12/2/2023 0 Comments Cudi montage producer![]() Now here comes West, whose rollout of Ye was punctured by his courting of America’s grim forces and offensive commentary on the history of slavery. Kali trampled Shiva while wearing a skirt of human arms and severed heads. Zeus chained Prometheus to a rock to have his liver pecked out. Kids See Ghosts, West’s joint project with Kid Cudi, has arrived just one week on from his polarising, half-baked eighth solo album Ye – the worst record in his previously unimpeachable catalogue. But seven days after unveiling his own imperfect creation, self-proclaimed god Kanye West has had no time for slumber. This, though, is the sound of two artists looking back over the vast distance they’ve travelled so far.Christian scripture teaches that on the seventh day, God looked over the world, nodded to himself in satisfaction and settled down for a hard-earned rest. On ‘Reborn’ – which rides a brilliant, brittle, staccato beat – the duo instructs us to “ keep moving forward”. It sounds, suitably, ghostly and supernatural – a brief glimpse into another world. The message is clear: it’s okay to not feel okay.Ī seven-track album (it’s Kanye’s current obsession both ‘ye’ and ‘Daytona’ ran to the same length) can hardly help but feel slight, though the brevity actually suits this collaborative record. Here it sounds defiant: “Guess what, baby? I feel freeee!” Elsewhere on the album, lyrics allude to “ pain” and being “ lost”. On the original, emo rapper 070 Shake belts out the line “And nothing hurts any more / I feel kind of free” in the manner of a vintage soul singer there is jubilant release. ![]() Another stand-out forms the chorus of ‘Freee (Ghost Town Pt.2’), which recycles a moment from the ‘ye’ track ‘Ghost Town’. ![]() There’s a call-and-response between the lyrics “ Lord shine your light on me” and backing vocals that implore, “ Stay strong”, while a calming wash of synth ebbs away in the background. The stand-out moment of ‘Kids See Ghosts’ occurs just past the mid-way point of the finale track, ‘Cudi Montage’. They have helped to shape a world in which rappers can lay bare their vulnerabilities and address issues such as mental health – a world that gave us Vic Mensa’s 2017 debut and saw Jay-Z return with ‘4.44’, a bald mea culpa that wilfully exposed his fragile masculinity – and here they unite to issue an almost uniquely meditative, self-accepting album. This is the sound of Kanye and Cudi catching up with themselves. It’s characterised by the ethereal, low-key beats and off-kilter, barely in-tune singing that have been Cudi’s trademark since his emotional 2008 mixtape ‘A Kid Named Cudi’ influenced Kanye’s introspective and ice-cold ‘808s & Heartbreak’, which in turn influenced the likes of Drake and The Weeknd. The former artist will take the lion’s share of the headlines around the project, given that it’s the third release he’s been deeply involved with this month – there was, of course, Kanye’s solo record, ‘ye’, and the Pusha T album ‘Daytona’, which he produced – but, actually, this is Cudi’s album through and through. There is a calmness to the debut album from Kids Sees Ghosts, the new collaboration between Kanye West and Cleveland, Ohio, rapper Kid Cudi.
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