some model that falls to earth, and is physically perfect, but she's a bird, and his friends won't accept her. Seriously? Get real and get a plot and a clue. Dark Fantasy's package is very appealing, but ultimately it's too much of a ripoff of someone else's musical style for my taste, and more importantly, the sentiment expressed is the same old poor-liittle-me-I'm-so-put-upon public persona that we've all gotten really tired of. Expand
    • 11 of 84 users said yes

See all 255 User Reviews

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