Take a deep breath. Done? Now read this magazine feature on Kanye West, titled "American Mozart."

hankmoody

hankmoody

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May 2012
American Mozart
INTENSE, EMOTIONAL, AND FREQUENTLY OUT OF CONTROL, THE HIP-HOP SUPERSTAR KANYE WEST ALLOWED HIS ANTICS TO TURN HIM INTO A NATIONAL JOKE AND TO EARN HIM THE CRITICISM OF TWO AMERICAN PRESIDENTS. WOULD A MASSIVE CONCERT TOUR WITH HIS FRIEND AND RIVAL JAY-Z OFFER THE TROUBLED RAPPER A TASTE OF REDEMPTION—OR DISASTER?

By David Samuels

Whatever you think of the many controversies he has ignited, you must admit that Kanye West is at least some kind of musical genius, ranking among the top five producers and the top five rappers of the past decade. (His singing, by contrast, is kind of a joke.) Every one of his five solo albums has gone platinum, and he has sold 30 million digital downloads of his songs, to become one of the most downloaded musical artists of all time. He has won 18 Grammys—the most of any artist in the past 10 years—while serving as a backpack-wearing icon of black nerd chic. Kanye’s power resides in his wild creativity and expressiveness, his mastery of form, and his deep and uncompromising attachment to a self-made aesthetic that he expresses through means that are entirely of the moment: rap music, digital downloads, fashion, Twitter, blogs, live streaming video. He is the first true genius of the iPhone era, the Mozart of contemporary American music, intent on using his creative and emotional gifts to express the heartbreaks and fantasies of his audience.


http://www.theatlantic.co...05/american-mozart/8931/
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It's a nice recap imo.

Anyhow, my bad. Didn't realize constantly checking Kanye threads on Niketalk was a prerequisite to existence.
 
dog NT had OD'ed on Kanye. Hes a supremely talented artist, but its pretty wild
 
Word of all ppl to make a thread about in the music forum. You might as well posted this in the official Kanye thread.
 
I have no qualms about that article. Kanye is clearly the artist of the 2000's and is the best artist overall, TODAY.
 
Originally Posted by illphillip

You clearly don't understand what the word "clearly" means.
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Originally Posted by Maximus Meridius

Hol'up he got 18 grammys?
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That award show holds very little legitimacy with me but yeah, he has 18.

[h3]Most Grammys won[/h3]
The record for the most Grammy Awards won in a lifetime is held by Georg Solti, a Hungarian-British conductor who conducted the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for twenty-two years. He has won 31 Grammy Awards[sup][1][/sup] and has a total of 74 career Grammy nominations.
[table][tr][th=""]Rank[/th][th=""]1st[/th][th=""]2nd[/th][th=""]3rd[/th][th=""]4th[/th][th=""]5th[/th][th=""]6th[/th][th=""]7th[/th][th=""]8th[/th][th=""]9th[/th][th=""]10th[/th][/tr][tr][td]Artist[/td][td]Georg Solti[/td][td]Quincy Jones,Alison Krauss[/td][td]Pierre Boulez[/td][td]Vladimir Horowitz[/td][td]U2, Stevie Wonder[/td][td]John Williams[/td][td]Aretha Franklin,Vince Gill, Henry Mancini, Bruce Springsteen[/td][td]Pat Metheny[/td][td]Chick Corea, Al Schmitt, Jimmy Sturr, Kanye West[/td][td]Ray Charles, Eric Clapton[/td][/tr][tr][td]Total awards[/td][td]31[/td][td]27[/td][td]26[/td][td]25[/td][td]22[/td][td]21[/td][td]20[/td][td]19[/td][td]18[/td][td]17[/td][/tr][/table]
 
Originally Posted by HankMoody

It's a nice recap imo.

Anyhow, my bad. Didn't realize constantly checking Kanye threads on Niketalk was a prerequisite to existence.
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[h1]Rakim: 'We Need a Few More Kanyes' [/h1][h1]
[/h1][h1]APR 23 2012, 2:49 PM ET[/h1]
Rakim praises Kanye West's music, saying that Hip Hop is in need of more artists like him.

Throughout his 25-plus year career, fans and artists alike have garnered Rakim with extensive amounts of praise for his craft. Now, the legendary Long Island emcee returns the accolades to one of Hip Hop's biggest current icons, Kanye West.

In a recent interview with The Atlantic, the God Emcee praised Kanye West as both an artist and a member of the Hip Hop community. He said that Yeezy's deft as both a producer and emcee has helped him take Hip Hop in new a unique directions. Ra also added that even Ye's notorious outbursts are signs of his devotion to music.

"I love Kanye for that. Being a producer, making beats, and being a rapper. He does it all," he explained. "Now, sometimes somebody can give you a credible track. But when you're searching for records or samples, only you know in your mind, in your intuition or your first instincts, what you need. When you hear that record, there's no denying it - 'Oh my God, I've got to sample this.' And he has that situation where he's lucky enough to love rhyming but can make his own beats, and that's like the perfect match. When he plays a record, his mind is on it right away. So, being able to do that and the way he does it, Kanye is not afraid to reach...like, 'Jesus Walks' is one of my favorite Kanye songs. To this day, that song comes on, and I want to turn it all the way up. I don't want nobody to talk to me. I just want to enjoy that track, you know what I mean? A lot of tracks he does, he's not afraid to go out the box where a lot of rappers might say, 'Oh, I'mma do my 16 bars.' Kanye just does whatever the track tells him to do—and that comes from being a rapper and being a producer at the same time."

He added, "You feel that in the award shows stuff where Kanye has these episodes, right? It's because he's passionate. If a lot of us don't take it that serious, then it's not going to be serious no more. People say, 'That was his opinion, but he was so passionate about it,' like that's bad. You've got to say, 'Well, really?' We need that. We need the media to know that some of us are really passionate about music...we need a few more Kanyes, people that's really passionate about Hip Hop and who keep it alive."
 
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