Runaway - A review from a former fan.

I was just gonna tweet about this but I guess I should blog about it instead cos I have a a few things to say.
I used to be huge on Kanye West. When College Dropout dropped (in my opinion still his best album), I was so buzzed. He was only the third rap artist whose album I could sit down with and listen to from head to toe without getting bored (in case you want to know the other two are Eminem's The Marshall Mathers LP and Ludacris' Word Of Mouf). So I really had high hopes for him. From there my luvv for his work has been steadily fading, up to the point where I joined the world in calling him an asshole during the Taylor Swift affair, even though I've spent my whole time in music making excuses for Michael Jackson and Eminem. I still haven't listened to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy in its entirety. I just can't bring myself to, especially since I haven't really taken to any of the tracks from the album. It's been a lot of people's album of 2010, but it doesn't even make my top 10.
Anyway this isn't about the album, it's about a video from the album. Or a video developed around the album. Let me start this way. When I saw the VMA performance of Runaway I didn't like the song or the suit. I did like the ambience of the performance though, it looked quite okay. Then today I tuned in to BET (which I rarely do) and saw the full length video named after the song. At 33 minutes it rather long, but that wouldn't have been a problem if it had been engaging. Instead it drags in so many places. And the few lines of dialogue, while being memorable as quotes in their own right, were delivered poorly. Nicki Minaj's introduction was horrible (in my opinion she should drop that overblown British accent entirely, we are not amused) and The Phoenix was beautiful without looking phoenixey (if that's even a word)
For all its faults, it is a beautiful video. Although you know a banquet would never really be held a room so large as to be unwelcoming, the scene did look pretty amazing. The ballerinas were beautiful, but that's because ballerinas always are beautiful, and had nothing to do with Kanye's artistry. I liked the line about never believing what you hear on the news, and his serenading her on an MPC was really cool.
The one thing I really really like about the video is the overall tone of sadness that pervades it. The one thing I really don't like about it is it's another portrayal of the extreme hubris that pervades the Kanye West persona. That said, it is undoubtedly a unnecessary marketing move, as Kanye will sell, crappy but annoyingly impressive video or not.