Hey, remember how excited you were for a new Kanye West album when The Life of Pablo dropped on Tidal? It's time to get psyched all over again, because there will be another new Kanye West album in summer 2016, according to West himself. The big question is, will this album be a Life of Pablo sequel or something else entirely? It's not like West is dropping any clues. He announced the news with a simple tweet and then returned to his regularly scheduled Twitter rambling.
The process behind The Life of Pablo's release might offer up a few clues about West's new album though. Given the short time span between the release of the summer album (actual date to be announced — probably on the actual release date) and Life of Pablo, as well as the many changes to Life of Pablo's track list, it would make sense for this latest album to feature songs that were recorded for Life of Pablo, but didn't fit the album's theme. After all, even now that it has been released Life of Pablo is still evolving. The album isn't for sale, and the streaming version on Tidal has been tweaked more than once since it premiered.
West allowed his fans into the strange and messy process behind assembling Life of Pablo via Twitter, where fans watched as the album title changed from Waves to Swish to The Life of Pablo. The track list changed as well, growing from 10 songs to 18, with a few leaked tracks like "Fall Out of Heaven" still hanging out in music limbo, waiting to be included in a future album or forgotten altogether. There is also an alternate version of "Wolves" featuring Sia — she performed the song with West on Saturday Night Live — that is in a similar state of musical purgatory.
It certainly feels like West has plenty of material on Life of Pablo 's cutting room floor to stitch together into a new album in time for summer, but West is nothing if not full of surprises. There were three years between his seventh studio album, Yeezus, and his eighth album, The Life of Pablo. Who knows how much material the prolific West has piled up. Remixes, alternate versions of songs, and songs that haven't been completed yet could make up his ninth album.
Adding fuel to the sequel rumors is the fact that West is no stranger to producing album sequels. Back in 2005 and 2006 he released Freshman Adjustment Vol. 1 & 2. Maybe West has decided The Life of Pablo still has more to say — or maybe he is going to turn his fascinating Twitter rants into a spoken word album. In the world of West, anything can happen.
