10 2000s Albums That Are Practically Flawless
Diamonds of the New Millennium.
There's no guaranteeing that any album is going to take off from the get go. From the minute that production starts, people are just hoping to throw together a bunch of tracks that tend to hold together as something coherent when you play them from back to front. Every so often though, you find yourself in the realm of musical gods along the way.
Compared to the normal music that you hear on the radio, these albums feel more like experiences the more you sit with them. Although there may be some songs that you can pick and choose from time to time, the focus is the album itself, which takes on different twists and turns at every single track. One minute you might be showing how you're one of the greatest musicians that ever lived, and the next you might be putting yourself in the most vulnerable place you can in order to get some sort of closure.
It's quite a risk, but there have been plenty of fans who were willing to go for the ride. As the new millennium was opening up, these are those rare albums that managed to keep everything personal and universal at the exact same time. You can call some of these grandiose (and some of them are), but the tracks in here are pretty much bulletproof.
10. Late Registration - Kanye West
Every single pop artists has to deal with the sophomore slump sooner or later. Since practically anyone can fall into the right place at the right time on their first record, this is the moment where you prove that you weren't a fluke and you actually had something to say. Especially from the bling era of hip hop, there was no one really banking on the kid in a pink polo to be the breakout star of the genre.
After setting the world on fire with The College Dropout, Kanye West hooked up with producer Jon Brion and created a masterclass with Late Registration. After the chipmunk soul coming from his first outing, there's a lot more experimentation on this record, as Ye pulls from everything from jazz to James Bond themes to even having Jamie Foxx reprise his role as Ray Charles on the breakout single Gold Digger.
As corny as the other stuff sounds though, this is probably the most mature that we got to hear Kanye sound up until this point. Compared to the stuff we heard on Jesus Walks, songs like Hey Mama and Roses are stark looks at the little kid that Ye used to be and how fame is taking a toll on him. You can say whatever you want to about the Kanye of today, but this is probably the most sympathetic dude you could have hoped to see after college.