Graduation

Background

Graduation is the third installment of West's planned tetralogy of education-themed studio albums, which West subsequently later deviated from due to events surrounding the conception of his fourth studio album, 808s & Heartbreak (2008). The album demonstrates yet another distinctive progression in West's musical style and approach to production. After spending the previous year touring the world with Irish rock band U2 on their Vertigo Tour, West became inspired by watching Bono open the stadium tours every night to incredible ovations and sought out to compose anthemic rap songs that could operate more efficiently in large stadiums and arenas. In West's attempt to accomplish this "stadium-status" endeavor, West incorporated layered electronic synthesizers into his hip-hop production, which also finds him utilizing slower tempos, being influenced by the music of the 1980s, and experimenting with electronic music. West was particularly influenced by house music, a subgenre of electronic dance music that first originated in his hometown of Chicago, Illinois in the early 1980s. West has stated that growing up, he would listen to hip-hop music at home or in his car, but when he felt like dancing, he would attend a house club. While he rarely listened to house at home, he still felt it was an important part of his culture and background.

West further broadened his musical palette on Graduation by not limiting himself to his customary use of samples and interpolation from classic soul records and instead drew influences from a far more eclectic range of music genres. Along with house music, Graduation contains samples and music elements of euro-disco, hard rock, electronica, lounge, progressive rock, synth-pop, electro, krautrock, dub, reggae, and dancehall. Also, for much of the third studio album, West modified his style of rapping and adopted a dilatory, exuberant flow in emulation of Bono's operatic singing. West altered his vocabulary, he utilised less percussive consonants for his vocal delivery in favor of smoother vowel harmonies. In addition to U2, West drew inspiration from other arena rock bands such as the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin for the melodies and chord progressions of his songs. In terms of lyricism, he simplifies some of his rhymes after touring with The Rolling Stones on their A Bigger Bang concert tour and discovering he could not captivate the audiences as well with his most complex lyrical themes.

West made a conscious decision to abstain from the widespread recording practice of excessive rap albums saturated with skits and filler like in his prior two albums, feeling that they weakened the album experience, and instead filled Graduation with significantly fewer tracks — in this case 13 (or 14 on the digital version), which would continue with the rest of his other albums such as My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and Yeezus. West cites the rock bands The Killers, Keane, Modest Mouse, and indie-pop singer-songwriter Feist for being among his favorite musicians and having considerably profound influence on the sound of Graduation. Due largely to these factors and the inclusion of layered electronic synthesizers, West believed that his record took hip-hop in a different direction. He also acknowledged that the differences did not in and of themselves make Graduation a good album; however, he felt it was an accurate representation of the music he was listening to and inspired by at that time.

Recording and production

West began working on Graduation immediately after releasing his second studio album Late Registration. By late September 2005, West had already completed three songs for the album, which he intended to contain a total of twelve tracks. Around the time of recording, West would often listen to songs written by folk and country singer-songwriters Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash in hopes of developing methods to augment his word play and storytelling abilities. The former musician had been recommended to West by multiple of his friends, including English disc jockey Samantha Ronson, all of whom claimed his music and the way he dealt with the press reminded them of Dylan. West also listened to his favorite alternative rock bands, including The Killers, Radiohead, Modest Mouse, and Keane, in order to gain new ideas on how to make his hip-hop production style more stadium-friendly. Additionally, West would often test his new songs on his iPod, in his office, in dance clubs and just about anywhere people might listen to his music. He would then make adjustments to the tracks based on feedback he received, repeating the process as many times as necessary.

In comparison to previous albums, Graduation features fewer guest appearances from other recording artists. West elaborated that it was a fully conscious decision to keep his guest vocalists at a minimum, saying that, "When I hear the records of my favorite bands – The Killers or Coldplay – you only hear one voice from start to finish". R&B singers T-Pain and Dwele, New York rappers Mos Def and ALBe. Back, and famed hip-hop record producer DJ Premier are featured in individual tracks primarily to deliver melodic hooks and refrains. However, though he originally intended for Graduation to be completely devoid of guest rap verses, West decided to invite New Orleans rapper Lil Wayne on the track "Barry Bonds". At the time, the two MCs had been working together, with West contributing to the production of Lil Wayne's sixth studio album Tha Carter III. As for the absence of skits, West explained, "There's just serious songs, hooks, chords, and ideas. No special effects or antics ... and no fake Bernie Mac!". West instead decided to record two earthy musical interludes in place of the hip-hop skits. He incorporated African sounds and polyrhythmic percussion into both. However, for unknown reasons, the two musical interludes were omitted from the studio album.

