Kanye West Drops ‘Real Friends,’ ‘No More Parties in LA’ With Kendrick Lamar
As promised, Kanye West kicked off his Every Friday series with a pair of new tracks, “Real Friends” and a snippet of “No More Parties in LA,” the rapper’s first and much anticipated pairing with Kendrick Lamar. The former cut features production by West with assistance from Frank Dukes, Boi-1da and Mobb Deep’s Havoc as well as an appearance by Ty Dolla $ign, while the latter boasts a trademark, soul-sampling Madlib beat. It’s unknown whether the two tracks are destined for West’s long-delayed Swish.
West revealed in Our Vinyl Weighs a Ton that he was an admirer of producers under the Stones Throw umbrella, notably J Dilla and Madlib, and “No More Parties in LA” also marks his first official collaboration with the latter. While Madlib admitted he worked on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Nightmare, none of his beats made it onto the LP itself. However, the “No More Parties in LA” beat and West’s lyrics first surface in bonus footage from Our Vinyl Weighs a Ton.
“Over at the crib you left your Ray Bans / My sheets still orange from your spray tan / No more parties in L.A.,” West says at the 22-minute mark of the short documentary, with West adding of their collaboration, “I just paint the scene of how I felt sitting there with Madlib working on these tracks and just hearing the textures.” The track also utilizes the same sample of Ghostface Killah’s “Mighty Healthy” that West used extensively on his Cruel Summer cut “New God Flow.”
In January 2015, Ty Dolla $ign revealed that he and West previously had a fruitful session together. “[In] like 24 hours, [we recorded] seven songs or nine songs that day. I was like, ‘I’m here with Kanye, I’m not gonna waste my time,'” Ty Dolla $ign told Billboard at the time. “He was open to my input, like, ‘Do whatever you want to do. Here’s your mic. Do you need anything?’ I’m like ‘Awesome! Let’s get it!'” One of the songs West and Ty Dolla $ign worked on during that marathon session was “Only One.”
Soon after West unveiled his new songs, he quickly deleted the track and the tweet that trumpeted its arrival. This was due to a technical glitch, not a change of heart: “Un momento, there was a slight distortion in the main loop within Real Friends,” the perfectionist West told fans on Twitter. “It will be back up shortly. When it’s back up, all rippers please rip the new one instead.”