Over the years, Kanye’s fourth album has continued to hold a special place in my music library. He couldn’t sing-the Achilles' heel of 808s-a flawed man with an imperfect technique is fitting of such a vulnerable album, but it adds a flavor that even a master singer isn’t able to reproduce. I couldn’t truly be welcomed into heartbreak before it felt foreign, weird, but the once strange place had suddenly felt like home. The very songs that I once wished to be filled with buoyant boasts, slick brags and inspirational lyricism sounded perfect as Auto-Tune drenched life anecdotes from a man unafraid to wear the shattered heart on his microphone. A year can change a lot, especially when a woman enters and exits your life like some beautiful, dark, twisted fantasy. This was the coldest winter of my adolescence, an age of love and heartache, conflict and pain, guilt and longing-emotional scars that can be relieved by the ointment of music. It was a little over a year after the release of 808s & Heartbreak, the winter of my graduation year, when I tried the album once again. This was a completely new Kanye, a singing Kanye, a tragic Kanye-the darkness of his 808s, the bleakness of his heartbreak didn’t resonate with my 17-year-old desire for the old Kanye. My heart sunk into the sole of my shoe when he redirected and renamed Good Ass Job, but I wasn’t prepared for him to completely revamp his artistry.