The axe cut off his limbs, forced him to trade in flesh and blood for cold, hard, metal, and eventually caused him to lose his heart. 808s & Heartbreak, an Album by Kanye West. Many serious musicians didn’t respect the machine because of its artificial sounds, and the aforementioned transistors made an already unpopular machine impossible to produce after advances in semiconductor technology. All of those will centre on opinion. In the film version of The Wizard of Oz, the Wizard eventually tells the Tin Man’s wish for a new heart by saying “You want a heart. //, Sorry, we have to make sure you're a human before we can show you this page. After a chance meeting at a Virgin Megastore in 2004, West called on Cudi to reference hooks for Jay-Z. It’s easy to draw a direct through line from 808s & Heartbreak to one of 2018’s biggest hits, Juice WRLD’s emo, heartbreak anthem “Lucid Dreams.” Juice WRLD’s album, Goodbye & Good Riddance, similarly deals with life after a breakup. If 808s and Heartbreak was the controversial result of Kanye’s sorrows, Yeezus would be the product of his frustration. The album opens with “Say You Will”, a slow and meandering track centered around a beeping synth loop, not unlike the sound of a heart monitor. Similarly on 808s & Heartbreak, at his numbest, most depressed, moment, Kanye was able draw out real emotion from that drum machine, an Auto-Tune filter, and his own life to create a blueprint artists continue to follow to this day. Released 24 November 2008 on Roc-A-Fella (catalog no. The TR-808 became so popular decades after its initial run, despite the artificial nature of its sounds, because it required ingenuity to coax anything that approximated a real feeling from it. saginaw. On 808s, however Kanye is the one drowning, with lost loves stepping past his flailing hands leaving him to wallow in deep, suffocating sadness. Two devastating personal events – … It’s easy to see what his advisors were trying to protect. Similarly, at a 2008 press conference to promote his then-new album 808s & Heartbreak, Kanye West described the inspiration for the album as “suffering multitude losses at the same time—it’s like losing an arm and a leg and having to find a way to keep walking through it.” In the months leading up to 808s, Kanye experienced the dissolution of a six-year relationship with his then fiancée Alexis Phifer and, most tragic of all, the death of his mother Donda West following a cosmetic surgery procedure. To the point where it’s almost weird. Though the 1939 film adaptation is better known, in the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz we learn that the Tin Man character was once a human lumberjack. “808s” turns 10 on Saturday, but critics certainly haven’t waited for the album’s anniversary to hail it a classic. Kanye West Embraced Trump While Eminem Dissed Him—They Both Alienated Fans, Meet Ant Clemons, The Mysterious Feature On Kanye West’s “All Mine”, How “Type Beats” Have Changed Hip-Hop Production, stepping far outside of their comfort zones. Both Common’s Electric Circus and Yasiin Bey’s The New Danger were were met with mixed reviews and commercial indifference. Yeezus and My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy are sonically different and groundbreaking in their own ways. Without 808s & Heartbreak, we may never have known the robotic trap of Travis Scott or the sad crooning of Drake. It’s no wonder, Juice cites 808s as his favorite album of all time. In various spots across 808s & Heartbreak, the constant flutter of West's processed voice is enlivened by the disarming manner in which despair and dejection are conveyed. Both wildly popular and misunderstood in the moment, 808s inspired a legion of artists that grew up in its wake. With Kanye’s personal tragedies and new collaborators setting the direction of the production and content, 808s could not have been more different than Graduation in both tone and subject matter. Kanye has a reputation for being self-obsessed, but 808s & Heartbreak takes almost a step past it being endearing, when it comes to his discussion of relationships and love lost. It was also Kanye’s breakout album as an actual artist, not just the rapper from Chicago that made his first 3 records and rocked a teddy bear and Bapes. Kanye’s collaboration with T-Pain would help inspire 808s & Heartbreak, and the rapper turned singer would help coach West on how to use Auto-Tune during the recording process. With this, 808s provide aural glimpses and moments of heartbreak that cannot be forgotten—they are plain in sight, harmfully—and situate sexual violence as a terrain that demands a response