While brilliant at times, ('Born 2 Live'/'Point O Viewz'), on occasions the fairly raw boom bap beats just don't excel quite enough ('Time's Up'/'No Main Topic') to grade this with the absolute best of the best. And while O.C. can rap, he doesn't have that distinctiveness in his voice that most artists do in the albums I consider to be toward the top of the class. I think this shows in that while I've listened to this a few times, I haven't really paid much attention to the lyrics at all. Despite the mostly negative review (it's been praised enough I guess), as the rating suggests I still highly recommended this, but not enough tracks blow my mind to grade this as a pure classic. Best Tracks: Word...Life, O-Zone, Born 2 Live, Point O Viewz, Ga Head, Born 2 Live (remix)

An interesting album which for me never really gets going until the songs in the middle, and like College Dropout, it finishes better than it begins. The first few tracks are nice but nothing excellent with Gold Digger only really getting interesting for me about 2:40 into it when we get that funky change up in the beat. From 'Crack Music' though my enjoyment increases, and then we see a couple of tracks in 'Roses' and 'Bring Me Down' that to me feel a lil like some of the long songs we'd see years later on Fantasy. Then with the thirteenth track we get a song which rivals Jesus Walks for Kanye's best single. Then 'We Major', 'Gone' and the international bonus track 'We Can Make It Better' are late stand outs with great production and features. It is maybe a tad less consistent as his debut, but the best stuff is still some of the best hip hop from this decade with some great beats, and the kind of stuff I wish he'd get back to producing. Best Tracks: Crack Music, Diamonds (Remix), We Major, Gone, Diamonds, We Can Make It Better.

I thought about giving this album a lower rating, but then I thought that that would be unfair because if it was from any other artist I would probably hand out 4 stars or more. Talk about great expectations. In comparison to his previous albums, track for track I'd say it's the most reliable Kanye album. I find that there are one or two skippable tracks on his past two, (however this has the least amount of tracks). No pointless skits also help the album flow better. In saying this though, it doesn't have the real standouts like 'Jesus Walks' and 'Diamonds From Sierra Leone' to name a couple from his previous albums. While Kanye is not the best rapper and the subject matter is less enthralling than before, he has clever wordplay and the production is still mostly great and diverse as we've come to expect from Kanye. A very different record than before, but most Kanye fans should enjoy it. Best Tracks: Good Morning, I Wonder, Flashing Lights, Barry Bonds, The Glory

1 No Church in the Wild (feat. Frank Ocean) ★★★☆ Pretty likeable opening beat and verse from Jay, marred by Kanye singing over autotune, and never recovers. 2 Light Off (feat. Beyoncé) ★★☆ Not feeling this one too much, again ruined more so by Kanye singing. "You can't sing bro". The worst track here 3 Niggas in Paris ★★★☆ A hard beat for sure. Not bad, not great. The choir change up that occurs at about three minutes is enjoyable that leads into Otis. 4 Otis (feat. Otis Redding) ★★★ I feel I could've really like this one, but there is a gross overuse of the sample, it's overpowering and becomes annoying. 5 Gotta Have It ★★★ Again the sample in the hook is annoying, otherwise it's a solid tune. 6 New Day ★★★★ The best track of the opening half a dozen. A nice soulful emotional beat. 7 That's My Bitch ★★★★☆ Finally a real banger. Good variety from the verses to the hook. Southern-influenced and funky. 8 Welcome to the Jungle ★★★☆ I'm not surprised Swizz Beatz produced this, the fast keys are very him, and perhaps become a tad monotonous. Fairly solid though. 9 Who's Gon Stop Me? ★★★ Okay... 10 Murder to Excellence ★★★★☆/★★★☆ Swizz provides another solid beat. Again Kanye is singing on the hook..... One of the better tracks though, talking about the African-American murder rate. Should have been longer../The track then changes to Excellence with Jay rapping about black achievement 11 Made in America (feat. Frank Ocean) ★★★★ I don't know why Jay-Z needs to be "egghing" after every bar, it gets on my nerves, but nevertheless, this is one of the strongest tunes, with Kanye and Jay rapping about their rise to fame. Frank Ocean provides good vocals. 12 Why I Love You (feat. Mr Hudson) ★★★☆ Solid... 13 Illest Motherfucker Alive ★★★★☆ I'm not feeling the first three minutes, not much is happening, but the rest of it is head boppin' stuff. A more kind of simple hard hip hop tune. Lacking the subject matter but probably the best banger here. 14 H•A•M ★★★★ A definite grower from when I first heard this. 15 Primetime ★★★☆ 16 The Joy (feat. Curtis Mayfield) ★★★ A bit boring, particular on the hook, lacks that extra punch. Overall after a slow start, the album improves with some tracks to go back to, and this isn't too far from a 3.5/5. However, many just lack that something extra to take it to the next level, or, there is something I don't like about them. As you can see above, about four tracks annoy in some way. If I could give some advice to Kanye before his next album, it's stop singing and overusing samples and I'll love you again.

Overall, this is not as bad as I expected it to be as I didn't enjoy the first couple of singles I heard from this. There are some tracks I like, but more that I don't, whereas I have found his past three albums to be fairly easy to play from beginning to end. This isn't something that I will play in the future. The biggest problem is that you have a man singing, who cannot, autotune or not, making for a number of boring songs. Enjoyable: Welcome to Heartbreak, Amazing, Streetlights Okay: Say You Will, Paranoid, See You in My Nightmares, Coldest Winter Bad: Heartless, Love Lockdown, Robocop, Bad News, Pinocchio Story