@kAnYeWeSt #MBDTF
Alright lets get one thing out of the way, The Source f*cked itself several years back when they started handing down 5 mic awards about as arbitrarily as Chef does Fat Back Awards.  That said, even under the old guard, pre Benzino/ David Mays meltdown, Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy deserves every ounce of that award!

“Many folks wondered what would happen if Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy didn’t receive a “5 Mics” rating from The Source…well I guess we’ll never know. Finally ‘Ye joins the elite club of Hip-Hop legends like Nas, Jay-Z, Notorious B.I.G., Ice Cube, De La Soul and OutKast who have created an album deemed a classic by The Source. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was one of the year’s most anticipated albums and Mr. West delivered ten fold. We recognized the musical mastery. For the full review written by Andreas Hale, pick up the Year-End issue featuring cover boys Rick Ross and Wiz Khalifa on newsstands everywhere, December 14th.”

Yeah I said it.  Yall might be scratching your heads right now because for those of you HN loyalist you know I’ve hated on Kanye for years and probably will continue to do so.  But Kanye West the producer/ artist is a genius and its undeniable.  This album which I admittedly can’t stop listening to like a fiend on crack rock is one of the most well produced work of ART we’ve seen in this era.

Now I’m not going to go all dissecting the album into little bits and doing some silly review but instead tell you to do yourself a favor if you haven’t already and cop it.  Download it, borrow it whatever you gotta do.  If you’re like me incensed by the state of Hip Hop LISTEN TO IT.  If you’re a fan of the new era of Hip Hop, Hip Hop 2.0 as I call it…LISTEN TO IT.  If you’re an artist whose ever “gripped” a mic (and you know what I mean) LISTEN TO IT.  If your fingers ever moved a crossfader, pounded the pads of an MPC or backqued a Technics 1200…LISTEN TO IT.

Its not perfect but you can’t honestly listen to the album and say he didn’t put his heart and soul into it, perhaps even too much.  He allows us a window into his thoughts, which as we already know can be a dangerous proposition giving much credence to the “Beautiful Dark Twisted” title.  Unlike any Hip Hop album since the days of perhaps B.I.G. its just that, an album – a work of complete art that is the sum of all its parts, an appropriately named “Journey.”

Is Kanye whining a little bit about his treatment by the media following his Taylor Swift fiasco? yep.  Does he complain about being emasculated by some chic, presumably Amber Rose, waaaay too much?  Yep.  But that’s the genius that is Kanye. He crafts it in a way that’s entertainment in his pain.  The beats are Kanye….and FRIENDS (thankfully) at their finest and Yeezie put on a PhD caliber clinic on post production.  He left his competitors light years behind in the studio its not funny.

So while The Source still has its head up its ass they did do something right…they listened.  And if you’ve listened as well I’m confident you’ve discovered the same very unfortunate truth for haters like me that we gotta toast to the asshole! Well played Kanye.