that is not invested in prior injured states. But I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Kanye has chosen this moment to remind the world that 808s and Heartbreak exists. Even with all of the collaborations, Kanye’s ability to execute and realize his singular vision, forged from personal tragedy and heartache, is a triumph in and of itself. The album is really uneven and has innovative moments and plain boring moments. It led to the unrealistic percussion that came out of it—kicks that reverberated too loudly and too long, cymbals that sounded like laser blasts from sci-fi films, tinny snares. The Wicked Witch of the West put a spell on his axe to keep him from marrying his true love. Hearts will never be practical until they can be made unbreakable.” But broken hearts have always been practical in one regard—their consistent ability to inspire art. 1593 Followers. According to one of the producers Miykal Snoddy, 808s & Heartbreak really showcased West’s talent as an artist; the project sparked Lil Wayne’s Rebirth album that dropped in 2010 and created a lane for Drake. Rated #51 in the best albums of 2008, and #5638 of all-time album.. The 808s, combined with liberal use of autotune across the album’s twelve tracks, makes for a lonely and melancholic reflection on death, isolation, fame, and, of course, heartbreak. Released in 1980, the Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer was one of the first programmable drum machines, allowing users to create their own drum patterns as opposed to using presets. On the album’s simplest, and most emotional song, “Coldest Winter”—which samples lyrics from Tears for Fears 1983 song “Memories Fade”—he wonders aloud: In promoting the album, Kanye cited Phil Collins as a source of inspiration, and it’s evident in the crunchy, synthetic, drums, and more specifically Collin’s hit single “In The Air Tonight,” where he tells an ex-lover that he wouldn’t help them if he saw them drowning. Not to mention, y'all wanna say Kanye birthed Drake but So Far Gone only came out a couple months after 808s and sonically (outside of "Say What's Real") sounds a lot more like Lil Wayne and 90s/2000s R&B than 808s. 808s and Heartbreak was Kanye West's first real attempt at a concept album. There's true moments of genius, then there are moments of looking through the archives and putting shit together," he said. According to Kanye, some people even advised him to do the album under a different name. So all of that underpinned how much of an artistic risk 808s was at the time of its release. While on his meandering search for a new heart, he began to carry a different kind of baggage, even managing to find his own personal Wizard of Oz in Donald Trump years later—a feckless imposter with nothing to offer but bluster and theatrics. The sounds, especially that unreasonably loud bass, became staples in hip-hop, electronic, R&B, and house in the ensuing decades. The album’s immediate impact was felt the very next year as Drake and Kid Cudi cemented their status as newfound rap stars. A full decade later, it’s hard to imagine acts like Trippie Redd, Post Malone, and A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie or even trap superheroes like Young Thug and Future, without Kanye’s 2008 album. He ends the song taunting her by calling her a “spoiled little LA girl.” On “Robocop,” he compares a woman to the sadistic fan from Stephen King’s Misery. Maybe that’s why so many young artists connected with the album in their formative years. If we regard Kanye West as a genius (and by all rights we should), 808s is the album that cements that legacy. We see Kanye West in a much more emotional and insecure yet simultaneously egotistical position, after the death of his mother and his public breakup with Amber Rose Mr West is in a very insecure position in his life. Less than a year after 808s’ release, Kanye’s Roc-A-Fella big brother Jay-Z would attempt to send the pitch-polishing software to an early grave with “D.O.A. 808s & Heartbreak is the fourth studio album by American producer and vocalist Kanye West.It was released on November 24, 2008, by Def Jam Recordings and Roc-A-Fella Records.West recorded the album during September and October 2008 at Glenwood Studios in Burbank, California and Avex Recording Studio in Honolulu, Hawaii, with the help of producers No I.D., Jeff Bhasker, and others. This article has the numbers to prove just how genius and dangerous it truly was. Follow @genius on Twitter for updates According to Kanye, some people even advised him to do the album under a different name. Graduation was the culmination of Kanye’s