My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

In September 2009, Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards and the world turned on him overnight. He left the country, spent time in Rome and Paris, then flew to Hawaii and booked out a recording studio for months. He invited dozens of rappers, producers, musicians, and engineers and created a daily communal ritual: breakfast together every morning, basketball, then hours in the studio. The album he made from that exile is the most ambitious rap record of the twenty-first century.

What you actually hear when you press play is almost impossible to describe without underselling it. The production moves through soul samples, baroque orchestration, prog rock, gospel, and dense electronic layering within the space of a single track. Every song sounds like it cost a fortune and took a year to build, which is not far from the truth. West spent over three million dollars on studio time alone. The guest list includes Jay-Z, Nicki Minaj, Rick Ross, Pusha T, Kid Cudi, Bon Iver, and Rihanna, and every appearance is perfectly deployed. "Runaway," a nine-minute song built on a single piano note, is one of the most nakedly confessional pieces of music a major pop star has ever released. "Power" opens with a King Crimson guitar loop and lands with the weight of someone trying to convince himself he is unstoppable.

This is an album about ego and collapse, about fame and guilt and grief, about being the most talked-about person in the world and feeling completely alone. It is also the most sonically rich rap album ever made. If you have never heard it, start at track one and give it your full attention.