Many songs on Graduation contain background vocals provided by Connie Mitchell of the Australian dance music group Sneaky Sound System. The collaboration came about when West met her bandmates Angus McDonald and Daimon Downey at a diner in Sydney while touring the country with U2 around November 2006. Seeking musical inspiration, West asked McDonald for ideas, who in turn suggested that he be introduced to Mitchell. Upon meeting Mitchell after she arrived at Studios 301 where he was recording music during the tour, West had her sing over a vocal track and quickly took a liking to her voice. U2 singer Bono and guitarist The Edge also complimented Mitchell's singing while visiting the studio. Some time later, Mitchell received a call from West who asked if she could travel to The Record Plant in Los Angeles to begin recording tracks for his third studio album. Mitchell later admitted that while she previously did not know who West was and never really cared for hip-hop music, the collaboration has changed her views.

Musical style

With Graduation, West made a departure from the soul samples of The College Dropout and the heavy orchestration of Late Registration. Motivated by stadium impulses, West ventured towards a more atmospheric soundscape, being imbued with arena rock elements while exploring electronic music. The musical progression arose from West touring the world in 2006 with U2 and the Rolling Stones. The change also came about from him listening to music that encompasses genres such as rock and house. According to Jayson Greene of Stylus Magazine, West had developed a fascination with Euro-disco, a European form of electronic dance music. Going further, a columnist for Slant Magazine asserted that the album's hip-hop beats would be "European-club-worthy" were they stripped of the vocals. Most importantly, Greene perceived that West had developed an affinity with electronic synthesizers. Chicago Tribune music critic Greg Kot commented on the incorporation of synthesizer sounds, saying he viewed Graduation as "an album steeped in keyboard tones, in all their richness and variety". Mark Pytlik of Pitchfork surmised that the album demonstrated a new electronic production style, specifically noting its modulated electronic noises. By contrast, AllMusic's Andy Kellman wrote, "Though the synthesizer use marks a clear, conscious diversion from Kanye's past productions, highlights ... are deeply rooted in the Kanye of old, using nostalgia-inducing samples, elegant pianos and strings, and gospel choirs". Graduation has been regarded as a pop-rap album by music journalists Brad Callas, Joshua Botte of NPR, AbsolutePunk, Vice magazine's Eric Sundermann, Jay Willis of GQ, and The Atlantic's Spencer Korhaber.

West retracted much of the orchestral production that had characterized Late Registration; he replaced the production with heavy, layered electronic synthesizers that feature Gothic tendencies at loud volumes throughout Graduation. West injected distorted synth-chords, house beats, electro-disco rhythms, and a wide array of audio-effects into his hip-hop production. All the while, West buried his signature kicks and snares deep beneath the decomposing layers of synths into the bottom of the mix. Though he continued to use vocal samples, West gleaned them before also pushing the samples underneath the synths, causing them to "sound like voices trapped in a huge machine, not like organic, subliminal connections to a mythical black-music past". As always is the case with his productions, West does not reply nor settle simply on samples alone. Instead, there lies a sense of multi-layered music evidently within each track. Even in new, unfamiliar musical surroundings, West retained both his self-confidence as well as his close attention to sonic detail. As a result of this, the album contains numerous random, semi-audible sounds that may seem challenging to notice during the first few listens. The sounds range from keyboard arpeggios to crowd cheers and hard rock guitars; they act as a supplement for the atypical samples and the layered electronic synths. Throughout Graduation, West included enough subtle instrumental flourishes and studio embellishments to warrant a repeated, close, and careful listening experience. According to Ann Powers from the Los Angeles Times, the album's subtly dark tone was a byproduct of the inevitable toll placed on West as an artist, "an innovator in a genre that he must at least partially destroy to renew", who was torn between his devotion to hip-hop tradition and his "restless artistic drive":

