Kanye West has never been one to go backward artistically. He’s not a fan of doing something again (unless you count constantly deleting and re-uploading tracks, like he did with last week’s “Real Friends”). So it’s a bit of a surprise that Yeezy returned to the “release a new song every Friday” model that he used in the build-up to his 2010 opus My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
Not that we’re complaining. The G.O.O.D Friday series produced some of the best songs of Kanye West’s career, even if many of the tracks ended up forgotten after never getting a proper release. There are plenty of gems to re-acquaint yourself with now that Kanye’s turning Fridays into events again (of course, Friday is now the worldwide day for new releases, but G.O.O.D. Tuesday doesn’t have the same ring to it).
Among the lesser-known tracks from Kanye’s first Friday fixation are collaborations with Mos Def (“Lord Lord Lord,” “Don’t Look Down”), excellent performances from a pre-public-image-rehabilitation Justin Bieber (“Runaway Love (Remix)”) and the last known sightings of CyHi The Prynce (so many songs).
Even the mostly forgotten supergroup Child Rebel Soldier got in on the action, with Pharrell and Lupe Fiasco joining Kanye for “Don’t Stop.” Take a look at some of the other OG-GF tracks up top and dust off your favorite low-quality YouTube rips.