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33⅓ Main Series #97
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
In the first decade of the twenty-first century, Kanye West created the most compelling body of pop music by an American artist during the period. Having risen from obscurity as a precocious producer through the ranks of Jay Z's Roc-A-Fella records, by the time he released My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (MBDTF) in late 2010, West had evolved into a master collagist, an alchemist capable of transfiguring semi-obscure soul samples and indelible beats into a brash and vulnerable new art form.
A look at the arc of his career, from the heady chipmunk soul exuberance of The College Dropout (2004) to the operatic narcissism of MBDTF , tells us about the march of pop music into the digital age and, by extension, the contradictions that define our cultural epoch. In a cloud-based and on-demand culture - a place of increasing virtualization, loneliness, and hyper-connectivity - West straddles this critical moment as what David Samuels of The Atlantic calls "the first true genius of the iPhone era, the Mozart of contemporary American music." In the land of taking a selfie, honing a personal brand, and publicly melting down online, Kanye West is the undisputed king.
Swallowing the chaos wrought by his public persona and digesting it as a grandiose allegory of self-redemption, Kanye sublimates his narcissism to paint masterstroke after masterstroke on MBDTF , a 69-minute hymn to egotistical excess. Sampling and ventriloquizing the pop music past to tell the story of its future - very much a tale of our culture's wish for unfettered digital ubiquity - MBDTF is the album of its time, an aesthetic self-acquittal and spiritual autobiography of our era's most dynamic artist.
A look at the arc of his career, from the heady chipmunk soul exuberance of The College Dropout (2004) to the operatic narcissism of MBDTF , tells us about the march of pop music into the digital age and, by extension, the contradictions that define our cultural epoch. In a cloud-based and on-demand culture - a place of increasing virtualization, loneliness, and hyper-connectivity - West straddles this critical moment as what David Samuels of The Atlantic calls "the first true genius of the iPhone era, the Mozart of contemporary American music." In the land of taking a selfie, honing a personal brand, and publicly melting down online, Kanye West is the undisputed king.
Swallowing the chaos wrought by his public persona and digesting it as a grandiose allegory of self-redemption, Kanye sublimates his narcissism to paint masterstroke after masterstroke on MBDTF , a 69-minute hymn to egotistical excess. Sampling and ventriloquizing the pop music past to tell the story of its future - very much a tale of our culture's wish for unfettered digital ubiquity - MBDTF is the album of its time, an aesthetic self-acquittal and spiritual autobiography of our era's most dynamic artist.
152 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews
December 6, 2019
The first part, on Social Networks' noxious effects on our conception of the self, rings of a stale truism by 2019, but Graves analysis of the album, and his interpretation of Kanye's persona, feel justly celebratory and bring to light countless nuances of an infinitely rewarding work of art.
The occasional controversial opinion (College Dropout is the least cohesive of Kanye's first three records? Really?) is more thrilling than annoying; being outraged by controversial opinions is one of the great joys of debating pop music. Plus, now I understand Yeezus! (I mean the record)
The occasional controversial opinion (College Dropout is the least cohesive of Kanye's first three records? Really?) is more thrilling than annoying; being outraged by controversial opinions is one of the great joys of debating pop music. Plus, now I understand Yeezus! (I mean the record)
June 4, 2014
This book is the most overwritten text I have ever read, in terms of prose style, vocabulary, hyperbole, and cultural references. The vocabulary is excusable but when combined with the other aspects it became laughable.
This book is about two things: (1) Kanye West as pop cultural icon, with a dynamic persona, discussed mostly right before the release of MBDTF and (2) the album MBDTF itself. The analysis of the former was cogent but the latter was inconsistent, sometimes taking the album portion of the book to talk about Dante or use rhetorical questions to support a spurious assertion. Worse, there was no explicit framework through which to read the album itself.
These faults notwithstanding the book itself was indeed quite interesting and some of the analysis of Kanye and his work (and a bit about his collaborators although there should have been more on them, e.g. Rick Ross's part on "Devil in a New Dress" which is almost as good as Yeezy's). The author argues for the cultural importance of Kanye and that his works deserve serious scholarly attention. Many books about hip-hop work at a broader level of analysis, and I'm glad that this work (well, this series) focused on the records themselves. I would have bought it and read it even if I had known how it was written and that a considerable portion of the book was spent on something besides the tracks on the album.
I thought of two apologetic arguments for the style, both of which fail. (1) Because Hip-Hop isn't taken seriously among the scholarly community this text needs to be as academic as possible. Response: I dispute the first claim and point to the proliferation of books about hip-hop by scholarly presses such as Oxford and Palgrave, although agree that more studies are absolutely needed, less the scholarly narrative becomes one that "old school" rap is somehow superior to anything after the death of The Notorious B.I.G. or thereabouts. Also, academic discourse is characterized by rigorous argumentation and clarity of discourse and that was not the case for this text. If anything the references the Shelley and Heidegger (I don't think that was explicit but I do remember the phrase "Being-in-the-world") make it feel pseudo-academic (I kind of felt like I was reading Judith Butler at points, for what it's worth) (2) The style reflects the subject matter, Response - Scholarship should not sound like what it studies. Look at Heidegger scholarship. If it sounds like Heidegger, it's going to make no sense. Even if this argument is directed at the tone of the work it also fails at making it more scholarly or even pleasant to read.