Songs

Graduation opens on a sparse note with "Good Morning", beginning with an echoed, metronomic cowbell beat and a thumping bassline melded with a simple, arpeggiating synthesizer drone. The drone is drowned by the music that arrives at the chorus, which is a conflation of ambient synths and an astral backing choir crafted from a non-verbal vocal sample of "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" by Elton John. "Good Morning" eventually concludes with the voice of Jay-Z reiterating lyrics from "The Ruler's Back", the rapper's own opening track of his sixth studio album The Blueprint. The production for "Champion" features intermittent drops and 808-handclaps and expresses a slight jazz-rock influence, eschewing guitars and trumpets in favor of breezy synths. During the verses, West raps over a constant loop of the words "their eyes" while the chopped-up hook is formed from the question, "Did you realize, that you were a champion?" Both phrases are recontextualized from "Kid Charlemagne" by Steely Dan. The song also sports a reggae-inspired bridge delivered by Connie Mitchell in a distinct toasting vocal style. The soul-fired track "I Wonder" starts off with its piano-based refrain, which contains samples of "My Song" by Labi Siffre. It then proceeds to morph into a myriad of interlaced synths that are impacted by distorted snare drum strokes (taken from "Ambitionz az a Ridah" by 2Pac, which samples the drums from "Pee-Wee's Dance" by Joeski Love) and ethereal electric keyboards. During the bridge, the chord progression changes and the song adopts a heavy string section that emulates the melody of its synths. The composition then enters an instrumental passage and finishes off with a sweeping string arrangement.

"Good Life" utilizes multi-tracked, interlocking vocals that harmonize with guest singer T-Pain's Auto-Tuned voice. The song's melody is based on sampled keyboards from "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)" by pop star Michael Jackson, with the tempo slightly decreased and the pitch raised to the point its sound resembles squealing shrieks. "Barry Bonds" (named after the baseball player) is built on a moaning bass line and Gothic organ, while punctuated by wailing sampled from "Long Red" by Mountain. "Drunk and Hot Girls" exhibits a sluggish waltz pitched with the rhythm of an Eastern European drinking song. It contains a mix of dark orchestration and detuned electronics with elements of "Sing Swan Song" by German progressive rock band Can. West claimed that while listening to their song, he heard the words "drunk and hot girls" rather than the actual "drunken hot ghost" lyrics. Rather than rap, West and guest artist Mos Def sing along to the song's melody. Opening with a gradual, rising crescendo of symphonic strings, "Flashing Lights" emits synth twinklings before transforming into a moderately-paced, synth-driven beat. After the introduction, in which Mitchell's processed vocals repeat the titular hook four times, West raps the two verses, each one followed by the chorus sung by Dwele coupled with the hook. Following a break, the song enters a passage where its heavily manipulated hook echoes in and out before the coda draws the composition to a close. "Stronger" is built around a sample of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" by Daft Punk, while its echoing deep, hallow drums affect the electronic sound.

Lyrics and themes

In comparison to previous albums, which were largely driven by observational commentary on matters pertaining to social welfare, Graduation is more introspective in nature and addresses personal themes. West stated that he wanted to make inspirational music and placed more focus on individual perspective and experience that listeners could connect with in an attempt to create "people's theme songs". Dismayed that the messages behind his complex lyricism were frequently lost on listeners and did not carry well during live performances, West made an attempt to simplify his lyrics and use more simplistic rhyme schemes for more straightforward verses while concentrating on speaking volumes with sparser wording on Graduation. Having committed a significant amount of time towards elevating his storytelling abilities by listening to folk musicians, West manages to form a lyrical narrative within nearly every song on the album. West dedicated a majority of the album towards conducting an analysis himself and conveying his ambivalent outlook on his newfound wealth and fame. As such, West's subversive songwriting fluctuates between playful self-aggrandizement and critical self-doubt. While confident, extroverted and celebratory at face value, many songs contained on Graduation were thematically distanced and retained melancholic subtext. Some music critics remarked that compounded with West's urgent, emotive rapping style, the record sounded as if he were experiencing an existential crisis.

