Late Registration
Studio album by Kanye West
Released	August 30, 2005
Recorded	2004-2005
Genre	Hip hop
Length	70:25
Label	Roc-A-Fella, Island Def Jam
Producer	Kanye West, Jon Brion, Devo Springsteen, Just Blaze, Warryn Campbell
Professional reviews
Allmusic 2005 Blender 2005 Entertainment Weekly (B+) 2005 The Guardian 2005 Los Angeles Times 2005 Pitchfork Media (9.5/10) 2005 RapReviews.com (9/10) 2005 Rolling Stone 2005 Slant Magazine 2005 XXL (XXL) link
Kanye West chronology
The College Dropout (2004) Late Registration (2005) Graduation (2007)
Singles from Late Registration
"Diamonds from Sierra Leone" Released: July 4, 2005 "Gold Digger" Released: October 10, 2005 "Heard 'Em Say" Released: December 20, 2005 "Touch the Sky" Released: April 24, 2006 "Drive Slow" Released: June 6, 2006

Late Registration is the critically acclaimed second studio album by Chicago hip hop artist Kanye West. The album was released on August 30, 2005, and debuted at #1, selling over 860,000 copies in its first week, the once highest first week sales in Def Jam Recordings history. However, Kanye's next album, Graduation, would outdo Late Registration, selling 957,000 copies. Rolling Stone magazine named it their Album of the Year, and is one of the few hip-hop albums receiving a rare 5-star rating in its initial review, along with N.W.A's Straight Outta Compton and Beastie Boys' To the 5 Boroughs. It has gone on to sell over 2.8 million copies in the U.S. and received a great deal of acclaim from critics and went three times platinum.

Singles

The first single released from the album was "Diamonds from Sierra Leone", which contains a sample from the James Bond theme "Diamonds Are Forever" performed by Shirley Bassey. The song was originally a reference to his record label Roc-A-Fella, which is known for its "diamond" hand gesture. The song's title was subsequently changed from its original one ("Diamonds Are Forever") due to confusion with another song featured on Jay-Z's The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse titled "Diamond Is Forever". The title of the single as well as a subsequent remix (with Jay-Z) directly address the issue of conflict diamonds, which are a major factor in Sierra Leone's civil war. The second single released from Late Registration was "Gold Digger", which contains a vocal interpolation of Ray Charles' "I Got A Woman" sung by Jamie Foxx, who starred as Charles in the biopic Ray. It became his second single to top the Billboard Hot 100. The third single released was "Heard 'Em Say" featuring Adam Levine from Maroon 5, and the fourth was the Just Blaze helmed "Touch the Sky" featuring Lupe Fiasco. The track "Hey Mama" was intended to be released as a single, but was never released. A video was later made for the song "Drive Slow", and it featured Houston based rapper Paul Wall. This version of the song was included on the bonus DVD for T.I.'s platinum-selling album King. The original version of "Drive Slow" also appears on Paul Wall's CD, The People's Champ. The song was originally to feature M.I.A who opted out of the appearance due to a busy schedule.^[1]

Critical reception

Late Registration was the only album released in 2005 to receive a 5-star review from Rolling Stone, and was ranked #1 on their end-of year list of the year's 50 Best Albums.^[2]

This is Kanye's second album to be rated XXL by XXL magazine, XXL has only given this rank to a total of 16 albums. That means that Kanye's first two major studio releases have been given the highest rank in XXL Magazine. West, Jay-Z, Nas, and Dr. Dre are the only artists to receive multiple XXL ratings. ^[3]

The album was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards of 2006 and received the award for Best Rap Album.

Late Orchestration

Main article: Late Orchestration

Track listing

CD

• Tracks 5, 12, 15 and 18 are skits that are not listed in the albums booklet.