The author also misuses the phrase "beg the question" on page 29.
If you're still with me to this point know that fans of Kanye West SHOULD read this book. I'm very happy it exists. Also, if you're ever curious how an over-eager UChicago first year writes a paper for the humanities core seminary read this book (although Mr. Graves went to Princeton).
This book is about two things: (1) Kanye West as pop cultural icon, with a dynamic persona, discussed mostly right before the release of MBDTF and (2) the album MBDTF itself. The analysis of the former was cogent but the latter was inconsistent, sometimes taking the album portion of the book to talk about Dante or use rhetorical questions to support a spurious assertion. Worse, there was no explicit framework through which to read the album itself.
These faults notwithstanding the book itself was indeed quite interesting and some of the analysis of Kanye and his work (and a bit about his collaborators although there should have been more on them, e.g. Rick Ross's part on "Devil in a New Dress" which is almost as good as Yeezy's). The author argues for the cultural importance of Kanye and that his works deserve serious scholarly attention. Many books about hip-hop work at a broader level of analysis, and I'm glad that this work (well, this series) focused on the records themselves. I would have bought it and read it even if I had known how it was written and that a considerable portion of the book was spent on something besides the tracks on the album.
I thought of two apologetic arguments for the style, both of which fail. (1) Because Hip-Hop isn't taken seriously among the scholarly community this text needs to be as academic as possible. Response: I dispute the first claim and point to the proliferation of books about hip-hop by scholarly presses such as Oxford and Palgrave, although agree that more studies are absolutely needed, less the scholarly narrative becomes one that "old school" rap is somehow superior to anything after the death of The Notorious B.I.G. or thereabouts. Also, academic discourse is characterized by rigorous argumentation and clarity of discourse and that was not the case for this text. If anything the references the Shelley and Heidegger (I don't think that was explicit but I do remember the phrase "Being-in-the-world") make it feel pseudo-academic (I kind of felt like I was reading Judith Butler at points, for what it's worth) (2) The style reflects the subject matter, Response - Scholarship should not sound like what it studies. Look at Heidegger scholarship. If it sounds like Heidegger, it's going to make no sense. Even if this argument is directed at the tone of the work it also fails at making it more scholarly or even pleasant to read.
The author also misuses the phrase "beg the question" on page 29.
If you're still with me to this point know that fans of Kanye West SHOULD read this book. I'm very happy it exists. Also, if you're ever curious how an over-eager UChicago first year writes a paper for the humanities core seminary read this book (although Mr. Graves went to Princeton).
January 15, 2019
I've had this book for so long and just decided to read it because I wanted to reminisce about when times were good and things made sense.
I'm so fucking mad at a Kanye West right now. It just makes me so upset, who Kanye has become. However, If I'm honest, it's all my fault that I'm mad because I fell into Yeezy's meticulously developed plan to make us, black people, feel like he gave a fuck about us, black people.
Kanye West only cares about one person, Kanye West.
Anyway, I loved this contribution to the 33 1/3 series because it was wild. I mean the way that Kirk Walker Graves writes, you can tell that he fucking stans Yeezy soooooo hard and it made it so easy to slide into all the metaphors he was laying down. Reading this book, I felt like I was wearing a VR headset, watching and examining all the moments and thought-processes, songs, music-video concepts and daydreams and nightmares that make me love the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy album so much. It made me wonder about how Kanye went from MBDTF to his most recent release, ye. It made me wonder what Mr. Graves thinks about the current state of affairs of the Yeezy enterprise.
I really liked the chapter-by-chapter breakdown of each song and how detailed Graves got into the structure and creation of each song, but moreover - I love how Graves discussed the angels and demons Kanye battles, builds up, tears down, explains and exemplifies on each track. As far as music writing goes, I really feel like Graves knows his shit.
It was a fun ride, a quick read and really just got me going. It got me super riled up. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is one of my favourite Yeezy records ever and Mr. Graves did a great job of helping me quietly geek out and reminisce.
I'm so fucking mad at a Kanye West right now. It just makes me so upset, who Kanye has become. However, If I'm honest, it's all my fault that I'm mad because I fell into Yeezy's meticulously developed plan to make us, black people, feel like he gave a fuck about us, black people.
Kanye West only cares about one person, Kanye West.
Anyway, I loved this contribution to the 33 1/3 series because it was wild. I mean the way that Kirk Walker Graves writes, you can tell that he fucking stans Yeezy soooooo hard and it made it so easy to slide into all the metaphors he was laying down. Reading this book, I felt like I was wearing a VR headset, watching and examining all the moments and thought-processes, songs, music-video concepts and daydreams and nightmares that make me love the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy album so much. It made me wonder about how Kanye went from MBDTF to his most recent release, ye. It made me wonder what Mr. Graves thinks about the current state of affairs of the Yeezy enterprise.
I really liked the chapter-by-chapter breakdown of each song and how detailed Graves got into the structure and creation of each song, but moreover - I love how Graves discussed the angels and demons Kanye battles, builds up, tears down, explains and exemplifies on each track. As far as music writing goes, I really feel like Graves knows his shit.
