Photo by Philey Sanneh. Courtesy of DONDA
Everyone has different opinions about Kanye West’s new album, Donda, but one thing is undeniable: it’s long as hell. The final tracklist has 27 songs on it, including four tracks with alternate versions, and the total runtime is a whopping one hour and 48 minutes. It’s longer than a lot of feature length films.
Three years removed from his 7-song album experiment, Kanye has changed his philosophy when it comes to brevity. Instead of focusing on making a concise body of work, he went the opposite direction and gave us everything.
In the streaming era, many people interact with albums differently than they used to. After an initial listen to a new project, a lot of fans save their favorite songs to playlists and rarely revisit the rest of the album. So with Donda, Kanye offered up as many options as he could. Don’t like the version of “Jesus Lord” without The Lox? That’s OK, you can listen to “Jesus Lord Pt. 2” instead. Tired of slogging through a two-hour album and don’t want to hear songs like “Donda chant” and “24”? Copy the album over to a new playlist and remove them. We’re in a new era where you can customize albums to your liking.
A lot of complaints about Donda have revolved around its length, and a common narrative has surfaced: “There’s a very good album hiding under there if you trimmed some of the fat.” With that in mind, four members of the Complex Music team—Andre Gee, Jessica McKinney, Eric Skelton, and Jordan Rose—put together our own custom tracklists with the goal of creating alternate versions of Donda that we’ll want to keep listening to over and over.
Jordan's custom 'Donda'
1. “Donda” f/ Stalone & Tony Williams
2. “Believe What I Say”
3. “Junya, Pt. 2” f/ Playboi Carti & Ty Dolla Sign
4. “Praise God” f/ Baby Keem & Travis Scott
5. “OK OK” f/ Fivio Foreign, Lil Yachty & Rooga
6. “Off the Grid” f/ Fivio Foreign & Playboi Carti
7. “Heaven & Hell”
8. “Jesus Lord, Pt. 2” f/ Jay Electronica & The Lox
9. “Jonah” f/ Lil Durk & Vory
10. “Keep My Spirit Alive” f/ Conway the Machine, Westside Gunn, & KayCyy
11. “Pure Souls” f/ Roddy Ricch & Shenseea
12. “Moon” f/ Don Toliver & Kid Cudi
13. “Hurricane” f/ Lil Baby & The Weeknd
14. “Lord I Need You” f/ Sunday Service Choir
15. “Remote Control” f/ Young Thug
16. “Jail” f/ Jay-Z
17. “No Child Left Behind” f/ Sunday Service Choir & Vory
18. “24” f/ Sunday Service Choir
My biggest gripe with Donda is that the sequencing is all over the place. Unlike the version he played at the second listening event in Atlanta, the final draft of the album sounds pieced together like a playlist rather than one cohesive story. So I attempted to give my version of Donda some semblance of a beginning, middle, and end, while also making it more concise. I thought “Donda” was a perfect opener, not just because it’s the title track, but also because it feels like the opening of a sermon. This isn’t Jesus Is King, but Kanye is still incorporating evangelical elements into his music, so having his late mother open it felt appropriate. Later on, I use Baby Keem and Travis Scott’s verses on “Praise God” as a segue to ease us into the bar-centric rager songs like “OK OK,” “Heaven & Hell,” and one of the best songs on the album, “Off the Grid.”
“Pure Souls” is my favorite song on the album, so I used it as the centerpiece to get back into the more gospel-sounding tracks like “Moon” and “Hurricane,” which sound like one song that was split in half. “Hurricane,” of course, is a cut from Kanye’s long-fabled album Yandhi that was never officially released. The second listening session might have influenced me in how I think the album should end, but “Jail” followed by “No Child Left Behind” just feels like its natural conclusion—I still have no idea why Kanye would make it the second track in the final version. Sticking with a spiritual theme, “24” literally sounds like something you would hear at the end of a church service, so that’s why I wanted to close with it. I removed songs like “Donda Chant,” “Come to Life,” and “New Again” because they felt repetitive and I didn’t think they added much to the album. I also thought Pop Smoke’s “Tell The Vision” was an unthoughtful posthumous inclusion, so I left it out, along with some of the alternative versions of other songs like “Jail, Pt. 2” because I think they were unnecessary to begin with.
Andre's custom 'Donda'
[Disc 1]
1. “Donda Chant” f/ Syleena Johnson
2. “Junya, Pt. 2” f/ Playboi Carti & Ty Dolla Sign
3. “Believe What I Say”
4. “Praise God” f/ Baby Keem & Travis Scott
5. “Off The Grid” f/ Fivio Foreign & Playboi Carti
6. “New Again” f/ Chris Brown
7. “Ok Ok, Pt. 2” f/ Rooga & Shenseea
8. “Remote Control” f/ Young Thug
9. “Pure Souls” f/ Roddy Ricch & Shenseea
10. “Keep My Spirit Alive” f/ Conway the Machine, Westside Gunn, & KayCyy
11. “Hurricane” f/ Lil Baby & The Weeknd
[Disc 2]
1. “Donda” f/ Stalone & Tony Williams
2. “God Breathed” f/ Vory
3. “Jail” f/ Jay-Z
4. “Heaven and Hell”
5. “Jesus Lord, Pt. 2” f/ Jay Electronica & The Lox
6. “Jonah” f/ Lil Durk & Vory
7. “24” f/ Sunday Service Choir
8. “Moon” f/ Don Toliver & Kid Cudi
9. “Come To Life”
10. “No Child Left Behind” f/ Sunday Service Choir & Vory
In typical Kanye fashion, there are some complications with Donda that I had fun trying to mend. Donda was billed as a gospel album (or was at least expected to be such since Kanye swore off secular music) but there are more than a couple of moments on the album that harken to his pre-2019 vibes. So I tried to switch things up by splitting the project into a double album.