Good Morning primarily features motivational lyrics about someone achieving their goals, but also touches on celebrity status and culture, and West's negative outlook on it. The free-associative "Champion" is also primarily composed of motivational lyrics, but West also briefly touches on the difficult relationship he had with his father–who divorced from his mother when he was just three-years-old–eventually reaching the conclusion that even with their ups and downs, in the end, his father was a champion in his eyes. West described "Stronger" as an "emancipation", as he uses the song to vent his frustration over mistakes he has made in the past. He describes his tribulations with music critics and media causing his return as a "Stronger" rapper, as the song title implies. "I Wonder" carries an introspective tone, retaining a chorus about finding one's dreams, while West uses the verses to describe the struggle a person experiences in determining the meaning behind their life and achieving those dreams. Inspired by watching Bono open stadium tours, West concentrated on speaking volumes without using too many words on the song and delivers his raps in an exuberant, staccato manner. Using the same vocal styling, "Flashing Lights" tells the operatic narrative of man contemplating the complexities of a tragic relationship. "Can't Tell Me Nothing" serves as West's reflection on his fame and is characterized by bitter remorse and defiant self-awareness. West begins the song by expounding his conflicted feelings regarding wealth and desire, describing a compulsion to spend that overwhelms any and all other objectives in life. He ties this into his perceived overall inability to keep himself together even as he grows into an increasingly prominent figure in the public eye.

Artwork

West collaborated with Japanese contemporary artist Takashi Murakami to oversee the art direction of Graduation as well as design the cover art for the album's accompanying singles. Often called "the Warhol of Japan", Murakami's surrealistic visual art is characterized by cartoonish creatures that appear friendly and cheerful at first glance, but possess dark, twisted undertones. The collaboration between the two came about when West visited Murakami's Kaikai Kiki studio during a brief trip to Asaka, Japan. The album's artwork expresses colorful, pastel imagery influenced by Murakami's affiliation with Superflat, a post-modern art movement influenced by manga and anime. Its production process took place over the course of several weeks, with West constantly visualizing new images and emailing the ideas to Murakami and his team. Bringing the educational theme expressed by West's previous albums to a close, the visual plotline of the images contained within the liner notes lead up to a graduation ceremony that takes places within a fictional college institution situated within a futuristic metropolis called Universe City. Murakami explained the metaphor behind the artwork saying:

The cover is based on Kanye's theme of student life. School. It's a place of dreams, of righteousness, a place to have fun. It's also occasionally a place where you experience the rigid dogma of the human race. Kanye's music scrapes sentimentality and aggressiveness together like sandpaper, and he uses his grooves to unleash this tornado that spins with the zeitgeist of the times. I too wanted to be swept up and spun around in that tornado.

The artwork's storyline centers around "Dropout Bear", West's anthropomorphic teddy bear mascot. The story begins on a rainy day with Dropout being awoken by his alarm clock, and after realising he is running late, runs out of his apartment to his car, modeled after a DeLorean. When the car's engine dies, he is forced to find an alternative means of transportation. Dropout attempts to hail a cab but it speeds right past him, soaking him with puddle water. He then tries to get onto a metro rail but just misses it as it pulls away. Left with no other options, Dropout is reduced to pursuing his goal on foot. As he races down sidewalks, populated by multi-eyed, living mushrooms, Dropout is pursued by a monstrous rain cloud that attempts to swallow him whole. Eventually, Dropout Bear arrives at the university and makes it to his ceremony just in time to stand before his colleagues, a wide variety of anthropomorphic creatures like himself. The visual story concludes with Dropout Bear being shot out of a cannon from the university into the sky into another stratosphere on the back cover.

Marketing

While hosting a listening session for his second studio album Late Registration on August 3, 2005, at Sony Music Studios, West revealed that he wanted to schedule the release of Graduation sometime around October 2006. Several months later, on March 28, 2007, West appeared on the Los Angeles radio station Power 106. He said that he was working on his third album and Common's seventh album Finding Forever and rapped a few lyrics from one of his songs in a cappella. On May 11, it was announced that the release date for Graduation was September 18. West debuted the album's lead single "Can't Tell Me Nothing" on the New York radio station Hot 97 on May 15. He then released a free mixtape under the same name onto the Internet on May 27. The mixtape features preview clips of songs that would appear on Graduation and showcases various artists signed onto West's record label GOOD Music as well as collaborations with other unaffiliated musicians. It also contains "Us Placers", the debut song of Child Rebel Soldier, a supergroup West formed with Lupe Fiasco and Pharrell.