It was a fun ride, a quick read and really just got me going. It got me super riled up. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is one of my favourite Yeezy records ever and Mr. Graves did a great job of helping me quietly geek out and reminisce.
July 8, 2021
Helt sjukt at det går an å skriv så godt om musikk!!!!
Det her e rødt skinn ramma inn i gull, ballerina på demontid, helsvart smoking og lavendel-sko i bokform. Kenny Vest e så klink i bolla atte hjælp!! Hjælp!!!
Det her e rødt skinn ramma inn i gull, ballerina på demontid, helsvart smoking og lavendel-sko i bokform. Kenny Vest e så klink i bolla atte hjælp!! Hjælp!!!
July 13, 2022
I miss the old kanye straight from the go kanye chop up the soul kanye set on his goes kanye i hate the new kanye the bad mood kanye the always rude kanye spaz in the news kanye i miss the sweet kanye chop up the beats kanye i gotta say at that time i liked to meet kanye see i invented kanye it wasnt any kanye and now i look and look around and its so many kanyes i used to love kanye i used to love kanye i even had the pink polo i thought i was kanye what if kanye made a song about kanye call em mister old kanye man that be so kanye thats all it was kanye we still love kanye and i love you like kanye loves kanye
May 19, 2022
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is a masterpiece of an album so I was happy to see there’s a 33 1/3 for it. I loved the way that this one was written too, the first part delving into Kanye as a person and artist because it would be tough to truly understand the album without understanding him first. But the second part of the book where it goes track by track through MBDTF was fantastic. The way that he talks about classics such as Runaway, Dark Fantasy, and All of the Lights is a must read for fans of hip-hop and music in general.
March 17, 2020
This is the first book I read in this series of books dedicated to music albums., And the experience was a rich one. If you know me personally, you'll know that I am fanatical about Kanye West. I've always been. I make no apologies. (I've had friends and strangers get mad at me just because I dare to say I love his music. And honestly speaking, that makes Kanye's appeal even more attractive. Just saying).
Kanye fascinates me (and infuriates me!!). But more importantly, his music fascinates me. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is my favorite album of all time, so reading this was a joy and a must-read. It delivered. Astute and/or thought-provoking observations with razor sharp music criticism. You can tell that the author is a fanboy, like me. But he was able to highlight Kanye's neuroses and his helpless attraction to excess. The first half is more about Kanye: the man. The second half is an in-depth breakdown of each song from the album's track listing. The chapter on the song "Runaway" was a work of magic.
Kanye fascinates me (and infuriates me!!). But more importantly, his music fascinates me. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is my favorite album of all time, so reading this was a joy and a must-read. It delivered. Astute and/or thought-provoking observations with razor sharp music criticism. You can tell that the author is a fanboy, like me. But he was able to highlight Kanye's neuroses and his helpless attraction to excess. The first half is more about Kanye: the man. The second half is an in-depth breakdown of each song from the album's track listing. The chapter on the song "Runaway" was a work of magic.
October 30, 2015
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kirk Walker Graves is a nonfiction introspective and philosophy on the Kanye West album of the same name.
(4) The author made a pointed claim early on in the book: Graves had not met or attempted to contact Kanye West or any of the involved parties in the making of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy in order to gain special knowledge on the production of the record. Instead, Graves collects knowledge made publicly available through interviews, blog posts, and of course, the album itself. Graves tells the story of the album’s creation, internal themes, and occurrences in Ye’s life through the eyes (and with the resources) of every regular listener who has been captivated by the record since its release in 2010, albeit with an apparent dedication to decoding every second of the album’s playtime and relating it to the past and present events in American pop culture.
The amount of depth found in the analysis of this album is astounding. Graves breaks down obvious lyrical themes with ease at the beginning of each chapter, but what provides the most insight is his attention to sonic detail and its connections to popular cultural themes that the author believes inspired the LP. For example, the book cites the effect applied to West’s voice in the second track Gorgeous as a reflection of the way Ye feels he speaks to the vast audience of his everyday critics: loud but canned; clear yet distorted. It is in these moments where the book distinguishes itself from the many reviews written about this album, and becomes an in-depth and emotional analysis of how it has seemed to quickly become a modern-day classic.
While the book claims to contain no ‘special knowledge’, it is clear that the facts are very well researched, every interview, tweet and important event (such as a concert or release announcement) described in detail and made to connect to whatever claim is being made.
The book was organized into an individual analysis of each track, in the order of the tracklist that you can see on the back of your jewel case. This helps to provide a sense of progression throughout the book, as Kanye originally sculpted My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy to contain.
(5) Kanye is known for his harsh critics, from music snobs to your mom to multiple Presidents of the United States. This book acknowledges such criticism, and pokes fun at it occasionally by using popular stereotypes to provide comic relief. This said, since said criticism is one of the main inspirations for the making of MBDTF, the author approaches Kanye and his work with a most indifferent point of view, citing sources for all of his claims and keeping his analysis free of bias. At times, the author’s love for the album become very apparent, some sentences glowing with admiration for Ye’s musical prowess. However this mostly serves to highlight the amount of detail and thought put into Twisted Fantasy. Readers interested in finding a ‘clean’ analysis of West’s work and personal life without being bombarded with memes and hateful blog posts can not go wrong with this book.
