“True Love” is the fifth track on Kanye West’s 2022 album ‘Donda 2.’ In this emotional track, Kanye West laments about lost love, an experience he has been fighting through for the last few years. On this track, Ye is joined by the late rapper X.
Kanye West announced his brand new album ‘Donda 2,’ as a sequel to his highly anticipated and heavily delayed album ‘DONDA.’ The new album contains 22 tracks along with some frequent collaborators such as Future, Travis Scott, Playboi Carti, and Don Toliver. Both albums are dedicated to the memory of Kanye’s mother Donda, who passed away in 2007.
Kanye West has been through an emotional couple of years due to the divorce from his wife Kim Kardashian. The duo called off their marriage in early 2021 after Kim claimed that she is no longer able to keep up with Ye. This hit Kanye quite hard as he lost custody of his four children with Kim as well.
“True Love” is said to have been recorded somewhere in 2018, which explains the verse by XTentacion (shortened due to censorship!). The Florida rapper was gunned down on June 18, 2018.
Listen to “True Love” by Kanye West Ft. XTentacion
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Kanye West “True Love” Lyrics Meaning and Song Review
In the hook by X, he reveals to us his own struggles with love and relationships. He stresses the fact that true love should not be hard to maintain and it should not be painful. He imagined himself spending his entire life with her, but it turned out to be just a dream.
In the only verse of the song, Kanye West talks about not being able to be with his kids. Since the divorce from Kim Kardashian, Kanye has been forced out of their family picture, and this really seems to get to him.
No hard feelings but these feelings harder
When I think about it, my eyes fill up with water
Kanye and Kim have not been on the best terms since the divorce. In January 2022, Kanye claimed that Kim tried to stop him from attending one of her kid’s birthday parties by having the party in an undisclosed location. Later in the verse, Kanye also reveals that Kim’s family tries to keep the children away from anything to do with Ye, like preventing them from wearing Ye’s famous shoe lineup Yeezys. He also reveals that he only gets to see three kids out of the four!
Wait, when I pick ’em up, I feel like they borrowed
When I gotta return them, scan ’em like a bar code
Kanye West tells us how it feels like to see his kids right now. Since he does not have custody of the kids, he has to meet them on Kim’s terms. There are schedules to see them which makes it feel like his own kids are borrowed and not his own. A borrowed item has to be returned. It’s only an obligation. Being with your kids should not feel like a liability. He has to return the kids within a time frame or face severe consequences.
Kanye West slips in that nannies look after his kids now that they are under Kim’s watch. This might be a slight backhanded shot at Kim for her busy schedule with everything she has going on, from TV shows to modeling to the new dating life with Pete Davidson, that she might not have time to look after their kids.
Another backhanded shot is when Kanye says that he is the only house in the neighborhood his kids can come to. Kim Kardashian moved away since the breakup and Kanye bought a house right across the street of this house to be close to his kids.
In the second chorus of the song, we hear Kanye talking to X’s kid; “Tell Gekyume…Daddy’s not gone.” X’s only child, Gekyume was born seven months after X was gunned down. Kanye seems to console the fatherless child that X is not really gone as long as his music breathes.
Let us hear what you think about this song in the comments below. Check out the complete lyrics on Genius.