Change is never accepted at first because it must be understood.
Along with the rest of HipHop and it’s community, Kanye West has been a very large blip on the radar lately because of these “rants”, dubbed “visionary streams of consciousness.” I, though not really being even a listener of Mr. West’s music, for some reason are drawn to the things he is saying.
It’s the hints of cultural revolution and a taste of Avant-garde that make me lift an ear and then for him to be so rich on top of it.
But he is right.
Everything he says in his most clearest moments of the interviews seem to be right in my eyes but what is more baffling to me is why the listener keeps questioning something so obvious.
In a recent interview with The Breakfast Club, Charlamagne asks, “Why do you talk about so much money now,” then further goes to say “revolutionaries didn’t need money to change the world.”
No they didn’t. They didn’t until now and a modern revolutionary would know this.
Kanye is by far not my favorite artist, but his mind is very creative, smart and strong and the recent actions taken to be heard are more bold and with a far larger drive than maybe any artist we’ve seen in the last decade. He is an embodiment of success and there is no denying it. Why do you know his name? Because he made it known. Everybody is so taken aback by what is coming out of his mouth that people are forgetting what artists do: We question everything around us and look to build, to create, to use to share and make visible or heard. Now Kanye has gotten to this career moment where he, just like I and many other driven, art-junkie, success hungry visionaries would, is really trying to advance beyond being the poster child of the corporate music world. Which he undeniably is, sales or not, Kanye West is one of the most hated on artists out right now with constant star dust raining everywhere he goes. The world wants to watch him. Everybody loves hating the one pushing music out like its business. But it IS business. And Kanye is learning how hard it is to move into the business world through every one of his ventures and is getting mad. Again, bringing up Charlamagne saying “revolutionaries didn’t need money to make a change,” in which Ye responds with “you need to have product, you need to own something.” That statement is coming from a multi-millionaire who still, even with all this money, isn’t grasping firmly the start of one said revolution but opening the eyes of a giant.
Charlamagne, not to be rude but how blind can you possibly be to not see that revolutionaries do not get heard in this day and age? Their voices are either bought out or cut off entirely. Or is there a revolution you can refer to recently?
Why don’t they get heard? Because those same corporations, backed by any world leader, will go slightly out of their way to push power around to make entry harder for someone who they believe can do harm to their stance and might not understand or care for the business itself, not to mention at that point, it’s about integrity.
Who the fuck wants to let someone who into the elite of elites to have sudden control of massive amounts of product geared towards teenage and young-adult minds? What type of stable, happy-where-he-is, forty to fifty year old man with a wife and kid, billionaire wants to give creative control of a world wide product who’s main focus is teaching and art, defying the fashion world and stealing moments at award shows while bashing a president and claiming him to have been “using” him?
Do you see what I am saying?
Revolutionaries and art get covered up or lack of exposure all the time because no good business man wants to lose control or change not under their own terms. Revolutionaries are not wanted by any politician still politicking and their “art” is revered until not proven a threat. Not to mention Art and Revolutions go hand in hand. And the rules are simple to be successful as an artist: Invest and Comply when it’s needed. Breaking those rules calls for reaction, and the reaction of the treatment by way of major fashion designers, corporations and such from Ye himself is the exact way any artist would react with such a strong following.
These rants are more than conscious streams, Mr. West, these are the next page of a history in the making and as an Elite you would have to move your pieces on an elite chess board, no? Thus owning something.
Kanye West has power, money and a following. Wouldn’t you say that it is scary to know such a wild “black man” is creating such a buzz…and then he mentions your name, Mr. President? Nike? LV?
I give you kudos, Ye, and understand your concepts and that’s all that matter to me, your music still isn’t to my liking, but I get it. But if you get to the top, the doors you open better have taste.
-M. Detelj
#Detelj 