Yeezus and Drizzy. Ye and the Champagne Papi. Kanye West and Drake. For the last decade, these two artists have been some of the biggest and most impactful names in hip hop and the music industry. At every step of the way, they have been in constant competition, building a contentious beef that has exploded in the last couple of years as each has tried to continually top the other in critical reception, chart sales, and as industry royalty. Each has also gone through deeply personal and affecting life events, many controversial, that have acted as ammunition to unload on one another while also being a crucial point of their careers and the catalyst for their material going forward. After what is likely to go down as some of the strangest and most elongated album rollouts ever, both West and Drake have finally released their anticipated albums,  “Donda” and  “Certified Lover Boy”, as well as their latest batch of drama. Though the two albums are fundamentally different in their themes and aesthetic approaches, with the only comparison stylistically being that they are at the most basic level hip hop, it seems necessary to compare them in context to each other given the pair’s ongoing feud, the proximity of the release dates (within a week of each other), and the deep ethical and moral questions residing under the surface of both as they see West and Drake confront the issues and controversies that have recently defined them not only as artists, but as people. 

“Donda” arrives following two years of speculation about the content of West’s next big project, particularly after four album cycles that saw him experimenting with new sounds and embracing a reflective writing style that highlighted many of the personal struggles and spiritual revelations he was and still is going through.  “The Life of Pablo” (2016) and  “ye” (2018) found West at his most vulnerable, for the first time candidly exploring the emotional trauma of losing his mother, being in a troubled and now defunct marriage, constantly battling the tension between his ego-centrism and the desire to be a better family man, and dealing with a revealing bipolar disorder diagnosis. Following this, West released a heavily experimental collab album, “KIDS SEE GHOSTS”  (2018), with Kid Cudi that seemed to further the soundscape he had begun dabbling in with  “The Life of Pablo” and  “ye”, and again he dropped another album,  “JESUS IS KING” (2019) that completely shocked everyone by being a Christian and heavily gospel inspired album. After this point, it was unclear where West was at as an artist and a person. This was only exacerbated by further erratic behavior, most notably a long winded and truly bizarre endorsement of Donald Trump which saw him not only have an oval office meeting with Trump, which went disastrously but also call four hundred years of slavery a choice and question the position of Harriet Tubman. West has always been a polarizing figure seemingly uninterested in reigning in his ego, but this stint seemed to make evident the very real issues he was and is still going through and caused many to beg the question, “Is Kanye West okay?” 

All of this has led here, after a month-long roll-out that spanned three “listening events” in which West relied heavily on performance demonstrations, grand stages, and art – including him ascending through a football dome and performing on a recreated version of his family home– as well as releasing bits and tracks of the album, seemingly unfinished but continually advertised as “coming-soon”. After the third event,  “Donda” dropped– a massive 27-track album that clocks in at nearly two hours and delves deep into the mental, emotional, and spiritual state of Kanye West, an artist simultaneously at the top of the music world but at the bottom of his world. The album sees West address everything from his past four albums, as well as recent events, only even more candidly and headlined by a stacked set of features and a gorgeous breakthrough of sound. Conceptually, the album has recurring themes of grief, guilt, spiritual and personal awakening, accountability, redemption, and ultimate salvation. While much of these are heavily influenced by West’s own spirituality and personal struggle, the way in which he presents the issues and crafts the songs gives it an omniscient and ethereal quality that can allow anybody to be moved by the content. This is aided by easily the best part of the album– the diverse, lush, and otherworldly production. West is, sonically, at his absolute best and most groundbreaking. Despite the mixes sounding a little rough and perhaps unfinished, they still manage to soar with a sheer volume, uniqueness, and audacity, unlike anything I’ve heard before or will likely hear again. 

