Hey Y'all, been a while, hasn't it? During the holidays I went a little crazy and after my mom coaxed me off the roof, I decided to give the blog a break. The writing just wasn't up to snuff for a blog with the audience of at most two people. Either I have to go big, or I have to go back to posting the same post on the walls of everyone of my facebook friends.
If you're reading this, I want to thank you because instead of doing something constructive with your time, or at least reading
Stereogum, you've chosen to read this self indulgent apology, so big ups to you!
That said, almost a month ago I promised to tell you what I thought the album of 2008 was. Now this is not "the best" or "the most successful" or "my favorite". This the album that I feel encapsulates the year that was the best. That said, this is definitely in my top five for the year.
So without further delay, my pick for the album of the year is....
...Kanye West's
808s & Heartbreak.
First, I don't care that the whole thing is sung in autotune. People care way too much about autotune anyway. Autotune works amazingly well on the album.
West created one of the most emotionally vulnerable albums of the year full of messy emotions and then put it to the most robotic and unsympathetic music of his career. On top of that, he has obscured his voice with autotune, reverb, and distortion. It's as if West is using autotune to metaphorically fix all the sloppy experiences of the past year simply by fixing his voice. It's as if he wants to become a robot so he can purge himself of his emotions. West uses autotune as a way of numbing the sentiment and distancing himself from the events that inspired the album.
This would all be unimportant if the production wasn't pretty much spotless and the songs for the most part were pretty good. "Streetlights" and "Paranoid" do stand out as the best. "Bad News," "Say You Will," "Coldest Winter," and "Welcome to Heartbreak" can also be considered successful to some degree or another. These songs are all able to evocatively evoke West's depression without ever falling into cliche. However the singles, though catchy, don't really hold as much weight on the album. And on an album that is so singularly West's, the guest verses from Young Jeezy and Lil' Wayne drag down their respective songs. Neither one of them can muster anything that nears the universality of West's. The only song on the album though that could be considered completely unsuccessful is "RoboCop." I don't even want to write about that song. Though it's much better than an earlier leaked version, the strings on the verses and the extended outro are completely unnecessary. This song does incapsilate some of the albums themes-- 80s referencing production and an emotionless "robotic" subject.
With all this said, every time I listen to this song, I'm completely lost in this little world of ice West has built. Past all the bravado, past the materialism, the leering, the "I am voice of this or that," is a sensitive young man who has put together the most emotionally rich album of his career, if not the best.
Released in the midst of an extended national hangover, with so many people feeling pinched economically and apprihesive about the future,
808s and Heartbreak may be one man's story emotional breakdown, but it serves as the soundtrack of a wider national meltdown that effects every one of us.
This is why I have chosen it as the album of the year for 2008.
In this time when tempers are high, it's important not to lose track of the music.
