Kanye West’s much-anticipated gospel album, Jesus Is King, finally arrived over the weekend.
Originally intended for release on September 27, the album was delayed for almost a month, and even then came out ten hours later than planned.
Jesus Is King, the new gospel album from Kanye West has finally arrived, eliciting a whole spectrum of reactions, in true Kanye fashion.
An accompanying documentary, also titled Jesus is King, is now screening in selected IMAX theatres around the world, including in Melbourne. The film sees Kanye performing at various Sunday Services – a Christian concert series organised by the singer – and hanging out at a James Turrell installation in Arizona’s Painted Desert.
The album, which consists of 11 tracks, only three of which go for more than three minutes, has generally not been received well with critics. The Guardian gave it a 2-star review, describing the tracks as feeling more like sketches, and calling the album “undercooked.” Elsewhere, fans have posted hilarious but mostly favourable reactions on Twitter.
The album marks a new entirely-religious direction for the singer, with Kanye reportedly claiming that he will never record “secular” music again. Whilst Christianity has always featured in his music, it hasn’t assumed a centre-stage position until now.
Ever since the release of his 2016 album, The Life of Pablo, Kanye’s release schedule has been fraught with revisions, with release dates missed, album titles changed, and entire tracklists discarded.
Jesus Is King was originally meant to come out on midnight of October 25th, however, when the time came the album did not appear. Just after midnight, Kanye made a surprise appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and claimed it was out, however an hour later he tweeted they were still fixing mixes on a few of the tracks. The album finally came out around midday on the 25th.
In a recent interview with Beats 1 presenter Zane Lowe, Kanye described himself as “unquestionably, undoubtedly, the greatest human artist of all time.”
Take a listen to Jesus Is King below:
