Kanye West Released His New Album Last Night
In typical Kanye West fashion, the rapper invited a handful of people to a remote barn in Wyoming on Thursday to release his new album, titled "Ye." West streamed the event online, where fans could listen along live, but never released the album on streaming platforms (in 2016, Kanye waited two days to release the "Life of Pablo" after his Madison Square Garden party).
It all took place at the Diamond Cross Ranch outside of Jackson Hole, where Pitchfork reports:
Chris Rock introduced him. "Hip-hop is the art form created by free black men, and no black man has taken more advantage of his freedom than Kanye West," Rock said.
For now, the details are scarce, but early opinions have been, naturally, polarizing. As the New York Times reports:
The debut of “Ye,” which was not immediately made available on streaming services like Spotify or Apple Music, included seven songs, with guest features from Ty Dolla Sign, Jeremih, Kid Cudi and 070 Shake. Mr. West’s lyrics do not shy from current events, nor from his recent brushes with ignominy. On one track, he references comments he made about slavery during the TMZ appearance: “They said build your own, I said, ‘How, Sway?’”/I said slavery’s a choice, they said, ‘How, Ye?’/Just imagine if they caught me on a wild day.”
On another, Mr. West references the rape accusations against the hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, rapping: “Russell Simmons wanna pray for me, too/I’mma pray for him ‘cause he got MeToo-ed.”
One listen Kanye review:
The beats are cool.
Lyrically, you're not getting anything crazy insightful. Meh
I need more Kid Cudi in 2018
WTF was that Nicki Minaj voicemail?#Ye- Sowmya Krishnamurthy (@SowmyaK) June 1, 2018
MY MESSY THOUGHTS UPON FIRST LISTEN OF KANYE WEST'S NEW ALBUM #YE: pic.twitter.com/GyxhxrzXpd
- Zach Keali’i Murphy (@Fade_to_Zach) June 1, 2018
From what we can gather from early reports and Instagram snippets, the album sounds like much of what we'd expect from Kanye- blunt, controversial lyrics over incredible beats, with most critics comparing it to his earlier work. West also debuted a line of "Wyoming" merch to coincide with the release.
A post shared by Rap Radar (@rapradar) on May 31, 2018 at 9:58pm PDT
A post shared by HIGHSNOBIETY (@highsnobiety) on Jun 1, 2018 at 2:42am PDT
We'll keep this post updated as more details emerge, but this is Kanye we're talking about, so who knows what's actually going to happen.
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