After countless delays, Kanye West, the self proclaimed, “greatest human artist of all time,” finally dropped his 9th studio album, Jesus is King.  Originally scheduled for a Sept. 27 release, the album faced three different delays, moving the date to Sept. 29, to an unknown date and finally, to Oct. 25.  Once Friday hit, West then tweeted at 1:18 a.m., claiming that the album, again, is not ready, and that he won’t sleep until his final changes are made.  A truth to many lies, Jesus is King, dropped around noon of the 25th.

WEst has truly made a 360. A new born-again Christian, West now calls his own specialty, rap, “the Devil’s music.”  Going in a completely different direction, the album is a fully clean, Christian gospel record.  With features from his very own Sunday Service Choir, Ty Dolla $ign, Ant Clemons, Fred Hammond, Clipse, and Kenny G, West made a statement with 11 songs.  After careful evaluation, I personally, think the best song on the new album is “Use This Gospel,” featuring Clipse and Kenny G.

Starting off with a fantastic beat which sounds like West humming “oh, oh,” and then transferring into the chorus, sung by West himself.  He talks about the difficult road into heaven and calls on the gospel for protection and puts his faith in God.  Following the chorus, West reunites Pusha T and No Malice, a former brother hip-hop duo called Clipse.  The first verse goes to Pusha T, rhyming beautifully and killing his part, thanking God for blessing him with his luck.  After another play of the chorus, No Malice gets his verse, reflecting on his legal mistakes made in the past. The song concludes with a Kenny G solo on the saxophone.

Other hits on the album include, “On God,” and “Selah.”  Although, I feel that West was missing a few key components.  For example, this was one of West’s first albums without featuring rapper Kid Cudi.  Dating back to June 8, 2018, the two released a duo album, ‘Kids See Ghosts.’  Now, unfortunately, West doesn’t even include a Kid Cudi feature on this album.  I also feel he could have rapped more on the album, I understand that it was a Gospel album centered around God, but I would have enjoyed a few more rap verses, West’s forte.

I also was able to attend West’s film, partnering with the album, Jesus is King. Contrary to the album, I was extremely disappointed with the movie.  Only 38 minutes long, it barely featured any of the songs on the album.  I was almost weirded out and confused by the film. West only appeared in the film a few times and the videography was unorthodox.  Maybe I missed the point or main idea of the film, but overall I was disappointed.

Overall, I feel Jesus is King is pretty solid.  Apart from the movie, the music was different and fun.  You can’t go into listening the album expecting rap and West’s old work, because he’s changed and so has his music.  I would rate the album a 7/10.  Jesus is King is far from West’s best work, but definitely had some very good music.  I would recommend you give it a listen with an open mind, and you may be surprised.