The Life of Pablo

“I downloaded the 30-day trial of Tidal just to get the album.”This is, by far, the most talked-about aspect of The Life Of Pablo, Kanye West’s eighth studio album, and it is exactly how our night began. Drunk, Sober, and High sat on an L-shaped couch ready to absorb all that is Kanye West, his ego, and his long-awaited new music. Oh, and let the record show that Drunk showed up four shots in, Sober thinks that she’s a legit-enough Kanye fan to comment on his music without inebriation, and High smoked a well-rolled joint as we went from song to song. Fine. He pregamed a little bit too, so you can consider him slightly cross-faded. The smartest thing Kanye ever did was put "Ultralight Beam" as the first song on the album. We unanimously agreed that this is the best song on the album, High insisted that Chance the Rapper’s verse is the best verse on the album, and Sober disagreed because, "damn, there’s nothing as nice as the warm vocals of gospel choir" (which come in at the chorus). We sorta cruised through the rest of the album, which seems like it was meant to be listened to in full. Each song is so different, but has a million little songs inside of it. It’s a collage, and it works. That takes us through “Father Stretch My Hands” (Parts 1 and 2), and before we know it, we’re at the infamous “Famous.” And we can’t talk about "Famous" without talking about the misogynistic undergirding of Kanye West versus Taylor Swift, and that’s a very interesting thing to talk about when you’re in varying states of, uh, consciousness. Sober poses the questions: How does Kim feel about the fact that her husband wants to f*** Taylor Swift? And why would Rihanna agree to be on this song? High poses the statement: I love the part that remixes “Bam Bam” by Sister Nancy.Drunk goes: His misogyny is getting pretty bad… We all agree it’s getting worse and it isn’t very cool. And then there’s “Waves,” which we all thought was mostly only good because of Chris Brown, but UGH, CHRIS BROWN, YOU ARE SO PROBLEMATIC. High says: This is honestly one of my favorite songs on the album – it’s so soulful in a My Twisted Dark Fantasy kind of way but the use of a pop feature like Chris Brown and the simple lyrics make it feel like it should be a radio hit. The way Chris Brown sings “You set the night on fire” kinda gives me chills. High thought the best songs on the album were the ones that sounded like My Dark Twisted Fantasy, though that is his favorite Kanye album, so that may or may not devalue his opinion. (That’s Sober’s opinion.) However, he did make a good point in that this album, as a whole, is a really interesting mixture of every genre and style Kanye’s played around with thus far, from The College Dropout to Yeezus. Drunk laughs when we get to “I Love Kanye.” “It’s so self-aware,” she says. Then, we had the best kind of conversation there is to have about Kanye and Kim, especially at different levels and types of inebriation: who made who famous?Sober thinks Kanye changed the Kardashians for the better. Have you SEEN the way they used to dress? Drunk and High think it’s the other way around. Maybe this is not a coincidence. “This is going to sound crazy,” Drunk begins, “but I sort of think that Kanye and Kim’s relationship is…” “A conspiracy?” we ask. “Yeah…” she says. “I feel like they’re just really good friends.”High promptly goes off. He’s thought long and hard about this and although he doesn’t quite have present a coherent response to the conspiracy theory, his ramblings do bring up a couple interesting points. “I don’t know if I necessarily buy that,” he begins, “but I do believe that he’s using the Kardashian brand to bring his music into the mainstream culture in a way that it couldn’t have been before. Just think about, like, what Kylie and Kendall are doing in fashion, in technology with their apps, they’re trying to revolution the concept of a socialite in the twenty-first century and Kanye is using–he’s building upon their empire and simultaneously infusing it and grounding it in hip-hop culture. It’s such a reciprocal relationship, you know? Kanye validates their clan’s position as celebrities and they expand his audience to the people who buy Kylie’s Lip Kit.”This all goes to show that, even though the album isn’t shit but isn’t quite radio-material either, we are still able to appreciate it because Kanye always makes a work of art. So, what Kanye has become, or is becoming, is something much bigger than his music. Alas, we are back at a conversation about his fame, which is really a conversation about nothing–nothing tangible, at least. Can you tell that I’m the sober one? Image via.