Kanye West & Ty Dolla $ign’s ‘Slide’ Review: Sloppy Production Continues West’s Slide From the Top
Some music critics refuse to review songs by artists whose behavior is truly reprehensible. For that reason, Kanye West’s “Slide” might get ignored by a lot of the same critics who helped forge Yeezy’s reputation. Here’s a look at how “Slide” compares to West’s previous tunes and what makes it an odd move for West.
Kanye West’s ‘Slide’ feels like a bait-and-switch
West has always been more respected as a producer than as a lyricist. “Slide” starts with a sumptuous synthesizer intro that sounds a bit like the THX music. One can’t help but hope that the track was going to lead into a maximalist synthesizer production a la My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. However, we get yet another late-period West production that’s too sloppy for its own good. The production never builds to anything or reaches a satisfying conclusion.
As for the lyrics — what is there to say? It’s just another song where West raps about how controversial he is while hitting on a girl. It’s nothing we didn’t hear in “Carnival,” his big single from earlier this year. At least that song had some bombast and the novelty of soccer hooligans singing the chorus. “Slide” is easy to ignore. Sadly, West is not.
The weirdest thing about ‘Slide’ is a reference to a creepy movie
The only interesting thing about the lyrics is a throwaway reference to Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut. That movie is catnip for conspiracy nuts. Part of the reason they love it so much is its depiction of elite occult rituals. The film reinforces the conspiracy that rich people are all secretly worshipping the devil or Moloch or whatever Alex Jones thinks they do.
West brags that he’s “crusin’ like Eyes Wide Shut.” Considering that West is Christian and positions himself as an underdog, it’s weird he compared himself to fictional elite occultists. Everything he does is weird in the worst way.
Kanye West lost his way with melody
During a 2008 interview with MTV, West said he was successful because of his approach to melody. “The reason why I’m one of the big artists is I was always interested in that melody,” he said. “I was like, ‘Yo, let me stop f****** around, I’m just gonna, like, make it be all melody!’ My lyrics are from the same perspective. It’s not no R&B get-down-on-your knees-and-beg-a-girl type bulls***. It’s still, like, guy music, but it’s swag on it.”
West also gave us a flash of his famous ambition. “Every time that I perform I’m always thinking … my plan is to be the greatest performer of this generation,” he said. “That’s why whenever bands come out and say, ‘This album is better than The Beatles,’ it is impossible to make an album better than The Beatles unless you’ve got 30 years. Beatles records — people have known them their whole lives … hopefully five years from now people still play ‘Love Lockdown’ and people still play the records that I’m doing right now.”
These days, West has lost all sense of melody. Nothing he’s making is on the level of The Beatles’ worst records. He’s become one of the biggest tragedies in the history of music.
