Kayne West is a veteran in the music industry, especially in the genre of hip-hop. He’s made music with interesting people ranging from Jay-Z to even Jamie Foxx and recently Kayne has been making headlines with his transition into Christian music.
Now Kayne holds Sunday services for everyone to hear his choir and his message. During these, Kayne was teasing an upcoming album called “Yandhi” which was supposed to follow his previous album “Ye.” Instead, Kayne has released “Jesus is King” which is his 10th studio album. Unlike his previous albums, Kayne takes a huge step into the Christian genre and it shows with the intro “Every Hour.”
The first track starts with amazing vocals from the Sunday Service Choir. The rawness of the vocals sounds great and is a perfect way to introduce the next track “Selah.”
This song had Kanye reflecting on his past ways. His performance is decent on this track, with the production providing a cushion for Kayne. The mixture of the Sunday Service Choir and theatrical instrumentals mesh well together.
“Follow God” is a nice-sounding track where Kayne discusses his experiences being a Christian. It also pays homage to Kayne’s previous song “Farther Stretch My Hands Pt 1.” Kayne delivers an impressive performance with his catchy flow and witty lyricism. However, the track is short, and its ending does nothing to enhance the song at all.
“Closed on Sunday” talks about the Sabbath which is an interesting concept of Christianity. In Christianity, the Sabbath occurs on Sunday and serves as a day of rest for most Christians.
Kayne uses this analogy to compare it to popular fast food chain Chick-fil-A. While the premise of this song is interesting, Kanye doesn’t do a good job at all executing the song. His vocals sound depressing, and the lyrics are bland, with no effort put into them.
“On God” is where Kayne talks about his comments on the 13th amendment and the Grammy’s. The production of the song is mediocre at best with the beat sounding very overwhelming.Kayne also does not have a good performance. He fails to expand on the subject matter and only delivers one verse, which makes the song uninteresting.
“Everything We Need” is a decent-sounding song containing amazing vocals from Ty Dolla $ign. He sounds very comfortable on the beat while matching his energy with Kayne. However, Kayne decides to use auto-tune and it sounds very out of place. He would’ve done better just rapping over the song since he provides some decent lyrics.
“Hands-On” features Christian artist Fred Hammond talking about how Kanye feels like God is hands-on with his life. Kayne provides a decent performance on this track over an atmospheric beat.
His concept is interesting and he does a good job explaining it. However, Fred Hammond doesn’t sound good at all. His use of auto-tune does not mesh well with the production at all.
Overall “Jesus is King” fails to hit the mark in an abundance of areas. First would be the production on the album. While some of it is good most of the production sounds like bad Christian rap.
Kayne also seems lost throughout the album by trying to convey his message about his religion. Kayne should take another attempt at this concept because he sounds lost here. 2/5
Courtesy of GOOD Music and Def Jam Recordings.
