Donda is the latest, highly-anticipated album from hip-hop’s renaissance man Kanye West. Following 2019’s Jesus is King, Kanye once again makes heavy use of spiritual themes and gospel influences. Adding to the mix, Kanye also brings to light his own mental health issues, his mother’s legacy, and his own controversial public image.
For those unaware, Donda is named after Kanye’s late mother Donda West who died in a botched plastic surgery in 2007. Throughout his career, Kanye has made it clear that the passing of Donda has strongly impacted him and his art.
While the album seems intended to pay tribute to West’s late mother Donda, she seems strangely absent in the album. Aside from the opening “Donda Chant” and the eponymous track, Donda barely makes mention of her. While the overall themes of the album might be more important to Kanye than explicitly referencing his mother, it still might’ve been prudent to replace the more “filler” songs with songs dedicated to the album’s namesake.
In many ways, Donda feels like a “return to form” after the black sheep Jesus is King, resembling earlier albums like Life of Pablo and Ye. Despite this, Donda is still an intensely spiritual album that almost feels like a gospel album at points.
“Heaven and Hell”—with lyrics like “devil, lay down” and “burn false idols, Jesus’ disciples”—is probably the best example of this.
In contrast to the exuberant “new Christian” tone of Jesus is King, Donda is noticeably darker. While it doesn’t go as deep into themes of bi-polarism and suicidal tendencies, as much as Kanye’s other albums, Donda makes references to spiritual suffering (“She told me to go to Hell like I ain’t been yet”) and the Devil’s power in the world (“The devil rules the playground but God still owns the building”).
In “Jail” (the album’s opening song and return of the Kanye/Jay-Z duo), Kanye raps about the deceptive nature of humans and the idea of spiritual bondage and isolation.
Donda is at its best when dealing with these themes and mixing Kanye’s unique production style with gospel influences. At its worst, Donda is pointlessly extravagant and bloated. This is a long album, clocking in at 108 minutes. While some of that runtime is warranted, the album does contain some “fillers”.
“Junya” (which features Playboi Carti for no apparent reason) is an especially jarring song paying tribute to reclusive fashion designer Junya Watanabe. In a supposedly serious album dedicated to Kanye’s late mother, this repetitive, borderline materialistic song appears to be out of place.
Despite this, the album has bits of humor that do work. At the end of “Off the Grid”, Kanye quips:
“Some say A-A-Adam could never be bla-a-ack
‘Cause a black man’ll never share his rib, rib, rib, rib, rib, rib”
As a whole, Donda feels like a transition album for Kanye in a similar way that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was. It takes all the spiritual themes present in Jesus is King and harmonizes them with Kanye’s usual style.
While some will undoubtedly dislike the direction Kanye is taking (especially how radically different it is from the “Dropout Bear era” albums), Donda is a powerful reminder of how artists change as their lives go on. A lot has happened to Kanye since his early controversies, and his music is going to reflect this.
If you’ve been a loyal follower of Kanye throughout all these years, Donda—despite its flaws and filler tracks—is a worthwhile listen, and some of this album’s tracks are bound to become classics. Kanye is an artist who never fails to bring something new to the table, and I’m looking forward to his next big project.