At the end of May, Island Def Jam pushed forward the release date for Graduation up from September to an unspecified late August date, a decision that West first announced on the introductory track of his Can't Tell Me Nothing mixtape. On July 19, the album's release date was changed once more and moved to September 11, 2007, the same US release date as rapper 50 Cent's third studio album Curtis. When first presented with the proposal of his label moving the release date of his album yet again as well as the idea of a sales competition between him and 50 Cent, West initially expressed his indifference towards the thought, saying, "When I heard that thing about the debate, I thought that was the stupidest thing. When my album drops and 50's album drops, everybody wins because you're gonna get a lot of good music at the same time". However, then Def Jam president and CEO Jay Z welcomed competition, feeling that it would be prosperous for hip-hop, and the date became permanent.

The album's release generated much publicity over a sales competition with 50 Cent's Curtis. Three months prior to the September 11 release date, West extended his gratitude towards 50 Cent for the enthusiasm and excitement the friendly competition had produced. Though confident that he would emerge victorious, West said that he would be perfectly fine with losing to 50 Cent, stating that he would rather "be #2 on that day rather than come out and be #1 on a day nobody cares about". In an interview for USA Today, 50 Cent expressed his view on the idea of a sales competition, stating "It's great marketing – for Kanye West. But I sell way more records than Kanye West, and I generate way more interest than Kanye West. They think they can match us up, but they'll find out when that week goes by and the sales come back. This is no rivalry". "Mine will sell and his will still be on the shelf", 50 Cent told Rolling Stone. On August 10, 50 Cent confirmed during an interview with SOHH that he would end his career as a solo recording artist if Graduation were to sell more copies than Curtis in the United States. However, 50 Cent later retracted his statement within an MTV interview due to his contract agreements with Aftermath Entertainment and Interscope Records. But most retailers and radio programmers interviewed picked West, whose single, "Stronger", was Number Six on Billboard's Hot 100 -while none of 50's four singles climbed higher than the thirty-second spot.

Commercial performance

On the first day of its release, Graduation sold over 437,000 copies. The album debuted at number one on the US Billboard 200 chart, grossing a total of over 957,000 copies in its first week in the United States alone. Graduation became West's second consecutive studio album to top the Billboard 200 and also debuted at number-one on the album charts in the United Kingdom and Canada. It was within the very same week that "Stronger" topped the Billboard Hot 100, selling over 205,000 digital downloads and giving West his third number-one single. The album registered the best first-week sales totals of any record released within the last two years, with the last being West's own Late Registration.

Additionally, Graduation became ranked as the 15th highest sales week for an album since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking data in 1991, as well as the highest sales week at the time of its release for an album since 50 Cent's The Massacre (2005). It also set the record for the largest week of an album digitally downloaded, registering over 133,000 paid downloads, beating Maroon 5's previous set record of 102,000 for It Won't Be Soon Before Long. Graduation's first week sales of 957,000 and Curtis's first week sales of 691,000 marked only the second time ever since the inception of Nielsen SoundScan that two albums debuted within the same week with totals surpassing 623,000 copies in the United States. The first occurrence of such an event was in September 1991, when Guns N' Roses conjunctively released Use Your Illusion I, which sold 685,000 copies, and Use Your Illusion II, which sold 770,000 copies. The first week sales totals of Graduation and Curtis have outsold the first week sales totals of Guns N' Roses' two albums. 50 Cent showed graciousness in regards to his defeat. In a statement released to the Associated Press, he said, "I am very excited to have participated in one of the biggest album release weeks in the last two years. Collectively, we have sold hundreds of thousands of units in our debut week. This marks a great moment for hip-hop music, one that will go down in history". After years of slumping sales, the album competition between the two releases and the resulting record breaking performances both albums demonstrated was considered to be a "fantastic day for hip-hop".

In its second week on the Billboard 200, Graduation outsold Curtis, 226,000 copies to 143,000. By the next week, on October 3, 2007, the former had sold a total of 1.3 million copies in the US. By year's end, Graduation was the third most-downloaded and best-selling album of 2007 on iTunes Store. Graduation became West's third consecutive studio album to sell over 2 million copies in the United States, and it was certified octuple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for shipping 8 million copies on July 17, 2026. As of June 14, 2013, Nielsen Soundscan reported that the album has since grossed over 2.7 million copies in the US. The 957,000 copies sold in the first week of Graduation's release stood as the sixth largest first week sales in hip-hop history up to January 7, 2019.

