Photo courtesy of NRK P3, Flickr
Kanye West has always been notoriously unpunctual. Throughout his career, he has promised fans he would release a seemingly endless string of music, teasing the tracks that never actually manifests into a published record. Whether it be his short-lived idea for a sequel to 2016’s “The Life of Pablo” album, entitled “Turbo GrafX 16,” or creating the entire concept for a “Yeezus” sequel, called “Yandhi”, Kanye has kept fans at the edge of their seats for new content for quite some time now. Today, fans have a wide collection of tid-bits of tracks that now only exists in a string of unfinished song leaks haphazardly posted across the internet.
When Kim Kardashian posted in early September that her husband would be releasing a new album, this time entitled Jesus Is King, the overall reaction from fans was a mixture of pure happiness and boundless questions for the man who hasn’t stuck to a release date in years. Sure enough, when September 27th came around, there was no album loaded on any streaming services. Fans, disappointed but resigned to their defeat, figured that Jesus Is King would simply join the rest of West’s unreleased works in a vault, never to be shared with the world again.
However, only a few hours after finishing his weekly “Sunday Service” show in Detroit on Friday, a cryptic tweet was sent out by the city’s historic Fox Theatre: there would be a special movie release that night held by West. Tickets were naturally gone almost immediately, and fans began lining up outside the venue.
During the show, West informed fans that not only will the album be released officially that weekend, but that he will be releasing an accompanying Imax film, which will be in theaters October 25.
The album itself is a mixture of all the elements that makes West inherently himself. From soaring gospel samples to hard hitting bass lines, it seems to be a cornucopia of Kanye-isms. The religious backbone of the entire record is maintained song to song, and truly evokes the feeling of spirituality.
Through references to Chick-Fil-A, rebuking the devil, and carefully placed choral arrangements, West has created something that no artist really has had before, an album about God that can be fully palatable and charted by the mainstream music world.
Kanye has taken a music that exists only in the world of some and created something that can be interpreted as spiritual for all.
Although a handful of early versions of songs for this album have already leaked online, the final versions of these songs will see numerous updates, some of which bring titans of music together in a never-before seen fashion.
On the final song of the album, previously leaked online under the name “Chakras,” West revamps and enlists the help of famed trumpeter Kenny G, as well as reuniting storied rap duo Clipse.
The road to “Jesus Is King” is one laced with potholes and cracks, a project that many very well believed would never come to fruition, and yet somehow still despite all the controversy and hold-outs, West manages to deliver an album for the ages.
cbarilla@ramapo.edu
