RUNNING ON EMPTY

DEVOID OF NEW IDEAS, RAPPER KANYE WEST IS NOW TROLLING US FROM THE BORING VOID

Donda Kanye West GOOD Music/def Jam Recordings

Contrary to its trolley rollout, this new horse dewormer of an album that Kanye West dropped early Sunday morning doesn’t qualify as edgy, no matter how hard anyone wishes it to be.

As listeners, we’re reflexively drawn to that imaginary edge, the precipice where artists flirt with the unknown while keeping their feet planted in consensus reality — and yes, it’s true, West once made great, era-defining music on that bluff. But now, after years of stylistic dithering and MAGA footsie, it’s clear that this guy has stumbled over the edge and drifted into a dead zone of esthetic inertia. His new music contains only one unpopped kernel of cosmic truth: The void is boring.

The album, Donda, is named after West’s late mother and perhaps to the rapper’s credit, he said on Sunday afternoon that his label shipped it off to the streaming services before it was complete. This comes after weeks of hyper-hype, though, with West hosting ticketed listening parties at football stadiums in Atlanta and Chicago, the most recent of which included guest appearances from Marilyn Manson, whom numerous women have accused of sexual assault, and Dababy, whose stage banter at Miami’s Rolling Loud festival in July was widely condemned as homophobic hate speech.

Maybe West thinks he’s inventing Jesus-as-edgelord cosplay by inviting these sinners to walk in his dim light, but Donda — which features cameos from both Dababy and Manson — isn’t an album about forgiveness so much as forgetness.

Your ears won’t be able to detect Manson’s contribution to the dreary Jail Pt 2, and you’ll forget about Dababy’s guest verse on that same song before he’s even finished delivering it. Earlier in the tracklist, in hopes of wiping any memories of West’s tawdry allegiance to Donald Trump, Jay Z appears with a mop: “Told him, ‘Stop all of that red cap, we goin’ home.’”

Then, to help seal the rhyme, Jay gets himself off the hook for capitalizing on this mess, too: “Not me with all of these sins, casting stones.”

It’s all pretty gross, yet totally unsurprising, and ultimately not even frustrating enough to be halfway interesting. West makes no new propositions here, sonically or lyrically. His backing tracks either pantomime the ominous synths of his last great album, 2013’s Yeezus, or the chapel organ groans of his now second-worst album, 2019’s Jesus Is King. As for the rapper’s vocalizations, they’re only more of the same, as both words and sounds. At nearly two hours, this is a long ride on an empty gas tank. Let’s not waste any more of our precious lives talking about it here.