The production walks the line between intimacy and cinematic bombast, oftentimes underscored by Gospel inspired instrumentals with angelic choirs and booming organs, but West also dabbles in and interpolates a variety of other genres, including drill, house, hip hop, and synth. It’s in these experimentations that West shows his versatility and incredible talent as a producer. It’s hard to explain, but the production genuinely makes you feel as if you are in a different plane of existence, and that’s before the powerful lyricism and impassioned performances from West and a host of guests including JAY-Z, Vory, Playboi Carti, Fivio Foreign, Lil Baby, The Weeknd, Baby Keem, Travis Scott, Lil Durk, Don Toliver, Kid Cudi, Roddy Rich, and Jay Electronica, among several others that bring their a-game. The tracklist is bloated and definitely has some moments that could be trimmed– “Ok Ok”, “Remote Control”, and “Tell The Vision” come to mind, as well as alternative versions to other songs in the list that easily could have been one or the other– but the album as a whole is still remarkably consistent for such a hefty length and every song does bring something interesting and unique, if not flat out mindblowing. Particular highlights include “Jail”, which has an anthemic instrumental and goosebump-inducing verse from Jay-Z with bars like “Don’t have to see you to touch you/This is what braille looks like, it’s on sight” and  “Jesus Lord pt 2”, which features the most profound, heartbreaking, and emotional lyricism on the project with a heavy story by Larry Hoover Jr. pleading for the release of his father from prison to end the track. 

 “Certified Lover Boy” finds Drake in a similarly complicated juncture of his career and life. Just a few years before, Drake revealed he had a son after being called out by Pusha-T on a diss track suggesting, among many things, that he was a poor father and had no meaningful involvement in his son’s life. Shortly after that, Drake released  “Scorpion”, an album that saw him half confront the realities of the situation, pronounce his love for his son, and write off many of the critiques surrounding his party-boy persona, namely that he is incapable of growing up and shedding his shell of toxic masculinity and frat-boy isms. Now, after an album hiatus broken up by two compilations and a brief EP–  “Care Package” and “Dark Lane Demo Tapes”, and “Scary Hours 2”, respectively–  and fueled by his continued and not so subtle reputation of being a regular Don Juan, openly referenced in the album title and cover, Drake seemed poised to bounce back, clear his name, and reclaim his spot at the top of hip hop. Or so you would think given all the hype surrounding the lead up to “Certified Lover Boy”, including promotional billboards in the hometowns of artists featured on the album, a cheeky and playboy attitude by Drake in many of his public appearances, and cryptic social media posts hinting at the album, including getting a heart etched into his hair. 

Unfortunately,  “Certified Lover Boy” lands with a thud. While the dichotomy and tension between Drake’s party boy mantra and his need to grow up, take ownership of his mistakes, and embrace his newfound responsibilities as a father were billed as a supposed back bone to this album, we scarcely see Drake engage this. Instead we get the same Drake, albeit marginally more self aware and occasionally candid, but simultaneously even more self-embracing, over a long 21-song album. Drake himself described the album as “a combination of toxic masculinity and acceptance of truth which is inevitably heartbreaking,” implying also a more sincere exploration of those very issues. And the opening two tracks– “Champagne Poetry” and “Papi’s Home”– deceive you into thinking he is a changed man, ready to lay down a more profound truth and more fleshed out sound. The songs feature a clever and melodic Beatles sample and a soaring R&B instrumental, respectively, as well as decisively written verses by Drake. He sounds renewed and energetic, self-aware but also deeply at peace with himself and ready to come out of the gates with an emotional showing. Unfortunately, after this, the album devolves into the Drake we all know, love or hate, wherein he succumbs to his propensity for sleepy R&B and hip hop production and an understated and monotone delivery that often finds him speaking his bars rather than singing or rapping them. To his credit, the project is more lyrically dense than  “Donda”, though that doesn’t necessarily mean the lyrics are more emotionally impactful. 

This creates a lot of boring dynamics that get really repetitive song after song, which makes listening to the album front to back a slog. Drake uses many of his verses as an opportunity to either delve further into his man-child ways and playboyism– such as is the case on “Girls Want Girls” when he says “Staring at your dress ‘cause it’s see-through… Yeah, say that you a lesbian, girl, me too”– or to confirm that he’s aware of the questionable things he’s done by singing about even more of those questionable things, like on “TSU” when he details what seems to be a toxic and manipulative relationship built off a girl’s “dependence” on him for money in the face of her parents abandoning her, which Drake uses to his own advantage and desire. 

With that being said, there are a handful of tracks that find Drake killing his flow and pen game, with standouts including the razor sharp “7 AM on Bridle Path” and “No Friends In the Industry”, and the novel but self-aware “Way 2 Sexy”, which samples Right Said Fred and features a host of goofy lyrics. It’s silly but definitely a fun, self-aggrandizing bop that’s even funnier when accompanied by the ridiculous music video. The best song on the album is easily “Knife Talk”, which has a menacing instrumental and cold blooded verses from Drake, Project Pat, and 21 Savage, the latter of whom devours the beat and gives the hardest bar of 2021- “I’m mister body catcher, Slaughter Gang Soul Snatcher.” It’s worth noting that “Certified Lover Boy’s” long list of features– including Lil Baby, Lil Durk, Giveon, Travis Scott, JAY-Z, Future, Young Thug, Kid Cudi, many of whom were also on  “Donda”– do bring some levity to the album, but they also steal the show right out from under Drake, especially in delivery. 

