Kanye West

The Life of Pablo

T.L.O.P. does the perfect job of showcasing what makes Kanye brilliant — excellent production mixed with creative samples and his Quincy Jones-esque ability to get the best work out of some of music’s most talented artists.

Our political leaders may no longer present themselves as gods, but our rappers do. The Life of Pablo proves that sometimes they give us our Taj Mahals too.

As glacially paced, mood-enhancing music, Pablo is a hypnotic slam-dunk and this reviewer will be among those first online if an all-instrumental edition finally surfaces on Vocaroo, because over the long haul ‘Ye the MC here proves as elusive as the proverbial Cheshire Cat.

It remains a modern gospel that is undeniably West's own, with a handful of vexatious moments peppered throughout the undeniably visionary ones.

The other way to look at the erratic Pablo is as an "instant" LP, one that was mastered at the last minute and debuted via streaming. On that count, it's a fascinating, magazine-like experience with plenty of reasons to give it a free play.

The Life of Pablo is a fucking mess—the scattered, contradictory work of an icon straining to keep up with his own brilliant pace.

The Life Of Pablo isn’t the greatest album of ‘life’, ever, or even the best album of Kanye’s career. But at times he’s still the most adventurous artist of his generation. And the most frustrating.

West wants everything, equally we expect everything, so the result is exhilarating in its instability. The Life Of Pablo is bursting at the seams with ideas and talking points.

It is so self-involved it crosses over into self-delusion, marked by such a tangible absence of perspective and objectivity it is as if he has actually lost sight of the elemental basics of his art.

“No, art is not done to decorate apartments. It is an instrument of war.”

The album is almost workmanlike, a reflection of the artistic process of its creator rather than a grand statement of intent.

For a rapper who has excelled in redefining the artform, The Life Of Pablo is a sprawling, uneven and curiously unfinished sounding affair with a dearth of recognisable bangers.

Sonically, at least, Pablo delivers and impresses throughout. Lyrically and thematically, the album is a wayward, rambling, and all-around incoherent mess, with only a handful of revelatory moments.

When The Life of Pablo is good, it’s very good indeed. What it isn’t is consistent. Perhaps it’s the sound of a man over-reaching himself. Perhaps it’s a document of a mind coming increasingly unglued.

Pablo’s failures are not the result of a single narrative, but in the attempted combination of all the narratives of his life. It’s the result of attention spread too many places, of perfectionism turned to over-tinkering, of an artist pushing himself to hit a self-imposed deadline, of working in the limelight rather than in the shadows.

The ultimate feel of the record is more like a mixtape than a completed album, and while the former would be interesting and welcome, as the latter The Life of Pablo is a crushing disappointment.

Sure, The Life of Pablo‘s obscurities and eccentricities make it ripe for endless dissection by West’s fans and followers, but make no mistake: this albums is flawed, it’s problematic, and most of all, it’s no masterpiece.