journey from underdog to juggernaut. Bangers by Mitch. Most notably, Kid Cudi’s signature hums and general sense of melancholy loomed largely over 808s and helped Mr. Solo Dolo eventually launch his own career. All of the heartbreak on the album is someone else’s fault. B0012198-02; CD). He changed up his style for 808s and Heartbreak, and has been doing the same with every album since. The relatively low price and faulty transistors contributed to the machine’s unique sound. Mature and minimal, but deceptively complex, 808s & Heartbreak found Kanye enlisting his usual collaborators (Tony Williams, Malik Yusef, Consequence), while adding new voices like Kid Cudi, Mr. Hudson and Esthero to the fold. In the decade since the album’s release, there have been very few traces of the smiling, Louis-Vuitton-backpack-clad kid from the Chi who reminded the world that you don’t always need to have street cred to have an authentic hip-hop career. In the previous year, West had just reached his commercial pinnacle. (Death Of Autotune).” Even though Jay was ultimately unsuccessful, there remained as a sizable contingent of traditionalists growing fed up with how many artists were using Auto-Tune as a crutch, not a tool. 808s & Heartbreak was their first collaboration, and likely the most memorable. Kanye’s personal loss was the music world’s gain, but here’s hoping that one day he will be made whole again. Even when 808s & Heartbreak isn’t emotionally mature, it remains emotionally honest. Another big difference between the 808 and other machines was that it was analog, which means it produced artificial sounds with hardware as opposed to digital, pre-recorded, realistic drum sounds. He’s mostly wallowing in his own sadness. To talk about 808s & Heartbreak, you have to first talk about the aforementioned TR-808. Nine years ago today (Nov. 24), Kanye West released his groundbreaking "808s & Heartbreak" singing album, which was met with polarizing backlash at the time. In addition to the growing anti Auto-Tune sentiment, some of ’Ye’s contemporaries struggled with experimental albums earlier that decade. 2008 Preview Editors’ Notes Kanye turns unbearable pain into haunted, stark electro-pop on this daring album, embracing electronic chill and ‘80s New Wave to express his suffering and isolation. I loved this album back in 2008 but ,compared to West's subsequent albums, "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" and "Yeezus", this album is ordinary and seems designed for radio. This was the album that followed the trilogy College Dropout, Late Registration and Graduated. This week marks the 10 year anniversary of Kanye’s most ambitious album. The impact it has had on both genres is staggering. The genius of 808s and heartbreak. He triumphed over 50 Cent in their manufactured sales battle with his third album, Graduation, which sold just under one million copies in its first week of release. The album is more navel diving then navel gazing. In a 2013 interview with the New York Times, Kanye claimed the album was “super-polarizing and redefined the sound of radio.”. The album’s opener “Say You Will” features eerie synths, and intermittent keys, but the literal pulse of the song is the bleep of a heart monitor throughout. It can be observed in the output of four of the biggest artists of the moment, Future, Travi$ Scott, Drake and The Weeknd. West pared down the bombastic maximalism of Graduation to, at times, the most basic sounds imaginable. See a recent post on Tumblr from @goddamnkrazy about 808s and heartbreak. The pitch-correcting software, which makes humans sound like highly emotive … With stark production and sung vocals, ‘808s & Heartbreak’ found Kanye West bearing his soul and paving the way for The Weeknd and Drake. In addition to the TR-808, the vocal plug-in Auto-Tune played a huge role in the album’s innovative sound. 808’s & Heartbreak helped me be able to express myself more and speak about my emotions in a way I had never done before. Love Lockdown and Blood on the Leaves, headliners from 808’s and Yeezus respectively, share some profound differences in Kanye’s perspective. In addition to T-Pain’s help with vocals, Kanye worked with multiple writers on each song. However, in the early 1980s, the 808 was a commercial failure. But all of those quirks helped bring about the 808’s future ubiquity in hip-hop music. Please enable Cookies and reload the page. 808s and Heartbreak is an R&B album performed by a hip-hop artist. While other contemporary machines like the Linn LM-1 or the Oberheim DMX typically retailed for about $5,000, the TR-808 came in at a little over $1,000.