Kanye West is currently featured in two online interviews. In one, on TMZ, he discusses his love of Donald Trump and then blows up at questions.
In an online interview West has posted (and had his publicist send out) with Charlamagne the Man, Kanye rejects Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and Harriet Tubman as “unrelate-able.” This is in counterpoint to the TMZ interview, where he asserts that “slavery is a choice.” West also talks about his stay in a mental hospital and his addiction to opioids.
All of this is fodder for the press. But two things are happening. One is, we are all guilty of watching this car crash, publicizing all this craziness. Kanye is brilliant, but crazy. We can’t get away from that. But he is also mad as a hatter. He’s just completely nuts. So these rants have to be taken in context.
Also, whatever following he had is leaving. He “released” two unfinished tracks to iTunes, Spotify and other services on Sunday. They are DOA, flops. Only of them has remained on the iTunes chart, at number 30. Otherwise, they are fragments of ideas. In the case of “Lift Yourself Up,” he took the sample without paying for it or notifying its owner.
Around 38:00 you get the beginning of Kanye on black icons.