Matt Neal
(4) The author made a pointed claim early on in the book: Graves had not met or attempted to contact Kanye West or any of the involved parties in the making of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy in order to gain special knowledge on the production of the record. Instead, Graves collects knowledge made publicly available through interviews, blog posts, and of course, the album itself. Graves tells the story of the album’s creation, internal themes, and occurrences in Ye’s life through the eyes (and with the resources) of every regular listener who has been captivated by the record since its release in 2010, albeit with an apparent dedication to decoding every second of the album’s playtime and relating it to the past and present events in American pop culture.
The amount of depth found in the analysis of this album is astounding. Graves breaks down obvious lyrical themes with ease at the beginning of each chapter, but what provides the most insight is his attention to sonic detail and its connections to popular cultural themes that the author believes inspired the LP. For example, the book cites the effect applied to West’s voice in the second track Gorgeous as a reflection of the way Ye feels he speaks to the vast audience of his everyday critics: loud but canned; clear yet distorted. It is in these moments where the book distinguishes itself from the many reviews written about this album, and becomes an in-depth and emotional analysis of how it has seemed to quickly become a modern-day classic.
While the book claims to contain no ‘special knowledge’, it is clear that the facts are very well researched, every interview, tweet and important event (such as a concert or release announcement) described in detail and made to connect to whatever claim is being made.
The book was organized into an individual analysis of each track, in the order of the tracklist that you can see on the back of your jewel case. This helps to provide a sense of progression throughout the book, as Kanye originally sculpted My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy to contain.
(5) Kanye is known for his harsh critics, from music snobs to your mom to multiple Presidents of the United States. This book acknowledges such criticism, and pokes fun at it occasionally by using popular stereotypes to provide comic relief. This said, since said criticism is one of the main inspirations for the making of MBDTF, the author approaches Kanye and his work with a most indifferent point of view, citing sources for all of his claims and keeping his analysis free of bias. At times, the author’s love for the album become very apparent, some sentences glowing with admiration for Ye’s musical prowess. However this mostly serves to highlight the amount of detail and thought put into Twisted Fantasy. Readers interested in finding a ‘clean’ analysis of West’s work and personal life without being bombarded with memes and hateful blog posts can not go wrong with this book.
Matt Neal
April 13, 2022
The author could've gone way deeper in his analysis. He also brought up Kanye's narcissism waaaay too often like pls we get it! Move on!!!!
August 7, 2019
Maybe I expected too much, hoping for more than a book long Pitchfork review written by a human thesaurus. When the author explicitly stated he made no effort to contact anyone involved in the making of this album, I should have known what I was getting into.
September 8, 2019
An overwritten walkthrough of the album. Not much insight a hardcore listener doesn't already have and zero insight into the making of the album. Additionally, I found it annoying that the author's understanding of the words "staccato" and "sample" are simply incorrect.
June 3, 2025
This book annoyed me !! I wanted to find out how Kanye actually made the record and get some context for what was going on in his life during this era, but this was just pages on pages of overwritten rambling interpretations of lyrics and the Runaway mini movie! V disappointing, especially as just before starting this I read another book in this series about Live Through This which took a much more researched and informative approach. The author really laboured his pretentious points about social media and narcissism, and tbh I felt like he was giving narcissist considering the whole book was his personal opinion rather than Ye’s actual process. Anyways I miss the old Kanye fr :-(
May 29, 2022
written kinda pretentiously but what do you expect when you buy a book explaining a kanye album
(also was an esp fun way to relisten)
(also was an esp fun way to relisten)
June 26, 2020
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is Kanye’s masterpiece, his boldest declaration and his grandest project. (Although, personally, I would place The Life of Pablo, Yeezus and Kids See Ghosts above MBDTF in my ranked list). For this reason, I was eager to read Kirk Walker Graves’ analysis on the album.
Graves does a good job at really putting the album into the context of Kanye’s life and why it was so important for that specific moment in time. I do think the preamble to the actual album analysis was a little too long but it gives us a pretty good idea of Kanye and how his identity is in the stitches and fabric of the album.
I especially liked the chapter on Kanye’s epic and emotional track, Runaway, which Graves has an amazing section talking about the power of sampling. It really puts the approach into a whole new perspective stating “Three separate histories are compressed into a sonic pulse, yet this nested independence fosters the creation of a unique living thing, something far greater than its parts”.
He also perfectly and brilliantly describes the distorted and incomprehensible vocal outro of that song as someone who has something important to say but doesn’t have the language to say it.
He sometimes touches on songs placements in the track-list which is a very important factor to me. His explanation of ‘Hell of a Life’ after ‘Runaway’ actually changed my mind on its position in the album.
A negative I have is that this book is overwritten as hell. The prose is way to complex for an album analysis. Extravagant wordplay is perfect for describing music, that’s fine - I love that, but when he is touching on context - the overwritten and poetic prose just seems absurd and try-hard.
