Passion, Pain and Demon Slaying By Kid Cudi
Kid Cudi rose to prominence with the success of his 2008 single, ‘Day N Nite’ and his debut album ‘Man On The Moon, The End Of Day’. He even got to sign on to Kanye West’s GOOD Music collective which featured other acts like John Legend and Common. He broke out to be strong force in the music industry amassing a cult-like followership among high school and college students, stoners and rappers alike.
But that was then, over the years, Cudi’s fame and popularity had shrivelled up among hip-hop and music fans and aficionados generally and only his true and loyal followers still reckoned with him. His most recent project, ‘Speedin’ Bullet 2 Heaven’, an experimental rock inspired record was a total flop. It was scored ‘0’ on Anthony Fantano’s music review channel on YouTube. Also, the drama following the fight to the custody rights of his daughter, Princess Vada, between himself and his baby mother did not help matters. Life was really being tough for the rapper.
So what was the best thing for him to do, to get back on the tracks and assume his lost throne as one of the biggest hip hop acts? To embark on a new project, to release a new album. And there it was, Kid Cudi officially announced the release of a new album titled Passion, Pain And Demon Slayin’ through his Instagram, scheduled for summer’16. As it always happens, unforeseen circumstances and hold-ups delayed the album, so Cudi, during these delays appeased fans by releasing two songs from the album, ‘Surfin’ featuring Pharrell Williams and ‘Frequency’. Videos for the singles, both directed by Kid Cudi himself, later appeared on his YouTube account with ‘Surfin’ video featuring cameos from Jaden and Willow Smith, A$AP Rocky and A$AP Nast.
Just before the release, the album suffered a major setback when Kid Cudi checked himself into a rehabilitation centre for ‘depression and suicidal urges’. I had lost hope and thought that was the last we would hear of the PPADS album, at least maybe for the time being. But after almost two months Cudi came out, performed at the ComplexCon festival and reassured fans the album was still on the way.
The album was finally set for release on December 15, the announcement coming with another single release from the album titled ‘Baptized in Fire’ featuring Travi$ Scott.
The album features guest appearances from Pharrell Williams, Travi$ Scott, Willow Smith and Andre 3000 and production from Mike Dean, Mike Will Made-It, Plain Pat and long-time WZRD partner Dot da Genius.
The album, ‘Passion, Pain and Demon Slaying’ is just, brusquely, a very beautiful album filled with expert production, great chemistry between Cudi himself and the featured artistes and his legendary humming, exciting rap and off-key singing. Cudi’s normal style of displaying gloominess or darkness is evident generally on the whole album but more predominant in first few tracks, with the album transcending from a melancholic beginning to a rather joyful end.
The album starts off with ‘Frequency’, an invitation to connecting to the cosmic, druggy and love-filled realm of the project.
‘yeah, yeah widen your view
And tune on into the frequency
Chill on out, love is the rule
Follow it to the frequency’
It then proceeds to the ‘Swim in the Light’ track which is filled with a wraith-like, psychedelic instrumentation. The track talks about Kid Cudi’s depression and addiction to drugs and ways he tries to numb his emotional pains.
The ‘By Design’ track features a wonderful collaboration between Kid Cudi and Andre 3000 and the track is one of the best on the whole album. It encourages people to go about their normal lives, going with and never fucking up the flow of the universe. This is actually the first time the two would be working together and it is probably one of the best things that happened in the album.
The album moves on to the ‘Baptized In Fire’ track featuring Travi$ Scott. This is one of the most anticipated tracks on the album considering the fact that Travi$ had acknowledged Cudi to be one of the greatest influences of his music style and he had always desired to work with him and this fraternal relationship is evident in the song as Travi$ describes Cudi as ‘big bro’. Some might say the song contains innuendos and overtones of responses to Drake’s earlier diss track which was as a result of Kid Cudi’s refusal to be featured on Drake’s ‘Views’ album because he was supposedly working on his own project.
‘My energy is a bit too precious, too
drenched in them blessings’
‘Big boss, I made your heart heavy
Can’t stop me, can’t carry me baby’
Moving on, the ‘Dance 4 Eternity’ and ‘Kitchen’ tracks are beautiful love songs filled with Kid Cudi’s trademark off-key singing and hums. The tracks offer, oppositely to most of the other tracks on the project, a fresh, happy and lovely scenery in which you can almost picture yourself, swinging hips with your loved one to time without end.
The album rounds off with ‘Surfin’, a fine collaboration between Cudi and Pharrell Williams. The song is divided into two parts starting off with a normal upbeat and buoyant vibe then transforming into this amazing, joyful and frenzy-like end. You should see how Kid Cudi dances like a kid in Disney Land in the video of the song.
I couldn’t have wished for more with what Kid Cudi had done on this project. This, by far is his best work till date and if he can continue in this direction, he surely can revive his career and assume his cathedra as one of the best that has ever done this. This was a perfect Christmas gift and I believe this album was one of the best in 2016.
