On “Do It,” nestled halfway through Kanye West and Ty Dolla Sign’s collaborative album “Vultures 1,” America’s second-biggest controversy magnet raps, “You don’t like it? That’s your loss.”
Contending and conversing with West’s music in 2024 is an obstacle course. The rapper, undeniably one of music’s most influential creative forces, has spent the past few years making headlines less for his music than the controversies by his own hand (and mouth), alienating casual listeners with divisive rhetoric and forcing his core fan base to reconcile with their evaluation of art made by a deeply polarizing artist. Many of those who checked out on West’s music have found his repeated antisemitic remarks to be too toxic to stomach. No matter how viable the music, the mere notion of listening to a new West release is enough to drive them away.
Of course, it’s perfectly reasonable to disengage with art on account of its creator. West can often be his own greatest enemy, and to his own detriment. Over the past few years, he’s lost brand deals with Balenciaga, Gap and Adidas, plus representation from CAA and his lawyers. But throughout his career, West has consistently seen his music act as a redemptive tool. As far back as 2009, when he stormed the stage and infamously interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards, he then retreated to Hawaii for several months to work on “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,” which ultimately became one of the defining rap albums of this century. While Taylor-gate still looms over him—not even he can seem to shake it, referencing her on “Vultures 1” track “Carnival”—his artistic merits weren’t wholly discredited, and it was clear that his creative light hadn’t dimmed.
Which is why “Vultures 1” arrives at a pivotal moment in West’s career. Public opinion of him has slanted so far in the red that it’s feasible to wonder if he’ll ever recover. And musically, it’s been shaky. Since 2016’s “The Life of Pablo,” he’s released a string of projects bursting with ideas but without the conductive precision to convey he knows when one works and another doesn’t. “Donda,” which he dropped in 2021, was overstuffed and lacked a cohesive vision, as if he’d assembled too many thought kernels, rendered them all individually valuable, and lined them up in one long, slogging row.
Thus brings us to “Vultures 1.” It isn’t the most groundbreaking album in his discography, but it’s the clearest vision that he’s presented in years. Its songs are mercurial yet intentional, each its own bizarre sector of a larger blueprint, and the 16-song set is often musically great, from the Brazilian funk sample on “Paperwork” to the bellowing horns of “Problematic.” Ty Dolla Sign‘s presence as co-pilot for the album is a wise move. He deepens the songs’ vitality, offering texture and harmonic jubilance where they could otherwise code as dense and opaque. As a solo artist, Ty has conveyed a rich understanding of how melody functions, and alongside some of the colder tracks on the album, his frayed vocals contribute an emotional heft that West can’t alone provide.
On a purely musical level, “Vultures 1” plays as a gothic collection of sharp aural moments that twists and shifts at each turn. West is an artisan of curation, and the team of musicians he assembles—88-Keys, Timbaland, No ID and dozens of others—offers variety and scope. The rolling drums and bleating bass line of “Back to Me” recall the patter of “Runaway,” while Ty’s warm harmonies play against an already controversy-stoking interpolation of Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love” on “Good (Don’t Die).” If there were any doubts that the old Kanye is forever lost, then the soulful “Burn” is a reminder of what made him such a creative wrecking ball in the first place.
Lyrically, however, those hoping for West to seriously reconcile with his public controversies will come up short on “Vultures 1,” where in characteristically antagonist form, he leans into them. His attempts to pour gasoline on the already raging fires are eye-rolling at best—“Keep a few Jews on the staff now, I cash out,” on “Stars”; “Anybody pissed off, gotta make ’em drink the urine / Now I’m Ye-Kelly, bitch,” on “Carnival”; and, of course, the tasteless “How I’m antisemitic? I just fucked a Jewish bitch,” on the title track—implying that he’s above it all. And in his mind, he probably is. But this is nothing new for West. As far back as his “College Dropout” days, he’s been consistently brash, egotistical and combative. Here, it’s once again on full display, and there’s no question that some of the lyrics bogging down “Vultures 1” are offensive and even morally problematic. West is fully aware of how he presents, and by the time he mutters “Crazy, bipolar, antisemite / And I’m still the king” on the album’s closer, it’s clear that it’s all by design.
That’s likely because he’s aware of his proclivities to surrender to instinct, as though all his ideas are worth pursuing. “You already know I’m impulsive,” he admits on the sneering “Keys to the City.” He reinforces the notion with a snippet of a Mike Tyson interview tacked at the end of “Hoodrat”: “No doubt he’s got some mental fuckin’ issues, most leaders do. The delusional issue, ‘I’m a god.’”
The issues don’t start and end there. West is at best musically compelling, and at worst—more often than not—a wanton edgelord, intent on saying some of the foulest things imaginable.” “Vultures 1” is the first in a trio of promised albums (though West fans know he’s quick to shift course from planned projects at any given time), and it’s a stark reminder that the artist the world once universally adored can’t—and simply won’t—outrun the mess he’s left in his wake.