Critical reception

According to the review aggregator Metacritic, Graduation received "generally favorable reviews" based on a weighted average score of 79 out of 100 from 32 critic scores.

Reviewing for Spin in November 2007, Charles Aaron hailed Graduation as "mesmerizing and alienating, like all the purest forms of pop culture", with music in the tradition of Puff Daddy's late 1990s pop-rap, but more skilled: "Its music is a rush of designer adrenaline, its personality insatiable self-justification. It's the paradigm ya love to hate". Pitchfork critic Mark Pytlik complimented the accessibility of West's sonic experimentations, finding it impressive and innovative how he assembled seemingly disparate elements on the songs. Greg Tate, writing in The Village Voice, dubbed him "the most genuinely confessional MC in hip-hop today" and said, "bouts of narcissism aside, Graduation contains killer pieces of production". Stylus Magazine's Jayson Greene said it "serves as a document of West's maturation" and, "musically, at least, it's the most accomplished thing he's ever done". In Rolling Stone, Nathan Brackett wrote of West's evolving and increasingly experimental, genre-bending production and said although he lacks Jay-Z's "formal mastery", West has "grown as a writer ... given the lousy year hip-hop has had, the music needs his spazzed-out, neurotic creativity more than ever". Josh Tyrangiel from Time wrote, "West plunders the best [samples] and meticulously layers every track with enough surprises that there are thrills and discoveries a dozen listens in".

Some reviewers were more qualified in their praise. For MSN Music, Robert Christgau deemed Graduation a "minor success" in which "every single track offers up its momentary pleasures—choruses that make you say yeah on songs you've already found wanting, confessional details and emotional aperçus on an album that still reduces to quality product when they're over". However, he felt West spent too much of the album rationalizing his obsession with his fame in sketchy fashion and occasionally awkward rhymes, "little stuff like his failure to convert 'this'-'crib'-'shit'-'live'-'serious' into a rhyme" on "Champion" or "'at bay at a distance' into an idiom" on "Big Brother".

Dorian Lynskey from The Guardian said West often "undercuts rap cliches with wit and ambivalence", but observed some disappointing lyrics such as on "Can't Tell Me Nothing", which he said revealed his limited perspective. Slant Magazine critic Eric Henderson found West's lyrics "only transparently expressive", saying that the songs' hooks "grab your ear on the first listen (notably bypassing your brain), your balls on the second, and your soul from there on out", and described West's production as having "adopted a beefy, synth-glam sheen". Dave Heaton from PopMatters felt that though the album is good, it lacks the epochal feel of Late Registration, with songs that "aren't as richly dressed" and he claimed that West "doesn't seem to be trying as hard".

Rankings

Graduation was named to year-end lists for 2007 by multiple publications. USA Today ranked it as the best album of the year, with the staff lauding the "musical and thematic variety" as well as "its articulate and witty rhyming". The album was picked by readers of Entertainment Weekly as the best of 2007, receiving 41 percent of the votes on the magazine's year-end poll. Graduation was listed by Amazon, My List Pad, and PopMatters as the third best album of the year, while it was also selected as one of 2007's top five albums by Blender, LAS Magazine, Rolling Stone, and Spin. The album was voted in at number six on The Village Voice's Pazz & Jop poll of the year, receiving 91 mentions. On the Idolator poll for 2007, which surveyed 452 critics, Graduation was ranked at number eight.

Graduation later appeared on numerous other best albums lists. Pitchfork listed the album at number 87 on their ranking of the best albums of the 2000s, and Complex placed it at number 2 on their list. Rolling Stone listed Graduation at number 45, and it finished second on its readers list. Complex ranked the album at number one on their list of the 100 Best Albums of the Complex Decade (2002–2012). Graduation was later included on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list, landing at 204 on the 2020 update. It also appeared at 470 on NME's The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time 2013 list.

Industry awards

Graduation won the award of Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Album at the American Music Awards of 2008, while also counting towards West earning the award for Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Artist. With his two wins at the ceremony, West was the second biggest winner, behind Chris Brown with three awards to his name. West told the crowd during his acceptance speech that despite winning the Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Album award, he wanted to give the award to Lil Wayne instead. Though this stands as one of the multiple times that West has given an award of his to someone else, West also has a frequent history of complaining when he does not win an award.

