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Slowly but verily, Kanye West’s epic-sounding 808’s and Heartbreak is leaking track by track. This time, the emotional808’s album closer, “Coldest Winter,” gets the beloved leakage treatment. “Coldest Winter” features no rapping whatsoever, almost burrying whatever hope “Heartless” gave me for the new album.

I’m all for emotion and feeling — obviously Kanye West is really hurting inside, and he has every right to. I am not judging his character or artistry. I think his songwriting is spot-on for the most part, and his production is stellar. Completely amazing. This tribal, gritty, earthy trend that “Love Lockdown,” “Heartless,” and now “Coldest Winter” have is refreshing in an time where hip-hop music is about as stale as croutons.

What I am judging, or calling out, is Kanye’s decision of having fully-fledged R&B songs on this album (like “Love Lockdown” and “Coldest Winter”). I’m not as against the vocoder as I was when I first heard “Lockdown” — his two new tracks have shown that Yeezy can use the auto-tune effect responsibly. I just wish he’d use his singing responsibly.

Maybe the rest of 808’s and Heartbreak is more like “Heartbreak.”  

Updated mp3 with the album version of “Coldest Winter” — no DJ part

Download: Kanye West – Coldest Winter (Album Version)

Tags: Kanye West

This entry was posted on Monday, October 27th, 2008 at 11:11 am and is filed under Listen, MP3, Music. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.