The Musiquarium

Released: 2024

Genres: Trap, Pop Rap, R&B

The Musiquarium’s VULTURES 2 Review Score: 8 out of 10

After one cancelled sequel after another, Ye finally stays true to his word and releases a direct follow-up to a previous project, with the help of his faithful collaborator, Ty Dolla $ign.

If you thought that VULTURES 1 was hated, the hate for VULTURES 2 took hatred to a whole new level of contempt and disdain. People were acting like this was the second coming of Corey Feldman’s Angelic 2 the Core, but this is instead another decent Ye collaboration, full of interesting production and sampling and contradictions between faith and sin. Sure, it might not be of the caliber of some of his greatest works and has some duds, but it still packs in plenty of gems.

The opener, SLIDE, is built around a sample of the THX music. TIME MOVING SLOW is accompanied by a choir. FIELD TRIP makes an unauthorized sample of the legendary drums from Portishead’s Machine Gun. FRIED sees the return of the hooligans from the previous volume’s CARNIVAL. On LIFESTYLE, the duo utilizes the famous drums from Led Zeppelin’s When the Levee Breaks, which has been a classic drum loop since the first Beastie Boys album.

530 sees the debut of a song originally intended for DONDA 2, with this version originally having a mumbled verse from Ye on the second half, but that has fortunately been fixed since the album’s initial release. SKY CITY is another holdover, this time from JESUS IS KING and is a beautiful, soulful song. RIVER and MY SOUL are two other songs that sound like they could have fit on JESUS IS KING or Donda, helping to balance the album’s more vulgar songs with songs of faith.

The only truly terrible song here is BOMB, which is easily the worst song from any of Ye’s projects; it seemed more like it was just Ye letting his daughters have a contribution on the album. There’s also HUSBAND, which is more tolerable, but ultimately quite cheesy, and ISABELLA, which is an unnecessary 9 second-long interlude that doesn’t serve much of a purpose.

Critics and the public alike have been acting like VULTURES 1 and VULTURES 2 are not only amongst the worst albums of both Ye or Ty Dolla $ign’s careers, but of the entire decade, but would they really be hating them this much if not for Ye’s recent outbursts on Twitter? Are so many people really unable to separate an artist from his opinions? None of these songs promote hate, yet people would lead you to believe that these songs are absolutely vile, yet they are more innocuous than most of the rap music out there.

Sure, compared to the first volume, VULTURES 2 was admittedly a bit rushed and was released in an unfinished state, (which resulted in months of updates and fixes) and Ye reportedly used A.I. modulation to finish some of his verses, but there is still plenty to like about VULTURES 2, despite its haphazard and unconventional release. If this is really the nadir of Ye’s discography, then this isn’t so bad.

For credit breakdowns and historic release details, view ¥$ on Discogs.

Back to the 2024 Album Guide or the ¥$ Reviews page.

Written by Brett Nippard