At the 50th Annual Grammy Awards, Graduation won the award for Best Rap Album, becoming West's third consecutive album to do so. The album was also nominated for Album of the Year at the ceremony, making West the only artist in Grammy history to receive a nomination for the award from all of their first three studio albums. West claimed in an interview that he felt confident towards Graduation winning the award. The album was considered the favorite to win Album of the Year, and its failure to win was considered by many publications to be a snub. At the same ceremony, "Stronger" and "Good Life" were awarded Best Rap Solo Performance and Best Rap Song, respectively. The latter also received a nomination for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration, while "Can't Tell Me Nothing" was nominated for Best Rap Song. The six awards that the album led to West contending for at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards were among his total of eight nominations for the ceremony, making West the most nominated music artist of that show. Graduation was a contender for numerous other industry awards.

Legacy

The critical reception and commercial success of Graduation left a profound influence on both hip-hop culture and popular music. West has earned praise for his ability to appeal to diverse music audiences such as indie-rock listeners and rave enthusiasts without alienating his core hip-hop audiences. Collaborative tracks such as "Homecoming" signaled the diversification of mainstream hip-hop and its intertwining with the genres of alternative and indie-rock in subsequent years. In addition, songs such as "Everything I Am" have been cited as "the best example of the soulful and introspective atmosphere that came to dominate the rap world, from Drake to The Weeknd". Irish rock band U2 has imparted that touring with West on their Vertigo Tour in turn had a significant effect on their own music as well in regards to the band's twelfth studio album No Line on the Horizon (2009). Lead singer Bono elaborated that West's rapping inspired him to utilize more percussive consonants for his songwriting and vocal performance.

West's third studio album, particularly with its two hit singles "Stronger" and "Flashing Lights", has been attributed to not only encouraging other hip-hop artists to incorporate house and electronica elements into their music, but also for playing a role in the revival of disco and electro-infused club music in the late-2000s. "Flashing Lights" was a leading part of a wave of synthesizer-driven music which combined danceable electro beats with an accessible pop format. It was succeeded by the high chart placings and multi-platinum sales of singles by artists and bands ranging from "Just Dance" (2008) by singer Lady Gaga to "Right Round" (2009) by rapper Flo Rida.

Graduation marked a musical progression towards synth-based production in regards to the art of crafting hip-hop beats. The studio album demonstrated West's shift from sample-orientated hip-hop production and more towards digital synths and drum machines generated by digital audio workstations (DAW). While samples are present throughout the album, they were fewer in number and not nearly as prominent. As hip-hop producer Anthony Kilhoffer recalled to Billboard in 2017 for Graduation's 10th anniversary, "I think it was the first time having a heavy hand in the use of electronic music in hip-hop. Previous to that it was very R&B influenced, tracks like 'Stronger' and 'Flashing Lights' contained very electronic type of elements. This was way before EDM became mainstream, and marked the end of the jersey-wearing era in hip-hop". Since Graduation's release, countless other record producers have followed suit in blurring the lines of conventional hip-hop with the incorporation of electronic production. This synth-driven production approach has since been adopted by artists including Future, Young Chop, and Metro Boomin.

Track listing

Credits adapted from liner notes.

Notes:

^[a] – co-production

^[b] – additional production

^[c] – extended outro co-production

^[d] – bridge section

Sample credits:

"Good Morning" contains samples from "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" performed by Elton John.

"Champion" contains elements of "Kid Charlemagne" performed by Steely Dan.

"Stronger" contains a sample of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" performed by Daft Punk and master use of "Cola Bottle Baby" performed by Edwin Birdsong.

"I Wonder" contains a sample from "My Song" performed by Labi Siffre.

"Good Life" contains a sample of "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)" performed by Michael Jackson.

"Barry Bonds" contains a sample of "Long Red" performed by Mountain.

"Drunk and Hot Girls" contains elements of "Sing Swan Song" performed by Can.

"Everything I Am" contains elements of "If We Can't Be Lovers" performed by Prince Phillip Mitchell and "Bring the Noise" performed by Public Enemy.

"The Glory" contains elements of "Save the Country" performed by Laura Nyro and contains a sample of "Long Red" performed by Mountain.

Personnel

Credits are adapted from liner notes.