“Name one genius that ain’t crazy”
This lyric from Kanye West’s song Feedback is a perfect summary of West’s wild and impressive musical career.
Starting off as a producer on Jay-Z’s Roc-a-Fella Records back in the later 1990’s, Kanye was seen as a special talent from the beginning, with Jay-Z taking him under his wing, allowing him to make beats for his record label. After much pleading, Kanye was given the green light to record his own solo album for release on Roc-a-Fella Records. In 2004, Kanye released his debut album The College Dropout. This changed the course of history for not only hip-hop, but for music as a whole.
Up until this point in time, hip-hop music was widely viewed as a way for the harsh realities of street life to be conveyed to the masses. The College Dropout on the other hand, was focused on themes of family, faith, racism and materialism. The College Dropout shifted the cultural landscape enough to allow West to make it big in the rap game without having a background of harsh street life.
West’s next 2 albums Late Registration and Graduation were runaway successes, cementing West as a pillar in hip-hop for years to come. Unfortunately, just 2 months after the release of Graduation, Kanye’s mother Donda West died from a heart attack after complications from plastic surgery. What followed was Kanye’s most emotional and off the wall record to date, 808s & Heartbreak.
With a stripped-down production, heavy use of auto-tune and electronic sounds, West’s album sounded like nothing else. A distinct, unique and raw autobiographical tale of a man who was emotionally destroyed after the loss of his mother, as well as the end of his long-term relationship with his fiancée . While this new style of music led to heavy criticism and lower sales, the impact it had on the industry was immense and is still felt to this day, almost 12 years later.
The earliest example of 808s’ influence was on Drake’s 2009 breakout mix-tape So Far Gone. Drake even used the one of Kanye’s beats from 808s on one of his songs. Flash forward to today, and the most popular rappers are almost always using auto-tune and the same style of electronic beats. Quite a far cry from the pre-Kanye era of hip-hop. Take the late rapper Juice Wrld as an example. In this 2018 interview he calls Kanye a time traveler and explains the impact of 808s & Heartbreak on his music, and the industry as a whole.
While hip-hop music has always had some level of popularity since it’s inception in the late 1980’s, it was never in the mainstream, got little radio play outside of dedicated stations and was looked at as something that had to be putting off a certain persona. Kanye changed what music is popular, he made hip-hop more accessible to everyone, and showed what kind of emotional depth can be embedded in a hip-hop album.
Love him or hate him, you can’t deny his lasting impact and legacy as a groundbreaking, genre defining artist. His influence will continue to live on in hip-hop for many more years to come.
Comments