Still, I’ve definitely taken something away from this book - a repeat listen of the album will tell how much exactly. I reckon quite a bit.
3.8
(Also, when briefly talking about the POWER section of the ‘Runaway’ short film, he refers to the Michael Jackson head in the parade as Thriller-era when it’s so clearly not. More likely History-era.)
Graves does a good job at really putting the album into the context of Kanye’s life and why it was so important for that specific moment in time. I do think the preamble to the actual album analysis was a little too long but it gives us a pretty good idea of Kanye and how his identity is in the stitches and fabric of the album.
I especially liked the chapter on Kanye’s epic and emotional track, Runaway, which Graves has an amazing section talking about the power of sampling. It really puts the approach into a whole new perspective stating “Three separate histories are compressed into a sonic pulse, yet this nested independence fosters the creation of a unique living thing, something far greater than its parts”.
He also perfectly and brilliantly describes the distorted and incomprehensible vocal outro of that song as someone who has something important to say but doesn’t have the language to say it.
He sometimes touches on songs placements in the track-list which is a very important factor to me. His explanation of ‘Hell of a Life’ after ‘Runaway’ actually changed my mind on its position in the album.
A negative I have is that this book is overwritten as hell. The prose is way to complex for an album analysis. Extravagant wordplay is perfect for describing music, that’s fine - I love that, but when he is touching on context - the overwritten and poetic prose just seems absurd and try-hard.
Still, I’ve definitely taken something away from this book - a repeat listen of the album will tell how much exactly. I reckon quite a bit.
3.8
(Also, when briefly talking about the POWER section of the ‘Runaway’ short film, he refers to the Michael Jackson head in the parade as Thriller-era when it’s so clearly not. More likely History-era.)
February 18, 2018
"I just needed time alone with my own thoughts
Got treasures in my mind but couldn’t open up my own vault
My childlike creativity, purity and honesty
Is honestly being crowded by these grown thoughts
Reality is catching up with me
Taking my inner child, I’m fighting for custody"
If you're gonna write a book about the greatest album of all time, you better do it justice or else Yeezy and I are gonna come after you. The author displays a deep connection with the music and mythos of Kanye, same as me. He analyses the album from the psyche of Kanye's inner child and the genius he is. It is oxymoron of being a grown up kid that best describes Kanye and is paramount in understanding the body of genius that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is.
I still remember the first time I heard this album, when I was 15. I never could understand why I loved this album so much. I had never heard anything by Kanye before, was aloof of his mythos and my friends showed no interest in the album, being submerged into the pop vagaries of the day. Even today when I revisit the album, it reminds me of being in front of a computer in a small room, rapping to every word Yeezy says.
The album has a deep connection with me while growing up and revisiting it 7 years later in all it's glorious details made me feel happy like a child. I feel like I'm Kanye when living, Frank Ocean when sad and trying to be Drake. But like Yeezy said, you can kiss my whole ass.
Got treasures in my mind but couldn’t open up my own vault
My childlike creativity, purity and honesty
Is honestly being crowded by these grown thoughts
Reality is catching up with me
Taking my inner child, I’m fighting for custody"
If you're gonna write a book about the greatest album of all time, you better do it justice or else Yeezy and I are gonna come after you. The author displays a deep connection with the music and mythos of Kanye, same as me. He analyses the album from the psyche of Kanye's inner child and the genius he is. It is oxymoron of being a grown up kid that best describes Kanye and is paramount in understanding the body of genius that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is.
I still remember the first time I heard this album, when I was 15. I never could understand why I loved this album so much. I had never heard anything by Kanye before, was aloof of his mythos and my friends showed no interest in the album, being submerged into the pop vagaries of the day. Even today when I revisit the album, it reminds me of being in front of a computer in a small room, rapping to every word Yeezy says.
The album has a deep connection with me while growing up and revisiting it 7 years later in all it's glorious details made me feel happy like a child. I feel like I'm Kanye when living, Frank Ocean when sad and trying to be Drake. But like Yeezy said, you can kiss my whole ass.
February 5, 2022
Rating this higher than I should. It's hyperbolic, overwrought and fanboyish... but I guess that fits the subject. It's enjoyably passionate and there are plenty of killer passages/lines.
It bothered me a bit when he would describe elements of songs in completely subjective terms, like "it sounds like a transmission coming from interstellar space" - I mean sure yeah, if you say so. I do want more Kanye analysis published, I wish something would come out along the lines of that recent cool-looking book about Kendrick Lamar. I'm glad to have this one on my shelf for a start.
It bothered me a bit when he would describe elements of songs in completely subjective terms, like "it sounds like a transmission coming from interstellar space" - I mean sure yeah, if you say so. I do want more Kanye analysis published, I wish something would come out along the lines of that recent cool-looking book about Kendrick Lamar. I'm glad to have this one on my shelf for a start.
September 23, 2024
really interesting. i love this album, but this book more examines what kanye is saying with this album. ego, obviously. but it's a really interesting read and definitely made me appreciate an already all timer album even more.
