I'm listening to some of his earliest mixtapes and songs, and they just aren't very good. Maybe it's because he decided to save all the real heat for his studio albums, but I'm listening to the OG Jesus Walks and other tracks from the "I'm Good"/ "Get Well Soon"/"Freshmen Adjustment" mixtapes....and fam they're largely just boring to me.

Like listen to this song and tell me it sounds any different from all the other bling era songs from the early 2000's:soundcloud.com/kanyesfreshmanadjustments/wow

My point is: Kanye is one of the greatest artists and musicians of all time, the biggest rapper in the world at one point. BUT, I can see why A+R's passed up on his early tracks. His rhymes and flows are tight but nothing really that remarkable

A lot of those songs weren't finished, as in properly mixed and mastered tho. And apologize is great

tbh he definitely needed help cause he still didn't sound comfortable on the mic.
I think it wasn't til he had sessions with Dead prez when he realized he could just be himself. also it aint easy going from producer to rapper.

Apologize OP

In the end it fueled him even more to master his craft so the way things worked out are fine

He was rapidly improving over time the more comfortable he got with rapping and strengthening his bars

Also had very very odd luck. That accident almost cost him his life but it also had the side effect of altering his voice to what we know now. He used to have a much deeper voice that didn't work as well with the very same songs that we got on albums. It became a perfect performance voice and one of the most recognizable in music history

Its hard to get a deal and yeah its understandable why people passed but by '02 a lot of them were def idiots also especially with his rising notoriety as a producer. He was doing those demos without a real budget either.

Nah the FA series had classics tho

Some songs I could totally see making album cuts if they were more polished

gotta start somewhere

lol u tripping wow is fire