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1. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Kanye West (2010)

Hip Hop

For the better part of the past decade, Kanye West has been very near the top of a short list of the most polarizing figures in the world, a place he’s seemed keen to inhabit. He doesn’t make it easy to like him, even for his die-hard fans, which I would still, somewhat cautiously, claim to be. As the years have rolled on, it’s become harder and harder to defend him amidst his nonstop publicity stunts and blatantly off-color remarks. Whether these behaviors are truly to his detriment or whether they’re all part of a scheme to maintain his foothold at the forefront of American pop culture, who’s to say? All press is good press, he’d likely argue.

The debate rages between whether to judge him on the basis of his ludicrous, juvenile antics or solely on the basis of his music. But in today’s world of hyper-connectedness, you obviously can’t very well separate the two. For those who only know him from the headlines, there can be no blame assigned for hating him. Much that he’s done has bordered on indefensible, or at least repulsive to casual observers. He’s made plenty of excuses for his behavior (ranging from laughable to perhaps valid) and has managed to deflect consequences like water off a duck’s back. His music would have to be pretty damn good to offset the amount of negative attention he’s weathered...

Let me be clear, I’m not qualifying the decision to place Kanye at the top of this list. There was never any doubt, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was always going to be number one. Ranking the top 100 albums of the decade was tough, but not because of any uncertainty as to who number one would be. But in the years since its release, praise of Kanye’s music has seemed to have become inextricably tied to an implied endorsement of his behavior, which this is emphatically not. But I digress.

2010-2019 was hip-hop’s decade, a sentiment I’ve asserted before, but it bears repeating. Sitting here in early 2020, there’s really no debate. A large portion of that success is the direct result of Kanye’s impact on the genre. Throughout the 2000s, his albums made big waves. The College Dropout, Late Registration and Graduation were all hugely successful and produced a slew of iconic tracks. 808s & Heartbreak took things in a different direction and showcased Kanye’s daring and willingness to draw from a wide range of influences. While most of the rest of hip-hop was still wearing saggy jeans and chains, Kanye was donning “pink polos and backpacks” and teaming up with Kid Cudi to reinvent the rap wheel. His intention to fundamentally change the game was clear, but it wasn’t until 2010 with the release of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy that his true musical prowess and artistic acumen came into their own.

Following the now infamous 2009 VMA debacle in which he snatched the mic from Taylor Swift in the middle of her acceptance speech, Kanye was facing a level of public ire that was, at that point, a relatively novel thing for him. He retreated into exile in Hawaii and there began work on what would become his magnum opus, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. He employed a highly collaborative system throughout the recording process, with different projects being worked in different rooms by a slew of hand-picked producers throughout the studio. All the while, he would bounce back and forth between them all, adding input and guiding the process to align with his vision. It seemed as though this vaguely organized mania put Kanye in his element, feeding off the energy of so much creative work happening in one place. He hardly slept throughout the recording process, apparently relying on quick-charging 90-minute power naps round the clock, rather than several hours of sleep at night. 

The result of the highly unorthodox process was a stunningly cohesive and painstaking, meticulous album that showcased the full extent of Kanye’s potential. Relying heavily on pianos and string arrangements to undergird most tracks, the resultant sound was Kanye at his most refined. The beats were largely minimal and never overcomplicated, while the baroque influences on the instrumentation conversely made them feel bigger and grander than ever. His trademark vocal sample chop-ups were there, especially on “Power”, whose now-iconic chanted melody has found its way to constant sports arena rotation, à la Freddy Mercury. 

For a rapper whose actual rapping ability had always played second fiddle to his production chops, MBDTF showcased some of Kanye’s best bars to date. There’s a ton of clever wordplay and effortless delivery to match, not only from him but from a Who’s Who contingent of featured artists including Jay-Z (of course), Rick Ross, Kid Cudi, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Pusha T and Bon Iver. The raucous “Monster” brought many of these collaborators together for a fun track upon which Jay and Minaj spit some of their best verses to date. But the standout track, by far, was the 9 minute “Runaway”, which began with a lonely piano refrain before giving way to a lush and dense drum and synth break beat beneath another expertly crafted vocal sample. It’s an evocative track, and one of Kanye’s most honest moments. In it, he acknowledged many of his personality flaws and bad habits while sarcastically saluting the struggle of others “assholes, jerkoffs and douchebags” who are beholden to their less than acceptable tendencies. 

Without a single weak link or misstep, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy cemented Kanye West as hip hop royalty and far exceeded most peoples’ expectations of what his maniacal vision was capable of bringing to fruition. In many ways, the album was a moment of vindication, and a definitive statement that he was, in fact, a musical genius, rather than a clown with a keen ear for beats. It changed the game and expanded the perception of what hip hop can be. A forward thinking artist like Childish Gambino likely wouldn’t exist without MBDTF. Modern rap supergroup Brockhampton would likely never have had the audacity to push the bounds of convention as they did so effectively over the past few years without the blueprint Kanye created. The true impact of the album simply can’t be overstated. Perhaps its true brilliance was obvious to no one more so than Kanye himself and that vindication resulted in a hyperinflation of his already burgeoning ego. But without that ego, we wouldn’t have gotten follow-up masterpieces like Yeezus or The Life of Pablo. For all his faults, and there are many, the fact is, we need artists like Kanye West, the figureheads for true creators that are utterly unfazed by the scrutiny that comes with being at the vanguard of artistic expression and musical evolution. 

*image; cover art for the album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West