Late Registration - Background

Background

Late Registration is the second entry in Kanye West's planned tetralogy of education-themed studio albums. Dedicated towards overcoming the sophomore slump which commonly afflicts rap artists that many expected him to experience following the critical and commercial success of The College Dropout, the album sees a progression in West's lyrical dexterity in addition to an expansion of his musical palette. At the time, the focal point of West's production style was its usage of sped-up vocal samples from soul records. However, due in part to the widespread recognition of The College Dropout, the technique had come to be emulated by a myriad of producers. It had reached the point where West felt that not only had the music landscape become oversaturated with his signature style, but it had also become a crutch to him and it was time to seek out a new sound.

A longtime fan of the English trip hop group Portishead, West had been significantly influenced by Roseland NYC Live, the band's 1998 live album with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. Early in his career, the live album had inspired him to incorporate string arrangements into his hip hop production. Though West had not been able to afford live instruments beyond violin riffs provided by Israeli violinist Miri Ben-Ari around the time of his debut album, its subsequent commercial success enabled him to hire his very own string orchestra. For his second album, West juxtaposed the lush, intricate melodies of string section with the hard, pounding drum rhythms of hip-hop and used the polymerization for the foundation of his rapping.

In order to facilitate this sonic transition, West collaborated with American film score composer Jon Brion, who served as the album's co-executive producer for several tracks. West had been exposed to Brion's craftsmanship while watching the film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, for which Brion had composed music. West was also listening to songs Brion had produced for When the Pawn..., the second studio album of alternative singer-songwriter Fiona Apple, another one of West's favorite musicians and sources of musical inspiration for the album. Although Brion had absolutely no prior experience whatsoever in creating hip-hop records, he and West quickly found that they had potent musical chemistry after their very first afternoon in the studio together where they discovered that neither confined his musical knowledge and vision to one specific genre. When questioned if his presence made Late Registration any less hip-hop, Brion replied, "There are colors and ideas that make different from average hip-hop, but Kanye is already different from the average hip-hop guy. He's got this sense of pop record-making which is really solid, and he likes tracks with a lot of things going on in them — which is not necessarily common for hip-hop. He was already barking up that tree. This is definitely not just a hip-hop album. But it is also by no means overtly arty, or non-hip-hop. I don't think its a weird record by any means."