808s and Heartbreak

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Time for a Kanye thread! I'm not utterly convinced by about 75% of the autotune vox but I am enjoying the rest! I've also been listening to Graduation quite a lot recently and the difference in mood is massive. The usual clever wordplay is still there but seems to take a back seat to Kanye being a big old emo (which of I imagine is the whole point).

Any poptimist thoughts? Fave tracks?

(Also I have just listened to 'Robocop' and I want an excuse to post this:)

Comments

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

General background - you all probably know about Kanye's mum dying this year, but he also split from his fiancee (the designer Alexis Phifer).

I think Kanye's lyrics on 808s are mostly quite bad, clumsy and solipsistic, with the occasional flash of really evocative poetry, but he mostly gets away with this because a) the music frames them really well, and often elevates them beyond what they are on paper (eg the sudden distortion on "system overload"), but more importantly b) because clumsiness of expression is something very real and resonant when it comes to heartbreak - some of the most moving confessional lyrics are those which express how hard it is to piece together a confession. This especially applies to Kanye - even more significant than the new sonic territory is the sense that this is new emotional territory for him, and he doesn't really know how to deal with it.

The way he resorts to cliche on 'Heartless' is interesting, esp in conjunction with that folky melody - lyrics like "how could you be so cold as the winter wind, yo" don't particularly move me (and lyrics like "how could you be so Dr Evil" actively piss me off), but there's this sense that Kanye's tapping into...a library of cliches for the heartbroken? I don't know where I'm going with this thought but having mulled it over for two weeks now maybe someone else can pick it up!

There's probably lots of fertile ground to think about when it comes to Kanye's own American Psycho inspiration - the music is SO stylised/stylish, it's almost like he doesn't know whether he wants to hide his feelings or expose them. Sad, minor-key melodies, but such polished production; obvious emo lyrics, but cliched to the point of meaninglessness. It's a very vulnerable album.

Overall I think I've only seen people either overrate this album, or kneejerk hate on it. In the context of Kanye generally it's probably going to be a detour, an excellent curio which keeps me very interested in the arc of his career but which doesn't match up to his previous work at all.

[cis.livejournal.com]

a library of cliches for the heartbroken

see also comment on 'dry your eyes' pre-overplay (even if you hate it)

[cis.livejournal.com]

ugh by 'comment on' i mean 'discussion about'. wherever that happened - nylpm? i feel like swygart wrote something good on it.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

hmm I don't think I ever read that? prob cuz I hate that song so so much...the comparison I had in my mind was

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hmm I don't think I ever read that? prob cuz I hate that song so so much...the comparison I had in my mind was <a href="http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?showall=true&bookmarkedmessageid=49&boardid=41&threadid=63281"something I said about Tori Amos's 'Baker Baker' once</a>.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

fucking html.

here. (http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?showall=true&bookmarkedmessageid=49&boardid=41&threadid=63281)

[cis.livejournal.com]

"Skinner talks in the words of others, the words we're told to say now, because he finds himself hurting that badly he can't quite express it in any other way"

yes i think so! & also the square table (http://freakytrigger.co.uk/old-ft/nylpm/2004/07/the-square-table-8-the-streets-dry-your-eyes/) on it, I guess.