808s & Heartbreak

jeff bhasker was a substitute keyboardist on west's glow in the dark tour when west tapped him to co-produce and write on nearly half the album. recorded across three weeks in september and october 2008 at glenwood studios in burbank and avex in honolulu, bhasker handled keyboards for the entire record and co-produced five songs including the singles. west's mentor no i.d. was working on tracks for jay-z's blueprint 3 in hawaii when west claimed "heartless" mid-session, redirecting the blueprint 3 material into 808s.[07][04][01]

bhasker applied auto-tune live in the studio during the glow in the dark tour when west wanted to perform the t-pain part of "good life," enabling west to sing through processing in real time. the production used roland tr-909 more than the titular 808, with engineer andrew dawson running the "love lockdown" kick through a sony dat machine, overloading it for distortion that made the final mix.[07][02]

west's 2005 contract with roc-a-fella, following the success of college dropout, gave roc-a-fella options over his next six albums and ownership of the copyright forever. universal acquired roc-a-fella in 2004 and released 808s under the def jam and roc-a-fella imprints on november 24, 2008. def jam owned the masters to west's albums through the mid-2010s, with copyright credits indicating west regained ownership starting with 2013's yeezus.[02][01]

west became an avid fan of kid cudi's 2008 mixtape a kid named cudi, especially "day 'n' nite," and surprised cudi with a phone call asking him to fly to hawaii. cudi, who had signed to west's good music label, co-wrote four songs on 808s including the chorus for "heartless," with west telling rolling stone cudi's writing was "pure and natural and important." no i.d., west's former mentor, was working on blueprint 3 tracks with west in hawaii when west stopped mid-session on "heartless" and claimed it for his own album.[09][07]

t-pain was recruited by west towards the end of the project as a coach for using auto-tune, with west telling t-pain he had listened to rappa ternt sanga and figured out it was "a bunch of love songs with a shit load of bass," which became the concept for 808s. jon brion introduced west to using the roland tr-808 to evoke emotion, a concept west applied by manipulating the 808's pitch to produce distorted sounds he called "heartbreak."[06][01]

when 808s was previewed, collaborators and critics immediately drew comparisons to common's electric circus, the 2002 experimental departure from west's labelmate on the same roc-a-fella and def jam structure. electric circus fused hip hop with rock, electronic, and neo soul, sold under 300,000 copies, and was quickly abandoned by mca after it fell off the charts, becoming the cautionary tale of what happens when a chicago rapper leaves the script.[05][01]