Kanye West/Awesome Music

I'm all happy for you, and I'mma let you finish, but I just wanted to say that Kanye West has some of the best music of all time!

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• "Stronger", sampling from Daft Punk and interpolating scenes from the Anime smash movie Akira in the video. (It helps that he's an large Anime and Japan fan, of course - with his swords and listening party to Graduation including HENTAI)
  • Not just Akira; the scenes in the "Stronger" music video are uncannily similar to the song's segment in Interstella 5555, which "tells" its story entirely through the music of Daft Punk.
  • The live version at the 2009 Grammy award, where Daft Punk actually being present was a surprise three minutes into a four-minute number, may be his greatest Crowning Moment of Awesome on stage.
• Earlier on, "Jesus Walks" and "Through the Wire".
  • "Flashing Lights" from the Graduation album is also pretty good. It's also on the Grand Theft Auto IV soundtrack.
• The entirety of Graduation, but Your Mileage May Vary. But probably not by that much as many of his fans feel it's his best album followed VERY closely by Late Registration
• Most critics however give the honor to The College Dropout, which was named the best album of the decade by a few publications (including Entertainment Weekly) and made countless other "best albums" lists.
• The whole point of the Glow In The Dark Tour was to create one of these every night, by all accounts he (with the help of Lupe Fiasco, N.E.R.D. and Rihanna) succeeded.
• As far as lyrics go, most of Kanye's songs (especially the singles from his first three albums) have one particular line that features such a random metaphor or corny play on words that it sticks in your head and makes you think, "Only Kanye..." Listed here until we get a Crowning Music of Funny page:
  • From "Good Life": "Have you ever popped champagne on a plane, while gettin' some brain / Whipped it out, she said 'I never seen "Snakes on a Plane."'"
  • From "Monster": "Have you ever had sex with a pharaoh? / I put the pussy in a sarcophagus!" See, it's funny because the Egyptians preserved their cats after death...
  • And of course, from "Slow Jamz": "She got a light-skinned friend, look like Michael Jackson / Got a dark-skinned friend look like Michael Jackson..."
  • From "Flashing Lights": "I'm just saying, Hey Mona Lisa, come home you know you can't Rome without Caesar"
  • These lines from "The Glory": "So yeah, at the Grammy's I went Ultra-Travolta/Yeah, that tuxedo might'a been a little guido/But with my ego, I could stand there in a speedo/And be looked at like a fuckin' hero"
  • From the "Get By" remix with a whole collection of Brooklyn's finest MC's, he starts his verse with "It's something about that Nina Simone piano flow, it's like a Michaelangelo painted a portrait of Maya Angelou"
• "Child Rebel Soldier". "Don't Stop!" The beat already kills...and then the horns come in. AND IT'S FREE.
  • Another free song "Christian Dior Denim Flow" is equally awesome, and ends with a killer Kid Cudi verse and a minute-long guitar solo.
    • Those two tracks mentioned above are also part of Kanye's "G.O.O.D. Fridays" initiative, which is him releasing a brand spanking new song every friday, and all of which have been completely awesome.
• Basically, the ENTIRETY of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
  • "Power" certainly qualifies. Wall-to-wall production with guitars, sirens, a women's choir, earth-shaking bass, and some of Kanye's best rhymes yet. Dwele sings a verse, and it samples "21st Century Schizoid Man"? Not to mention the cover art.
  • A snippet of "All of the Lights" featuring Drake was leaked, which sounds like a marching band's dream. EPIC. Then, in the premiere of his film Runaway, the song appeared without Drake, but included the chorus sung by Rihanna. STILL EPIC. And the final version? Five minutes long, but featuring vocals from not one, not two, but 11 guest artists, including Elton John - I repeat: ELTON FUCKIN' JOHN - who also provides piano throughout the song and the equally incredible orchestral interlude which precedes it. Amazing.
    • And now there's the remix, with Lil Wayne, Kanye's protege Big Sean, and Drake, who gets his vengance after being cut from the original version.
  • Also off of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is "Runaway", his 9 minute melancholy epic devoted almost entirely to making toasts to the "douchebags" and "jerk-offs". It shouldn't work, but it does.
  • "Devil In A New Dress," which was one of Kanye's 'G.O.O.D. Fridays' projects, extends the awesome that it already has with epic guitar wailing, sweet piano melodies, and an even sweeter verse by Rick Ross.
    • GETTIN' 2PAC MONEY, TWICE OVER!
  • If this ^{[dead link]} is indicative of the type of music we're gonna get off of Watch The Throne, his collaboration album with Jay Z, he's not gonna lose any steam from My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy any time soon.
  • This has to be the best Watch The Throne track, and up there as one of the catchiest things Kanye's ever done.
  • How have we come this far and not mentioned "Blame Game"?
  • The beautiful "Lost In The World"? It begins with a quiet and emotional sample of "Woods" by Bon Iver that builds into a glorious and thundering crescendo of African drums, chanting and church choir. Overall it is an emotional love song, a hate song, a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming, a Tear Jerker, and it is GLORIOUS.

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OF ALL TIME!