![]() But in the intervening years, the album has become a blueprint for an entirely new wave of rap: introverted, melodic, melancholy, confessional-the sound of Drake and The Weeknd on down to Juice WRLD and Lil Uzi Vert. ![]() ![]() At least, it certainly wasn’t when it came out in 2008. It isn’t hip-hop in the conventional sense. But you’d have to have a pretty good internal compass to bet your future on where that wind’s gonna take you. You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows, Dylan sang-a line, incidentally, from the first electric song of his that most people would have heard (“Subterranean Homesick Blues”). ![]() Like Dylan, the new direction made him a genius to some and a traitor to others-a split that highlighted both the divisiveness of his art and the conservative streak in a scene where the imperative to keep it real can be as stifling as it is comforting. Like Dylan, Kanye didn’t need the fame or credibility: His third (and third multiplatinum) album, 2007’s Graduation, had come out only a year earlier, and he’d already established himself as the kind of visionary who could steer the conversation while hovering somewhere above it. Perhaps the best comparison for 808s & Heartbreak is when Bob Dylan went electric in 1965.
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