I found two articles, This from Complex and this from Consequence of Sound that The Life of Pablo from Kanye West had tweaked / changed his album since it was released. I started listening in March I think, acquiring the album illegally and I just tonight bought the album from Kanye’s site for $20. I usually buy albums that keep me occupied for years and the version I downloaded is drastically different.
I’ve listened to the album I’d guess between 50 and 100 times since it came out. Reading those analysis from the two blogs as I listened to the two albums, they missed a lot of changes. I wish I had an hour to kill because the changes are huge throughout the album. New sounds, thrown out sounds, huge change in the vocals to instrument ratios.
The track “Wolves” is completely ruined by the improved version. The female vocalist sounds like a whiney redneck complaining way too much. Also, some of the cuts are now in sync where I really appreciated how out of sync the whole ordeal was in the past. The beat, background vocal and Kanye’s lyrics didn’t sync up and it was very well done. Now it is all symmetrical.
I noticed overall that every vocal on the album is louder and more in your face. The music itself takes a back-seat to some intense vocals, not necessarily new lyrics outside of a few words or push-ins here and there of chorus notes but just overall just more in the way of a great bass-line.
Not sure which version of The Life of Pablo I’ll stick with but both have their pros and cons. I think I’ll add both to iTunes and indicate one as original and one as refreshed in each track and when I do my daily shuffle of Kanye west, I’ll just keep in mind what’s old and new and listen to both versions interchangeably.