A. NICKI MINAJ - Pink Friday
B. KANYE WEST - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
A.
"Pink Friday" - Buy It
"Pink Friday" - Cop It
Three Tracks from the Album with links to each:
Track 2. Nicki Minaj feat. Eminem - Roman's Revenge
See review below. Lyrically, this is my favorite song on the album, while feverishly the most aggressive. I listened, awed by the vicious Roman character portrayed here. And Eminem, playing himself, proves his upswing is still around.
Track 3. Nicki Minaj - Did It On 'Em
Track 11. Nicki Minaj - Dear Old Nicki
A great track for long-time Nicki fans, the tale of losing her old self in ambition and its success. At first listen, I thought this was an unrequited love song to a boy. Instead it's a first-person confession on record.
Nicki Minaj is known to excel at her wordplay and rhyming. This is her one-two punch, how she obtained the current title belt in female rap. She's warming her way into the top 5 co--ed rap contenders and her place in history is still up for grabs. With a lot of hype going into this debut album, she pulls it off, but does not necessarily exceed the already too-high expectations.
This album around, she proves she can tell a story and stick to the point (a former sore area for her). The chopped up vocals are innovative and catchy. Her three different personalities (Roman Zolanski [the wicked one], Nicki [the story-teller] and Onika [the seminal character]) keep the listener on their toes. Lyrically, there is no competition too great for her. We see this exemplified in "Roman's Revenge" when she goes toe-to-toe with Eminem, where the winner is the audience (no Renegade).
Overall, the instrumentation is tightly knit, never sloppy, but it rarely exceeds contemporary hip-hop's expectations. That said, the background to her vocals are so consistently pleasing throughout that it is far better than the standard. She brings about the best lyricism from all of the featured rap acts (Kanye, will.i.am, Drake, Eminem).
Concerning the female singers who contributed: I felt Rihanna's bit on "Fly" was average while Natasha Bedingfield's input in the last track was boring. Both songs were pulled off by Minaj though. Singing instead of rapping is a new turn for Nicki, but it never fails--just falls flat sometimes. Remember: the auto-tuning should never be tuned out . Keep listening for her shiny gem word-bombs in those overly-poppy millionaire rags. Overall it is a great debut, with average-to-slightly-above instrumentation and singing. Fortunately it will be ranking high on the year-end list because it contains a few of the greatest rap verses ever heard. And the bar's been raised in many ways....
B.
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Buy It
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Cop It
Three Tracks from the Album with links to each:
Track 6. Kanye West feat. Bon Iver, Jay-Z & Nicki Minaj - Monster
If you haven't heard this yet, just download it now. The song requires no explanation other than the featured tracks.
Track 10. Kanye West - Hell of a Life
One of the nastiest beats I've heard Kanye produce, with the frictitious sounds and a great snare roll guaranteed. Lyrically, it gets more nasty than the beat, so if you want to hear about nuns ejaculating and marrying/divorcing a porn star on the same day, this song is yours.
Track 11. Kanye West feat. John Legend & Chris Rock - Blame Game
This song's second verse, with its monstrous voice-transforming, is insidious in the listener's head. After Monster, this track is the one that burrowed most into my brain.
His 5th album blends pop and rap even better than his past attempts. These are some of the best verses we've seen from Kanye, with wound-opening vulnerability (a Chris Rock feature talking dirty to one of Kanye's exes in a misdial, in "Blame Game" [see above]) and grandeur vulgarity ("Make her knees shake, make a priest faint--make a nun cum, make her cremate", from "Hell of a Life" [above]). This album has no homecoming-family love songs. Every song is aptly titled for the album, fitting into his magnum opus: this beautiful dark twisted fantasy. The instrumentation is so futuristic it's hard to call this a recent release. It feels as universal as any all-time classic. I'm eager to watch this album age.
Great Tuesday. Now it's time to go home.
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