All Kanye West has to do at this point to cement his place in the hip hop pantheon is star in a lame action movie. Having produced some gigantic rap hits and taken home two Grammys for his debut album The College Dropout, millions of fans will eat up every beat he drops. Unfortunately, while there are enough great singles on Late Registration to pay the bills for a few years more, much of the album is bogged down by half-baked musical indulgences and sub-par lyrics.
Kanye has always been a better producer than MC, but he brings in an all-star roster of guests to balance out his skills. The fantastic remix of lead single “Diamonds from Sierra Leone” pulls Jay-Z out of “retirement,” and the horn-blasting anthem “Touch the Sky” with Lupe Fiasco is just waiting to blow up MTV. “Drive Slow” even brings in Paul Wall to prove that the cough syrup-addled drawl of Houston hip hop is actually worth something. When Kanye is left on his own to rhyme, however, his preening arrogance and clumsy cadence tend to undermine the great beats and murder the mediocre ones.
While there are still plenty of hyperactive soul strings, horn blasts and party ready drum progamming, tracks like “Celebration” and “Addiction” suffer from irritating vocal samples and co-producer Jon Brion’s woozy keyboard burbles. “Gone” takes a good beat and drags it out to its death while even the silver-tongued Nas can’t help “We Major” gasp through its seven and a half minutes.
Fans of The College Dropout will find a lot to like here, but most listeners would be better off picking up Common’s stellar Be from earlier this summer to see how much better Kanye is when he stays in the producer’s chair. This Late Registration is reason enough to get your classes through the dean’s office on time this week.