June 23, 2021
YEEZY YEEZY WHATS GOOD
February 29, 2020
A good read on the album's context (including both the stakes and social setting for the album and exhaustive detailing of samples used). Analysis is a little overwrought but its not poorly written or argued
June 22, 2014
As a personality Kanye West fascinates me. Personally I think he's the last proper rock star as we know it - excess , narcissism, highly ambitious musical projects and flights into ridiculousness. Not to mention the contradictions in his character. I mean the guy can rap about how great he is and yet he records a highly personal album about his dead mother (the underrated 808 & Heartbreaks)
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is West's mega statement and one of the best albums in the last five years, so I was very eagerly looking forward to see if it's 33 1/3 treatment would give it any justice.
Thankfully Walk Graves volume is a highly informative and entertaining read. Not only is there an in depth discussion about the album itself but he dedicates a good chunk of the book to West's background and his slow climb to the top and how he developed his larger than life persona in the process.
MBDTF is a fascinating album because it is so huge. From the production scale to the lavish samples and it is West airing out his demons as well. Walker Graves manages to explore West's psyche and how it influenced each of the tracks on MBDTF.
I'm secretly hoping that all of Kanye West's albums will get their own 33 1/3 volumes in the future as they have an intricate story to tell but this first step is an amazing one and worth reading.
March 8, 2021
Rarely has an author been so desperate to perform auto-fellatio as Kirk Walker Graves is with this book. It’s bombastic, ridiculously over the top and often strays from the point. In some ways therefore it’s an absolutely perfect accompaniment to MBDTF, which, despite being one of the best albums of the last 20 years, could fairly have those same criticisms levelled against it.
KWK has clearly set out to write what he thinks is a work to match the creative genius of MBDTF, but sadly he hasn’t got the chops to pull it off. The fact that he’s never met or spoken to Kanye or anyone else involved in record isn’t necessarily a hindrance but it would have added some colour and balance if he had.
If you wan to read a more concise, less bombastic and more informative article about MBDTF the check out ‘Project Runaway’ on complex.com (which is referenced in this book). If however you think you’ll love Kirk like Kirk loves Kirk then give this book a try.
KWK has clearly set out to write what he thinks is a work to match the creative genius of MBDTF, but sadly he hasn’t got the chops to pull it off. The fact that he’s never met or spoken to Kanye or anyone else involved in record isn’t necessarily a hindrance but it would have added some colour and balance if he had.
If you wan to read a more concise, less bombastic and more informative article about MBDTF the check out ‘Project Runaway’ on complex.com (which is referenced in this book). If however you think you’ll love Kirk like Kirk loves Kirk then give this book a try.
July 29, 2014
I wanted to be swayed - and it did send me back to the album; I didn't even hate it quite so much but though Graves is a good writer not a lot happens here. That's part of the problem with the album for me, it's loud and colourful but not a lot actually happens. The discussion around social media and today's idea of heroes is interesting but it comes down to the same argument with Kanye - that bold must be better. I don't hear that in anything he's offered after his second album. I still don't. And though I enjoyed parts of this book I couldn't call it a success; one of the weaker entries into this series. Probably not enough time has passed for any serious discussion around this album too - people are still running on hype.
December 17, 2014
Better than most 33 1/3s that I've read recently, possibly because it's less "historical" and there's no "I revisited this album to write this." It's more of an essay about who Kanye is in the context of pop music today and how MBDTF is an expression of that. Because of this, it probably won't age too well so read it soon.
March 3, 2020
I want more. I want to write this in conversations with Graves. I am glad it was he who wrote it.
May 31, 2023
In my experience the 33 1/3 quality is all over the place. I find the selection and unsurprisingly the criticism comes from an rock snob (or indiehead if you will) perspective of what is good, and the criticism follows from there. The album is assumed good, and the criticism extends from that justification to explain why. There are both inversions (Use Your Illusion by Guns N' Roses is bad, and this is why) and exceptions (Drew Daniels' 20 Jazz Funk Greats is actually fantastic). But generally speaking, mixed bag.
That doesn't mean they aren't fun to argue with and boy oh boy you know that's why I picked up this. Plus the schadenfreude of a book on Kanye written right before his open embracement of fascism. On both fronts, it doesn't disappoint.
Full disclosure, even when I liked the guy, I found Kanye's albums to be overrated, especially this one. He's an album artist whose albums are all deeply flawed. And ironically, the Kanye album I find to be his best is the one Kirk Walker Graves here bitches about the most (Yeezus no doubt). MBDTF always struck me as a mess of self pitying that pretends to have grander themes that people are desperate to read into. It helps that the first half is legitimately great, but really it falls apart somewhere during Monster and never fully recovers. Runaway is a bad, no good, solipsistic pity party that for some reason people read as an apology despite that never being mentioned in the song at all. It's just not that deep and not all that enjoyable. And yet, it is criticbait through and through, and there's no denying it was successful in that aspect.