I do think on  “Certified Lover Boy” we see Drake confront himself and his demons a number of times, but the result is usually just him suggesting he is who he is and that he’s too old and successful to worry about the criticism. It’s frustrating because Drake clearly knows and even agrees with many of the perceptions of himself, but he doesn’t engage with them in any other way than calling them out and claiming that he can’t help but act the way he does. 

While I’m not here to judge the severity of West or Drake’s controversies and mistakes, I do think in listening to their respective albums– as well as in consuming any media produced by a controversial figure or marred by a controversial event– those controversies and mistakes should be considered, especially when in regards to their contextual presence in the music they are producing. In this regard, I think it’s far easier to engage in conversation and discourse with the material of  “Donda” because it finds West genuinely questioning and approaching his controversial past and his struggles with mental health and bipolar  disorder, as well as other issues of his life. Whether he succeeds or not is ultimately up to the listener, though I think in building an album so beautifully explorative and open to his past and current struggles, as opposed to continuing to pander to his condition as Drake does while occasionally dropping a bar or two about his son and his desire to be better to seem sincere, Kanye succeeds far more. 

There is one glaring caveat to that evaluation, though, and that’s West’s decision to to feature Chris Brown, DaBaby, and Marilyn Manson– all accused abusers, homophobes, and rapists, respectively– on the album, on “New Again” and “Jail pt 2”. The latter two were present at the last listening event and ironically featured on the alternative version to “Jail”, and it does raise the question as to whether Kanye was trying to literally build a redemption or forgiveness narrative in conjunction with the religious themes of the album. It seems incredibly on-the-nose to include the pair on the same song entitled “Jail”, but whether it was intended or not it’s still incredibly short-sighted. With regard to how the two artists are approaching their past and future, Drake leaves the impression that he is who he is whether anybody likes it or, while Kanye is daring us to watch who he becomes next. 

This leaves both artists in similar positions– a history of success, failure, controversy, and personal beef behind them– once again here to clear their names, prove their merit, and outlast the other as the crown prince of hip hop. Their egos exist as a shared Achilles’ heel as they desperately want what the other has to offer– Drake the deep impact West has had on hip hop and the industry and the continued respect he receives from both, and West the brilliant streaming performance and automatic hit making Drake is particularly apt at. Their contention is also deeply personal and about far more than whose music sounds better, but ultimately petulant, and to the fans, the world of hip hop, and the listener, the music is what will do the talking. 

When you look at where West was in his career at Drake’s current age and consider the material he has made since, you see an artist constantly pushing his sound and stepping out of his comfort zone creatively, succeeding and even redefining the industry again nearly every time he does so. When I look at Drake’s material, I see an artist who forged a sound and now seems content going through the motions of that sound, not even caring enough to thrive within it as he has before. His music and style has just become painfully predictable and boring, and while, yes, it is cleanly produced and nice to listen to, it’s also repetitive, uninspired and rarely worth the effort to get excited for. When you’re calling out another artist, continuing an elongated beef that you’ve equally contributed to, releasing your album only a few days after theirs– clearly in an effort to compete– and claiming to be at the top of the game, maybe you should back that up with an album that sounds like you even remotely care and are eager to show your musical superiority. Maybe Drake will get the last word given that  “Certified Lover Boy”  moved twice as many units as  “Donda” in its first week, and maybe that speaks volumes in that Drake can phone it in and still come out on top, but ultimately I think it’s West who can sit with the satisfaction of knowing he crafted a more complex album that’s far likelier to stand the test of time. 

Whichever side you fall on, there is an ample amount of compelling music from both albums and plenty of angles from which to discuss the pair and their respective impacts in relation to each other and the music industry, as well as when discussing the accountability we should hold celebrity forces to and the ethical and moral standards we should hold ourselves to when engaging with their work. In the end, the entirety of the situation makes for an endlessly interesting moment in music and culture and challenges us to consider more deeply something we’d otherwise write off as “just music.”