KANYE WEST
THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO
Kanye West thinks he’s God. He’s not the first in hip hop circles to make such a claim, but few have been quite as convincing as he has. Mark Robertson takes a look in his good book.
‘My last album was groundbreaking. Now the process is to strive for greatness!
Modesty doesn’t pay in hip hop. from the Kings of Rock to the Greatest. Of. All. Time. liveryone wants to be the man (and yes. it is always the man). Kanye West has polarised hip hop and beyond with his perceived arrogance. but four million record sales later he has become the Tiger Woods of hip hop. ending tip on the cover of 'Iime magazine.
2002‘s The College Dropout and last year’s follow tip Lute Registration didn‘t rewrite hip hop‘s rule books per se: they are so worn that the pages are barely hanging onto the spine. such are the constant changes going on within the genre. What these two records did do. however. is show that hip hop can create a superstar who is sophisticated enough to go against the grain but is accepted as part of the mainstream and the musical inner circle. West is fresh. distinctive. innovative and. ultimately. shrewd. He has an innate ability to combine the itchy with the catchy and can capture all the qualities of great pop music - choruses fit for chanting and stomping. beats with more hooks than a pirate's works night out. West has broken new ground and seems happy to delve into his emotions without thought of ridicule or recompense.
‘If I was to say that I hadn't already done all of that, then I'd be on some fake Hollywood bullshit modesty, and that's just plain stupid.’
Did you ever wonder if there was actually anyone actually left in the ghetto these days‘.’ With so many shamelessly fiaunting their street credentials via their gold teeth and bullet holes
on MTV Base. you would seem a lot smarter if
you had managed to dodge bullets rather than standing in front of them.
West. like many others. didn‘t emerge from the slums of Shaolin or via the crossfire of 8 Mile: he came from the ‘burbs of Chicago. via his birthplace in Atlanta. The progeny of a photographer and Black Panther father. and English teacher mother. West does seem to come over somewhere between philosopher and activist. He has an arrogance that swings
14 THE LIST 16 Feb—2 Mar 2006
between sagely' charming and bullish. Such was the appeal of Muhammad Ali. who claimed it was not arrogance but common sense that made him state jttst how good he was. West follows Ali's party line and given that pretty much every record he touches turns to gold (or more likely. platinum) his claims are justifiable.
But in his desire to ‘kcep it real‘. ls'any e‘s raps are about adventures in shopping malls. folding shirts at (iap and exercise videos. something that in reality speaks more to most people than tales of packirf heat and gangsterisms. However. it‘s about more than that: songs about the American health care system or the initistices in Sierra
Leone diamond trading single West out as one of the only platinum-selling rappers to move ottt of
the cliche comfort lone.
‘George Bush doesn't care about black people.’
While the Dixie Chicks berated Bttsh from the stage and got (symbolically) strung tip for it by leftie haters in the US. Kanye West made new friends and enemies in equal proportions by
declaring in the wake of the botched disaster of
the llun‘icane Katrina floods that ‘(icorge Bush doesn‘t care about black people‘. He was branded naive by some commentators. including actor Samuel l. Jackson. who joked that 'Kany e is probably going to be audited up the ass for the next live years. It‘s OK to feel that way. bill as fascist as these dudes are. you have to really watch what you sayf But while West may have sounded naive. in reality he used his position to make a point about the shoddy reaction by the US government to the crisis in New Orleans.
‘I have been working at this since I was 12 years old. I'm 27 years old now and I've been through nervous breakdowns trying to sell my beats.’ An education doesn't have to be from the school of hard knocks. West may make much of the fact that he never actually graduated from college he was studying at (‘olumbia and later at ('hicago State t'niversity (linglish. since you askctll before a break in the industry led him to drop otrt (geddit'.’l and embrace music full time.
Long before he was on the mic and at the front of the stage. West made a living selling beats. He got his first break while still at college when he sold a beat to Jermaine l)upri for his album mo in 1472 and from there was among the producers instigating a power swing in hip hop away from the east and west coast to the south in Houston and. in particular. his hometown of Atlanta.
The key to his production success was thick. luscious orchestration and speeded up. chipmunk-sounding vocals lifted from old soul tracks. This was a simple. but ultimately hugely effective innovation by Kanye West. It became his trademark. which he subsequently employed
K W
to great effect on tlo/clis of songs for the likes of .lanet Jackson. Mariah (‘at'cy Alicia Keys. Jay /. Britney Spears and l.udacris and more.
‘People saw this mild-mannered rapper dressed like Carlton from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, rhyming about
social issues and joking around.’
l-‘or most big rappers. having your own clothing label is pretty much compulsory these days Jay—X's Rocawcar. l’ l)idtly‘s Sean John or if) (‘ent‘s (i-t'nit but with the notable e\ception of the ever—sartorially aware ()titKast. the clobber is too often limited to hillowy denim and crap sneakers. West has taken a subtly different route to fashion. Talk of his own line. l’astelle. is very much in the pipeline but it proposes preppy over street. Having got into design during his time at university. he has become a clothes horse for the likes of Marc Jacobs and Yves Saint Laurent. He looks like a dandy. more likely to be sharing tea on the lawn with 'l‘obias and June than a bottle of crunk juice with l.il' Jon and the lfast Side Boy].
'Theirs is the type of music that you make when you have good taste in everything.’
West spent much of 3005 banging on about his favourite band. Weegie pop tarts l'ran/ l-‘erdinand .»\K.'\ 'the band that stylists love'. He also declared their chirpy indie disco staples ‘white crunk' due to their predilection for meaty drum beats and cites the band as a major influence on his music. The possibility of Alex Kapranos adding some vocal chops like .\laroon 5's wet liin Adam Levine did on 'lleartl 'em Say' for one of his next two planned albums (frat/notion and (;()1)(/.'i\\ 10/) remains an intriguing prospect.
‘The cool thing about that song is we're not trying to go for number one, we're trying to go for Number Forever.’ Now Billy (iraham knew how to get a crowd going like few others when it came to all things ecumenical. But with ‘Jesus Walks” Kanye West leaves him standing at the pulpit. mouth agape. It was one of the finest songs in the entire hip hop canon. and such was West's confidence in it that he teased l)Js to play a song so driven and addictive. so good. that w as about religion. West appeared on the front of Ito/ling Stone this month. posed up as Jesus. replete with thorny crown. lle‘d like us to think he‘s here to save Us. btrt really he‘s just here to make Us feel good. And when the marching band beat breaks out in those cavernous halls by the riverside maybe it will just feel like we've been saved. for a little while at least.
SECC, Glasgow, Fri 17 Feb.