Ah, we’ll see. 
Here’s a left-field one for you.
Seeing as you’ve been interested by a bit of hip-hop, you might want to try the album " A grand don’t come for free" by UK hip-hop/garage artist “the streets”. It was a massive seller in the UK and not something I’d normally listen too but I really enjoyed it. (and I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the music at least has reached the USA by way of advert backing tracks). It is very english in slang and references and the delivery is purposefully ramshackle but I thought it had charm.
It is a concept album with a coherent story that holds it together (so listen in the correct order) and it deals with heartbreak and hope in one lad’s mundane, working-class life.
Highlights include “dry your eyes” , “blinded by the lights” and “wouldn’t have it any other way” - so at least give those a go.
Not stopping, just very busy at work and not in the car as often.
Hey Mahaloth, you ever get back to this? New Kanye album theoretically drops soonish.
Yes, I am still on Yeezus. I slowed a bit due to business at work and I also have an audiobook I’m working on as well.
I’ve listened a few times to the first half of Yeezus(I restart because I take breaks between). I like the opening couple tracks, but then it devolved into “boring rap” on a few tracks and I don’t like it as much.
Still need to finish it and listen to it a few times.
I am not on track to listen to all of Kanye’s work before his new album drops. I’ll be behind on that one a few weeks.
You skipped my beautiful dark twisted fantasy! Or did you do that one and just not update?
Sorry, I am on that one, not Yeezus. Just swap out what I said and replace fantasy. That’s the one I’m on.
I did finish it today, actually. I dedicated myself to listening to it so I could write about it.
What can I say? The last two tracks(one song, actually) are amazing. The opening few songs are amazing.
I hated the middle portion of this album. His worst stuff. Kind of just vulgar and crappy music. Did not enjoy it. At all.
So Devil in a new dress and Runaway are the ones you hated?
It’s possible that I’m not allowed to be friends with you anymore. I’ll have to heck the bylaws. 
Do check out the podcast Dissect. We have a thread on here about it. Season 2 is a deep analysis of this album. Worth checking out regardless of your feelings on the album, it’s a lot just about how hip hop works as music. Very good.
I wouldn’t know from advertising but I did hear Fit But You Know It on college radio back when it came out. I’ll have to give the album a shot because while it isn’t the type of thing I’d rush out and buy immediately, I wouldn’t want to pass on hearing more of it for free (no pun intended.)
Some were vulgar/crude in a way I don’t get. One was an “ode to douchebags” basically and I hated that.
Someone might point out that Cannibal Corpse is hugely vulgar, but I would point out that while I’ve seen them in concert, I am not a fan of them.
Oh…not a prude by any means, I just didn’t get anything from the lyrical content on the middle of this album. I’ll try again.
If it helps, the whole albums is essentially him dealing with suicidal depression. Most of the songs are about deep self loathing. Power is practically a suicide note disguised as a pop song. The songs Devil in a New Dress and Runaway (the let’s give a toast to the assholes song) are more or less him dealing with the fact that by that point in his life everyone was loudly proclaiming everywhere that Kanye was an asshole. His tours had been canceled on him, he lost sponsors, he was thought of the way you think (thought) of him before you started listening to all this. That whole middle section of the album is him coming to terms with the idea that some of that public perception is his own fault and that he has fucked up his life. So, there is that.
Every time he mentions women in any capacity in the whole album he is actually talking about fame/the public. It’s allegory, and pretty thinly veiled. It’s a pretty bleak album, but it sounds poppy. Understanding this is pretty critical to understanding Yeezus and The Life of Pablo, because Yeezus is more or less MBDTF redux, done as hip hop/industrial fusion but with Kim saving his life instead of Amber leaving him because he fucked up yet again. Pablo is him trying to find balance between his real life as a husband and father and his public persona. Close listening is necessary. Hell of a Life (the “I just fell in love with a porn star” song), if you pay attention, is about a person who is so very alone that he is living his life entirely in a fantasy world because he has no real human connections anymore now that everyone he ever loved has left him for being a selfish dick back.
Not everything is for everyone, but I think this one is really worth taking a second pass at. This album is a major part of the reason why people call Kanye a genius.
I’ll keep focused on it and hold of on the next album until I’ve processed this one more.
If you have never heard Rumors, then it’s probably a sure thing that you never heard any of Fleetwood Mac’s earlier blues based music as the band originally had it’s start as members of John Mayall’s Blues Breakers. I’d suggest ‘The Pious Bird of Good Omen’. Not that it falls under “albums everybody has already heard”, but if you like the blues based Led Zeppelin, you may like other British blues bands. Standout tracks are ‘Albatross’ and ‘Black Magic Woman’.
Yes.
Finally got around to listening to Dissect - My Dark Twisted Fantasy.
I thought it was quite good and put some things in to perspective for me. For example, I did not know about Kanye’s personal crisis at that time and it all makes more sense now.
But that podcast suffers greatly from just being an essay read out into a microphone. It would be much better if someone else was there to react to his ideas and bounce off from.
Re-listened to all of Kanye up to Dark Fantasy. About to download the next ones and continue.
808’s and Heartbreak is his best album for me. It’s not even close. Having said that, I am obviously not the main target for his music and that album seems to me to be more mainstream than the others.
**
It’s interesting that you feel that way. When it came out it was so far outside the mainstream that it was practically avant-garde. It took years for people to catch up to what he was doing and, yeah now it sound like mainstream music.
You are not the only one who feels that way either. Kanye fans tend to fall into 2 camps, old Kanye and new Kanye with 808s largely being considered the first new Kanye album, and MBDTF being something that belongs to neither new or old.
If you like 808s you might really like the two new ones, ye and Kids See Ghosts. They feel a lot like 808s in a lot of ways.
Yeezus is… Polarizing. The Life of Pablo might also be up your alley if you can get past the vulgarity.
**Yeezus **is my least favorite album so far.
I have nothing to say except I feel Kanye misfired completely. It’s just nothing to me.