Kanye West is still there. The 47-year-old rapper from Chicago released his new album on February 9th Vultures 1, topped the digital charts in 160 countries and immediately dominated the streaming providers. A bitter blow for everyone who still believes in cancel culture. More than a year earlier, on December 1, 2022, West sat on a right-wing podcast and said that Hitler was a great guy. He loves Nazis.
It was the most radical failure in a long chain of confused, conspiracy theory, strange statements. The music and fashion industry pulled the ripcord, objectively Kanye has been canceled – Adidas deal, label deal, infrastructure: everything gone. But to what extent can you take away the platform from someone who is their own biggest platform? Consumers have decided: anti-Semitism is not a big problem for them. 68 million people listen to Kanye West on Spotify every month.
Anomalies and kid gloves
Wherever media is involved Vultures 1 When you deal with it, you find anomalies. Otherwise uncritical portals take off their kid gloves: long-lost 1/10 ratings rain down. YouTube’s biggest music critic, Anthony Fantano, posted an angry non-review video, saying the album is “such garbage, it’s impossible to even review.” So why doesn’t the entertainment industry still get rid of West, even though he has clearly shot himself into the past?
One reason for this could be the state of rap music. For the first time since the 90s, the genre doesn’t dominate the charts or zeitgeist. Promising newcomers died young, blockbuster albums by the established ones flopped. There are rumors among the Americans that the genre is running out of steam – hip-hop has recently been overtaken commercially to the left of country. In number one hits, in number one albums, everywhere.
The scene currently needs guys like West. At his best, the man was an engine of innovation; his albums are happenings. This explains why other artists didn’t saw it off. Despite all the controversy, rappers and producers came for Vultures 1 back to West in droves. They hope he can replicate the magic again. Then they would be part of the new, big thing.
Is the album the new big thing? The truth is: Vultures is mixed, but not terrible. The hope that the rapper would conveniently write himself off artistically after his social exclusion is not fulfilled. Instead, cling Vultures of what the scene hopes for from Motor West: gospel choirs on techno, genre madness, progressive hip-hop maximalism. He made an album whose silhouette is reminiscent of his great deeds, but doesn’t quite match their focus.
Freedom of expression and sovereignty of interpretation
This is precisely why the argument in music journalism is not about freedom of expression, but rather about the sovereignty of interpretation. The days when press reviews determined the success of a record are long gone. When people want to listen to Kanye, no one can stop them, even if journalists go all out.
Instead, people try to over-correct and “badly write down” their art. But this only makes Kanye West seem even more scandalous. The most effective tactic seems to be to avoid the scandal. Identifying him as a threat, however Vultures to be treated as what it is: solid, non-earth-shattering remnants of the career of an aging, slowly falling out of time artist who has had his best moments behind him. That’s why Kanye West needs every scandal so that his music looks like the happening it no longer is.