Late into the night on Friday, March 27th, hundreds of thousands of Kanye fans waited eagerly for his new album, Bully on streaming platforms like Spotify. They had been waiting months for this album, as Kanye had confirmed that the 27th was the set date. Then the worst news possible was exposed; the Spotify page was taken down. The album was delayed again, now being delayed for more than 7 times. After being delayed for more than a year, Bully dropped the next day, on March 28th, to mediocre reception.
The critical reviews came in quick.
Music review sites like Rolling Stone said, “The troubled star’s latest album offers plenty of fan service, but little substance.”
Another site, Pitchfork, said, “After a public apology, Ye returns to music as a hollowed-out shell of his former self.”
Most professional music reviews came to a consense that this album was not up to the standards that Kanye has set with most calling it a shell of his former self.
By interviewing multiple Morgan students with a rich music background, Bully has not met the already low expectations, based on his past album receptions, prior to its constantly delayed release.
Ever since Kanye’s 2020 album Donda, the quality of his albums has fallen off. Vultures 1 as well as Vultures 2 are mediocre at best, with very weak track lists according to music critics on Album of the Year.
Entering the first half of the album the quality of the tracks made me feel like I was entering an air-conditioned room after a hot day. It was so refreshing to see how Kanye was back to his roots; producing songs. There was production that matched the flow and energetic feel of the tracks and features that supported the tracks. I was actually surprised that the quality was so high, it reminded me of old Kanye.
Music enthusiast, sophomore Alex Wilson enjoyed the first half of the album.“The first half of Bully gave us a bit of hope for K
anye’s future career and music presence.”
The first half of Bully features some stand out tracks like FATHER (feat. Travis Scott),
The first half of Bully features some stand out tracks like FATHER (feat. Travis Scott), ALL THE LOVE (feat. Andre Troutman), and PUNCH DRUNK, which are all very well-produced tracks. Even at his lows, Kanye will do Kanye things; create an amazingly produced album. All three of these tracks feature high-energy production with heavy hitting drums and 808s. I was questioning my doubt during this track and for the first couple of songs off this album. FATHER feels like a song straight from another one of his albums; Yeezus. The beat is so heavy and it feels more like the rage rap that Kanye pulled off on tracks like On Sight and Black Skinhead. It had my heading nodding the whole song through.
Another music enthusiast, sophomore Kenneth Cameron-Antonucci said, “My least favorite part of Bully was the track Last Breath because he basically had no accent when singing in Spanish, and it felt unnatural.”
The track Last Breath features a Spanish singer, Peso Pluma, as the chorus of the song. Peso Pluma is a big artist in the Latin music scene with over 45 million monthly listeners on Spotify with five studio albums. Kanye also sings in Spanish in parts of the song, but it doesn’t sound natural. It seems out of place. Compared to Pluma, Kanye does not sound natural on the track. His heavily autotuned voice makes his Spanish hard to understand. He should have just let Pluma sing in Spanish for him. Kanye’s verse sounds like an after thought when they were putting the track together. I had to search up who was singing because Kanye just did not sound like himself. However, the production on this song is inspired by Latin American music, with trumpets and maracas in the background. It is very punchy and uplifting, fitting the mood that Pluma sets for the track.
Autotune is also a lowpoint of Bully. Kenneth says, “Bully is full of autotune, and the production carries the album, and the writing is lacking.”
Kanye uses a ton of autotune on Bully, muting his iconic voice into a robotic voice that barely sounds like Kanye. I am fine with autotune to a point because I listen to artists like Travis Scott who use a ton of autotune, but Kanye’s just sounded too robotic. There are no lyrically standout songs on the album, mostly talking above love and fame compared to his deeper themes of self reflection in his past albums like 808s and Heartbreak. 808s uses autotune to use his voice into a robotic one, adding to the mood of the album. His cold and robotic voice creates the deep and reflective mood of the album. The coldness in his voice feels sad and that is what makes 808s so great for me. Bully uses autotune to an excess because the album does not dive into self-reflection and Kanye’s voice is lost in the muddiness of autotune.
Alex Wilson, said, “I like the first half of the album because it showed off the older Kanye, but when we hit the second half, it started to incorporate AI-feeling elements and weirder sounding songs that sounded unfinished.”
In February 2025, Kanye said that he was going to use artificial intelligence to replicate his voice for some tracks on the album. Fans were very worried that Bully would have A.I. A.I. was one of the reasons that Bully was delayed for months. Kanye has used A.I. to generate music videos for songs like Bomb and even hinted at using it as a sample tool to make his voice sound different.
On its eventual release, Bully did not have any A.I., but the second half of the track still shows remnants, as Kanye’s autotune makes him sound like an A.I. and the production sounds unfinished. The flows of the vocals do not match up with the beat, and the beats do not fit with the mood. It still maintains the A.I. “feel.” I was utterly disappointed with this second half. The highs on the first half were erased in the second half. I felt like I was eating a bowl of rice, but on the bottom there was mold. It ruined the whole album.
Tanner Adamiec, sophomore, was disappointed with the features with the album because there was potential, but the tracks never reached it.
Another weak point for Bully is the feature list. The features are Travis Scott, Andre Troutman, CeeLo Green, and Peso Pluma. Travis does pull his weight on the track, Father, replicating Kanye’s high-energy rapping on the song. His feature hits hard and is very energ
etic. It is so head-bangable and catchy. It feels like if you play it in the car, the speakers will blow out from how hard hitting it is.
Andre Troutman is a talk box artist, turning his voice into an electronic instrument to create the vocals for some tracks on Bully. A talk box artist is an artist who uses a tube and special effects machine to turn his voice into something that sounds electronic or like a guitar. His features do add a different and energetic feel to the tracks he is on, but his style is very hit or miss, depending on the listener. I personally liked Troutman’s features. It was something new and different that was needed in this barren desert of an album.
Kenneth also said, “While listening to Circles off the album, I was very disappointed. The leaked version that dropped before was way better because of the melodic production. Now the production is too fast and energetic and feels like it was slapped on.”
Don Toliver is featured on the track Circles, but this track is one of the weakest on the album. Usually, Don is very consistent with his features, but Kanye changed the production from a slower, melodic beat to a faster, energetic beat that does not match the pace of the vocals. The version that was leaked before that featured a toned-down production, is superior because it sounds finished and it fits the mood. It had me levitating with the melodic vocals, but nope, my hopes were crushed. Kanye re-released the track without Don Toliver, and even then, the slower vocals do not match up with the faster-paced production.
Kanye should not retire because Bully is not a terrible album, but it features weaknesses that the old Kanye would never have let slip into his albums. It does feature head-nodding production throughout, but its autotune-heavy vocals and weaker features drag the whole album down. The second half of the album falls off compared to the first in terms of quality. The production misses the mood and flow of the tracks. If Kanye does decide to create another album, he should reflect on Bully and not make the same mistakes. Kanye could definitely rebound again with another project that is more finished than Bully.
