Fresh off Billboard and Vibe‘s Top 50 Greatest Rappers of All Time list, Rolling Stone has an offering. This, however, isn’t necessarily a good thing, as the list marks 50 Geniunely Horricle Albums by Brilliant Artists. Listed under the outlet’s “Epic Fails” label, the artists aren’t relegated to one genre. No one was safe, and West’s 2018 release Ye earned itself the top spot.
It isn’t as if RS was shading the artists, per se, but did pick the worst records (in their opinion) from catalogs. Ye is celebrated among fans, but it arguably hasn’t established the same impact as his other classics. Additionally, they noted that it was in 2018 when West’s public unraveling seemed to have its starting point.
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They wrote: “They are certainly the worst works of his career, and it would be easy to pick Jesus Is King or Donda as the single lowest moment. But we’re going with 2018’s Ye because it marks the beginning of the most disastrous artistic and personal collapse in the history of popular music. Clocking in at a mere 23 minutes, the chaotic, half-baked album was cut in Wyoming right around the time he told TMZ that slavery was a ‘choice’ and started wearing a MAGA hat in public.”
“The uproar over his slavery remark caused him to rework many of the Ye lyrics over a frantic two weeks shortly before the album dropped,” Rolling Stone continued. “Which explains screeds like ‘Just imagine if they caught me on a wild day/Now I’m on 50 blogs gettin’ 50 calls/My wife callin’, screamin’, say, ‘We ’bout to lose it all.’” The Kanye scandals of 2018 seem almost quaint compared to his recent issues, but he’s never made music less vital than this.”
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The pointed review was the only Hip Hop act in the Top 10, but not the full list. Lil Wayne’s 2010 album Rebirth also made this list at No. 24, while Run-DMC’s Crown Royal in 2001 came in at No. 27. Outkast’s Idlewild was a surprise for fans at No. 46. Others like Prince, Madonna, and The Jacksons also found themselves criticized.