Kanye: The Sequel

Kanye too fine. I like him like this: with his trap shut!

The discussion begins: is Late Registration better than the College Dropout? The reviews are spectacular across the board, the critics love Kanye's sophomore effort. The message boards are hot with this topic. So, has he done it again? I haven't heard Late Registration in its entirety as of yet. I didn't want this album release to be like Common's: I was on the Common/Be beat since the beginning of the year, I saw the in's and out's of his media campaign, contributed to the buzz around the album, participated in the listening sessions, heard Common explain his album time and time again, this didn't have a good effect on how I felt about the album. Now that some time has passed, I'm just now starting to hear BE for what it is and I'm loving it.

I didn't go to any of the Kanye's studio sessions. Didn't want the advanced copies and refused the downloads from my friends. I'll have Late Registration in my possession tomorrow, or maybe even tonight if the recca' stoe is still propped open when I'm done. I dug the College Dropout, I dug the earnestness of it's lyrical content; and how musically euphoric the production was, it was a very fun album to listen to.

The production on Late Registration must be blazin' because the talking heads are painstakingly detailing exactly how the music sounds. Like a review on jazz or how the serious music writers used to do it back in the 90s and before, I've never read so much detail paid to sonance. I want to hear this joint produced by Jon Brion and of course his track with Common. Is there a sonic theme? If this is so-called modernized hip hop, how does Late Registration compare to The Love Below? We will see, until then, Alpha, step. Omega, step/ Kappa, step. Sigma, step/Gangstas walk, pimps gon' talk/ Oooh hecky naw that boy is raw...