I saw Kanye tweet an assertion that Kanye without the ego is “just Ye,” so I made a Kanye side (traditional Kanye) and a Ye side (more solemn, gospel leaning tracks). The goal was to go from uptempo rap to smoother, sparser songs on both tracklists. It’s obviously not a perfect exercise, as there are some divine references on almost every song. But songs like “24” and “God Breathed” feel, to me anyway, like songs that would more easily play in a church service or church function than “Believe What I Say” or “Junya Pt. 2.” (Imagine the collective gasp from church elders hearing “throat coat from a throat goat.”)
I took off “Tell The Vision” because it was an odd choice for the project, and used “Jail Pt. 1” over “Pt. 2” for what should be obvious reasons. “Jesus Lord Pt. 2” is on the project to have the Lox present, and “Ok Ok Pt. 2” is there so Shenseea can get some shine as the only woman soloist on the project. I also used “Junya Pt. 2” so Ty Dolla $ign’s small but memorable part is included on the project.
Eric's custom 'Donda'
1. “Donda” f/ Stalone & Tony Williams
2. “Hurricane” f/ Lil Baby & The Weeknd
3. “Off the Grid” f/ Fivio Foreign & Playboi Carti
4. “Praise God” f/ Baby Keem & Travis Scott
5. “Jonah” f/ Lil Durk & Vory
6. “Believe What I Say”
7. “Junya Pt. 2” f/ Playboi Carti & Ty Dolla Sign
8. “Remote Control” f/ Young Thug
9. “Moon” f/ Don Toliver & Kid Cudi
10. “Pure Souls” f/ Roddy Ricch & Shenseea
11. “Keep My Spirit Alive” f/ Conway the Machine, Westside Gunn, & KayCyy
12. “Lord I Need You” f/ Sunday Service Choir
13. “Jesus Lord Pt. 2” f/ Jay Electronica & The Lox
14. “Jail” f/ Jay-Z
15. “No Child Left Behind” f/ Sunday Service Choir & Vory
16. “Come to Life”
When it comes to album lengths, 16 songs has always been a sweet spot for me. That’s enough space to get out a complete thought, and it leaves plenty of room for variation without getting too overwhelming and repetitive. So I cut out some songs that are fine on their own, but bog down the overall listening experience, like “24,” “Tell the Vision,” and “New Again.” Then I swapped in two of the “Pt. 2” songs that I enjoyed more than their OG versions (Ty Dolla Sign sounds great on “Junya Pt. 2” and I love hearing The Lox on “Jesus Lord Pt. 2”). Next, I adjusted the sequencing. “Donda” works as a perfect opener, so I put that first and removed “Donda Chant,” which has no replay value. I love albums that start strong with a few hits right off the bat, so “Hurricane” and “Off the Grid” come next, followed by a stretch of mostly upbeat and melodic songs that flow well from one to another. The album hits a stretch of more lyrical rap records from tracks 11 to 14, before it comes to a dramatic conclusion with “No Child Left Behind” and “Come to Life.”
Jessica's custom 'Donda'
1. “Donda Chant” f/ Syleena Johnson
2. “Jail” f/ Jay-Z
3. “Off the Grid” f/ Fivio Foreign & Playboi Carti
4. “Hurricane” f/ Lil Baby & The Weeknd
5. “Lord I Need You” f/ Sunday Service Choir
6. “Jonah” f/ Lil Durk & Vory
7. “Praise God” f/ Baby Keem & Travis Scott
8. “Moon” f/ Don Toliver & Kid Cudi
9. “Ok Ok” f/ Sheneseaa, Lil Yachty & Rooga
10. “Jesus Lord” f/ Jay Electronica
11. “Heaven And Hell”
12. “Pure Souls” f/ Roddy Ricch & Shenseea
13. “Believe What I Say”
14. “Keep My Spirit Alive” f/ Conway The Machine, Westside Gunn, & KayCyy
15. “No Child Left Behind” f/ Sunday Service Choir & Vory
16. “Come To Life”
Donda is a good album as is, but it could benefit from some trimming and rearranging. The ideal length for this project should be around 15 to 16 songs. Although the opening track “Donda Chant” is just an interlude, I think it’s still an effective way of opening the album. “Jail,” “Off the Grid,” and “Hurricane,” remain at the top of the tracklist because they’re strong records and sound good in the order they were already in. I shifted the rest of the album based on preference and what makes sense in terms of storytelling. After “Hurricane,” I brought “Lord I Need You” to the fifth spot. The song was originally at No. 20 on the album, but I think it deserved to be higher up. Not only is it a break in pace from the more uptempo tracks, but the vulnerability Kanye displays sets the tone for where he goes next. The rest of the order is similar to the original, but I removed 10 tracks. Instead of ending with the part two versions of songs, the album ends with “No Child Left Behind” and “Come to Life.” Aside from length and order, some of the features needed to be rearranged, too. Shenseea’s verse on “Pure Souls” was dropped, but her verse on “Ok Ok Pt. 2” was added to the first version of the song, behind Lil Yachty and in front of Rooga. There was way too much music to digest on the official Donda tracklist, so I cut it down to a more concise version that’s something that’s a little more accessible.