But back to the book. Kirk Walker Graves of course tries to elevate the album to unrealistic ends. His writing is often extremely overwrought ("Day cedes its dominion to the night as shadows lengthen past the point of maximal distortion, severing ties with the realm of the rationale. A kind of opaque fluid washes over the edges of our awareness. Mystery rather than clarity becomes the governing principle") and his conclusions are often at odds with each other (the chapter "Art as Atonement" begins meditating on the idea of what an artist's apology could look like and devolves into a discussion of the evolution of aesthetics without finishing the main idea). Occasionally, Kirk is right on the money (for as pretentious and heavy handed his POWER as Ozymandias reworked metaphor is, I think he makes a salient point). But frequently I clowned or wrote things like "bullshit" in the margin (my copy is very annotated). Yes he does use the G-word. Yes I did put scare quotes around it. Also, relative to other entries, there's not a whole lot of details into the making of the album. Not inherently a negative, but be aware and don't expect much you can't learn beyond WhoSampled.
Anyway, as much as I went in pre-emptively combative, and generally dunked on the whole book, I had fun. Nothing personal, Kirk. It is refreshing to look back at this era with wide eyes and really connect the dots from there to where he is now. Honestly the signs were there. It's unfortunate, and fuck Kanye forever, but it's a good reality check for our culture at large. We were so obsessed with the idea of anti-social self proclaimed gods that we really let our (American) society fall prey to the type. We toasted the douchebags and shockingly, they acted like douchebags.
That doesn't mean they aren't fun to argue with and boy oh boy you know that's why I picked up this. Plus the schadenfreude of a book on Kanye written right before his open embracement of fascism. On both fronts, it doesn't disappoint.
Full disclosure, even when I liked the guy, I found Kanye's albums to be overrated, especially this one. He's an album artist whose albums are all deeply flawed. And ironically, the Kanye album I find to be his best is the one Kirk Walker Graves here bitches about the most (Yeezus no doubt). MBDTF always struck me as a mess of self pitying that pretends to have grander themes that people are desperate to read into. It helps that the first half is legitimately great, but really it falls apart somewhere during Monster and never fully recovers. Runaway is a bad, no good, solipsistic pity party that for some reason people read as an apology despite that never being mentioned in the song at all. It's just not that deep and not all that enjoyable. And yet, it is criticbait through and through, and there's no denying it was successful in that aspect.
But back to the book. Kirk Walker Graves of course tries to elevate the album to unrealistic ends. His writing is often extremely overwrought ("Day cedes its dominion to the night as shadows lengthen past the point of maximal distortion, severing ties with the realm of the rationale. A kind of opaque fluid washes over the edges of our awareness. Mystery rather than clarity becomes the governing principle") and his conclusions are often at odds with each other (the chapter "Art as Atonement" begins meditating on the idea of what an artist's apology could look like and devolves into a discussion of the evolution of aesthetics without finishing the main idea). Occasionally, Kirk is right on the money (for as pretentious and heavy handed his POWER as Ozymandias reworked metaphor is, I think he makes a salient point). But frequently I clowned or wrote things like "bullshit" in the margin (my copy is very annotated). Yes he does use the G-word. Yes I did put scare quotes around it. Also, relative to other entries, there's not a whole lot of details into the making of the album. Not inherently a negative, but be aware and don't expect much you can't learn beyond WhoSampled.
Anyway, as much as I went in pre-emptively combative, and generally dunked on the whole book, I had fun. Nothing personal, Kirk. It is refreshing to look back at this era with wide eyes and really connect the dots from there to where he is now. Honestly the signs were there. It's unfortunate, and fuck Kanye forever, but it's a good reality check for our culture at large. We were so obsessed with the idea of anti-social self proclaimed gods that we really let our (American) society fall prey to the type. We toasted the douchebags and shockingly, they acted like douchebags.
November 11, 2017
It's like a 2.6. I round up because it's not bad, per se. Just a bit forgettable. Perhaps I went in with the wrong expectations. I thought this would focus on the history, process, and public reaction to the album, as much as the album itself. Strangely, the author did exactly that in the last chapter for West's next album, Yeezus.
But not so with the chapter-per-track main body. In it, the author does a close reading of the lyrics... without very frequently listing the lyrics. It's like a theologian who alludes to the Bible but never quotes it because, come on, we all have it memorized, right? Why wouldn't you? Perhaps the idea is that we should be listening along while we read?
But that notion is not expressed, nor is it necessarily possible for all readers in all circumstances. So instead of learning why this album had such a dramatic impact, how it influenced others, why someone needed to write a book about it, we just get one interpretation of some portions of the album, leaning heavily on descriptions of music videos for guidance. If that's what you're into, great.
I thought there were some good insights and I did enjoy revisiting the album. It's a very quick read, so it's not like there's much sunk cost here. But still, it could have been much more memorable.
But not so with the chapter-per-track main body. In it, the author does a close reading of the lyrics... without very frequently listing the lyrics. It's like a theologian who alludes to the Bible but never quotes it because, come on, we all have it memorized, right? Why wouldn't you? Perhaps the idea is that we should be listening along while we read?
But that notion is not expressed, nor is it necessarily possible for all readers in all circumstances. So instead of learning why this album had such a dramatic impact, how it influenced others, why someone needed to write a book about it, we just get one interpretation of some portions of the album, leaning heavily on descriptions of music videos for guidance. If that's what you're into, great.
I thought there were some good insights and I did enjoy revisiting the album. It's a very quick read, so it's not like there's much sunk cost here. But still, it could have been much more memorable.