LP

Chart positions

Personnel

• "Gold Digger"
  • Additional vocals: Plain Pat & Don C
  • Scratches: A-Trak
• "Drive Slow"
  • Additional vocals: Tony "Penafire" Williams
• "Crack Music"
  • Additional vocals: Tony "Penafire" Williams, Keyshia Cole, Charlie Wilson & Umar Of Last Poets
• "Roses"
  • Additional vocals: Tony "Penafire" Williams and Joi Starr
  • Bass: Keena "Keynote" Holloway
  • Keyboards: Ervin "EP" Pope
• "Bring Me Down"
  • Bass trombone: Bruce Otto
  • Cello: Richard Dodd, Matt Cooker, Armen Ksajikian and Victor Lawrence
  • Contrabass: Jason Torreano, Frances Senger and Denise Briese
  • Flugelhorn: Gary Grant and Dan Fornero
  • French horn: Rick Todd and Brad Warnaar
  • String orchestrations: Eric Gorfain
  • Trombone: Andrew Martin and Steve Holtman
  • Trumpet: Gary Grant and Dan Fornero
  • Viola: Marda Todd, Piotr Jandule, Tom Tally and David Sage
  • Violins: Eric Gorfain, Daphne Chen, Victoria Lanier, Julie Rogers, Alyssa Park, Audrey Salomon, Terry Glenny, Susan Chatman, Marisa Kuney and Amy Wickman
• "Diamonds from Sierra Leone (Remix)"
  • Guitars: Dave Tozer
  • Keyboards: Tom Craskey
  • Live drums: Michel Gondry
• "We Major"
  • Horns: Donte Winslow
  • Additional vocals: Tony "Penafire" Williams
• "Hey Mama"
  • Additional vocals: John Legend
• "Celebration"
  • Additional vocals: John Legend
  • Bass: Keena "Keynote" Holloway
  • Bass trombone: Bruce Otto
  • Brass arrangements: Jon Brion
  • Cello: Richard Dodd, Matt Cooker, Armen Ksajikian and Victor Lawrence
  • Contrabass: Jason Torreano, Frances Senger and Denise Briese
  • Flugelhorn: Gary Grant and Dan Fornero
  • French horn: Rick Todd and Brad Warnaar
  • Keyboards: Ervin "EP" Pope
  • String arrangements: Jon Brion
  • String orchestrations: Eric Gorfain
  • Trombone: Andrew Martin and Steve Holtman
  • Trumpet: Gary Grant and Dan Fornero
  • Viola: Marda Todd, Piotr Jandule, Tom Tally and David Sage
  • Violins: Eric Gorfain, Daphne Chen, Victoria Lanier, Julie Rogers, Alyssa Park, Audrey Solomon, Terry Glenny, Susan Chatman, Marisa Kuney and Amy Wickman
• "Gone"
  • Cello: Richard Dodd, Matt Cooker, Armen Ksajikian and Victor Lawrence
  • String arrangements: Jon Brion
  • String orchestrations: Eric Gorfain
  • Viola: Marda Todd, Piotr Jandule, Tom Tally and David Sage
  • Violins: Eric Gorfain, Daphne Chen, Victoria Lanier, Julie Rogers, Alyssa Park, Audrey Solomon, Terry Glenny, Susan Chatman, Marisa Kuney and Amy Wickman

Unused tracks

• "Bittersweet Poetry" (featuring John Mayer) (Used as a bonus track on Graduation)
• "Crack Music" (original version containing a verse by The Game) [Appears on The Game's Ghost Unit Mixtape]
• "Back to Basics" (featuring Common)
• "We Can Make It Better" (featuring Talib Kweli, Q-Tip, Common and Rhymefest). For the U.K. album this was included as (Track 21) and the track after it, titled "Late" (Track 22).
• "About An Angel"
• "Gone" (original version containing a verse by Rhymefest and no verses by Cam'Ron and Consequence and no second Kanye verse)

References

1. ^ "Kanye West Gives Media early peak at Late Registration in London". Baller Status (2005-06-24). Retrieved on 2008-05-16.
2. ^ The Top 50 Records of 2005 : Rolling Stone
3. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XXL_Magazine

External links

• Late Registration at Metacritic