July 1, 2023
there was a single thought running through my head as i read this, over and over. that thought was “fuck off”. why write a book about an album if you’re not going to write about the music?
the first half of the book is an execrable paean to american self obsession in the style of a 2013 academic, poorly weaving kanye into the authors infantile and facile thoughts on culture. he obfuscates the simplicity of what he’s saying by using every single word in the thesaurus, much to the detriment of his own books readability. luckily this is relatively brief because the halfway point is when he deigns to talk about the actual album.
unfortunately he barely talks about the music. i’m not going to go into depth about each song, but the best example is his writing about “devil in a new dress”, where he completely ignores rick ross blowing kanye out of the water on his own song, instead just.. talking about the music video. the last verse on one of relatively few songs on the album he’s writing about earns a single sentence that says “also rick ross does a verse”. fuck off dude! nobody is making you write this! if you don’t want to write about music, write something else.
horrible book. you’ll get more insight into the album from reading the wikipedia page than by reading this
the first half of the book is an execrable paean to american self obsession in the style of a 2013 academic, poorly weaving kanye into the authors infantile and facile thoughts on culture. he obfuscates the simplicity of what he’s saying by using every single word in the thesaurus, much to the detriment of his own books readability. luckily this is relatively brief because the halfway point is when he deigns to talk about the actual album.
unfortunately he barely talks about the music. i’m not going to go into depth about each song, but the best example is his writing about “devil in a new dress”, where he completely ignores rick ross blowing kanye out of the water on his own song, instead just.. talking about the music video. the last verse on one of relatively few songs on the album he’s writing about earns a single sentence that says “also rick ross does a verse”. fuck off dude! nobody is making you write this! if you don’t want to write about music, write something else.
horrible book. you’ll get more insight into the album from reading the wikipedia page than by reading this
July 16, 2023
I don’t know if “pretentious” is the right word for describing the prose of this book, but the writing style definitely overtook the overarching mission of discussing Kanye’s album with its wordiness and stilted sentence structures.
Besides that, this book gave me a newfound appreciation for the type of thinking that goes into the production of creating an album like MBDTF, and for all of Kanye’s many many (many) faults, those faults do not detract from his contributions to hip-hop, rap, and pop. I do wish Walker fixated more on the actual album than culture references during his track analyses (especially when the book contains an entire first section dedicated to the makeup of West and American culture that brought about the genesis of MBDTF), but every music critic has a specific focus they like to stick with.
I did really like the mention of hip-hop profiting off of the urban Black struggle, ending his review of “Gorgeous” by highlighting West’s question regarding whether hip-hop was a repackaging of slave spirituals and “an encoded new religion” - definitely an astute observation.
Besides that, this book gave me a newfound appreciation for the type of thinking that goes into the production of creating an album like MBDTF, and for all of Kanye’s many many (many) faults, those faults do not detract from his contributions to hip-hop, rap, and pop. I do wish Walker fixated more on the actual album than culture references during his track analyses (especially when the book contains an entire first section dedicated to the makeup of West and American culture that brought about the genesis of MBDTF), but every music critic has a specific focus they like to stick with.
I did really like the mention of hip-hop profiting off of the urban Black struggle, ending his review of “Gorgeous” by highlighting West’s question regarding whether hip-hop was a repackaging of slave spirituals and “an encoded new religion” - definitely an astute observation.
July 11, 2017
La prosa de Walker Graves me parece que llega a un intelectualismo ridículo, por lo menos cuando estamos hablando de un disco pop. No está mal escrito, y no digo que no se pueda hablar seriamente sobre la cultura pop, pero se podría haber trabajado con un acercamiento más coloquial. Cuando apela al lector normal lo hace como "imaginate que estás en el lugar de Kanye" y queda absurdo, horrible. Lo mejor está en la conceptualización general de MBDTF como disco centrado en la rise and fall del ego de Kanye, y cómo toda su discografía previa juega con eso. Lo que es el análisis canción por canción no suma nada. También me parece que la reinvención musical del auto-tune exagerado y el sample maximalism no tiene el reconocimiento que se merece. Pero ¡ey! ¡es un libro de MBDTF! ¡aguante!
April 7, 2020
When this book works, it works brilliantly as Walker Graves expertly analyses MBDTF track by track. Other than that, I felt as though he didn’t have much of a structure. A comparison of Kanye’s music to social media felt unfinished and a concert review of the Yeezus tour felt thrown in.
Also the question of whether such a new album was worthy of a 33 1/3 book was answered by Walker Graves (he said yes, which i do agree with), but then it seemed he felt he had to continually prove this, by making out that MBDTF wasn’t just Kanye’s best album, but the best album ever - giving Kanye credit for his producing work and collating of features, which are both noteworthy, but Kanye is hardly the first.
Also the question of whether such a new album was worthy of a 33 1/3 book was answered by Walker Graves (he said yes, which i do agree with), but then it seemed he felt he had to continually prove this, by making out that MBDTF wasn’t just Kanye’s best album, but the best album ever - giving Kanye credit for his producing work and collating of features, which are both noteworthy, but Kanye is hardly the first.
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