The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    Orion's picture

    Kanye West, Michael Jackson And Insanity

    By Orion on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 8:02am |

    More thoughts came about Kanye's slow motion mental breakdown. Be honest about what you think of this one, guys!

    Life is hard. It is hard for everyone. It is even hard for celebrities. Despite quite a bit of monetary success and an illusion of security in that regard at least, celebrities often have serious problems - problems they may not have had while they were lesser known. The eye is always on them - making many celebrities develop image problems they wouldn't otherwise have.

    Drugs invade their life - their newfound wealth allows for a drug temptation that they simply wouldn't be able to afford otherwise. People are jealous of them, there are demands from others that they never would have had while poor or middle class. The expectations of a repeat of whatever made them famous in the first place are very high. A mix of that and the loss of his mother in a botched surgery years ago seems to be plaguing Kanye West. Whatever it is, it's really bad. The music that Kanye has released to us is really bad in every sense of the word. People who went along with it should feel guilty for not intervening with a man who is obviously not well.

      My last essay on Kanye was pretty successful - even with a non-music audience over at the political website Dagblog. I got 226 views. People seemed to like it. I may be on to something here. Kanye West, with Yeezus, has released the worst hip-hop album ever made and possibly one of the worst pop albums in recent history.

     Alot of celebrities have problems. Elton John, Hulk Hogan, Halle Berry and Eminem all have admitted to entertaining suicidal thoughts or coming close to or even attempting it. The latter nearly died - his dark stage after losing his best friend Proof to a gun fight really sent him in to a dark world. Life is hard for everyone. 

    But with Eminem is a significant difference from Kanye. If you search around for it, you can find alot of unreleased music that Eminem recorded while he was in "a dark place" - it leaked but never got officially released. Throughout all of it he talks about feeling like he's going crazy ("The Apple") or worrying about what his daughter would think. On "Going Through Changes," he raps about becoming overweight from binge eating but we never see pictures of that. While he may be a little nutty, he seems always to be keeping himself afloat to a degree. Kanye doesn't have this at all.

    Maybe it's drugs? I'm not sure - Marshall was on plenty of drugs as well. Kanye seems unaware that he is becoming very strange. He seems unaware that people don't like his behavior. He seems unaware of many things. His appearances with Kim Kardashian look like he is in another world entirely. His bizarre and scary music isn't like the unreleased work of Eminem - it is more like the weird, scary work that Michael Jackson released starting with Dangerous like "Blood On The Dance Floor:"

     

    The titles are even similar - while Michael put out a song called "Blood On The Dance Floor," Kanye released "Blood On The Leaves" with his new album Yeezus. Both got ridiculously egotistical - while Michael literally had a statue of himself built, Kanye is making albums with titles like Yeezus and song titles like "I Am A God." Both were and are seriously mentally ill and somewhat unaware of it. MJ seemed to treat his problems with ridiculous levels of drugs - it's very possible Kanye is doing the same, instead of facing them head on and changing - the only real cure.

     Like MJ's "Blood On The Dance Floor," Kanye's new music is really creepy and uncomfortable to listen or watch to. It sounds like some sort of torture. Isn't torture illegal? Why did people go to jail for Abu Gharib and Kanye gets off putting out music like this? It doesn't have the entertainment value that creepy music like Rob Zombie, Nine Inch Nails or Marilyn Manson has. "Black Skinhead" sounds like Nine Inch Nails if Nine Inch Nails wasn't good. It's just creepy and scary.

     Someone in Kanye's camp would be wise to intervene. We need the Kanye who gave us "Jesus Walks," beat out 50 Cent in sales and produced hits for Dilated Peoples and Common back.

    Comments

    I did a quick check, only because 1) what you think interests me for some reason I myself don't understand. 2) I have recently met several people who have worked with Kanye West, and may have dealings with them in the future, and for that reason I am trying to get a bead on his shtick (without having to listen to much of his output, because truthfully, I have never been a hip-hop fan.)

    It turned out as I expected, you are very much in the minority, the album is getting rave reviews:

    ...The reviews are in -- and many music critics are praising "Yeezus."...Take a look at what the critics have to say:...

    http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-207_162-57589812/music-critics-believe-in-ka...

    ‘Yeezus’ Reviews: Critics Love Kanye West’s Experimental New Album

    http://hollywoodlife.com/2013/06/18/kanye-west-yeezus-reviews/

    Love Him Or Hate Him, Kanye West's “Yeezus” Album Is Getting Rave Reviews

    http://www.newnownext.com/kanye-west-yeezus-album-reviews/06/2013/

    Kanye West's Yeezus Gets Rave Reviews

    http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/480410/20130619/kanye-west-yeezus-kim-kar...

    MTV: ....a work of art, for better or worse. Easy listening, it most certainly isn't. Because it's not supposed to be....

    http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1709191/kanye-west-yeezus-review.jhtml

    The Guardian: ...Perhaps he just understands better than most of his peers that musical stars are meant to be extraordinary, provocative, divisive, controversial figures

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2013/jun/17/kanye-west-yeezus-review

    The only one I could find feeling similar to you is DJ Louie's mom, but he himself still can't not praise it:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dj-louie-xiv/praise-yeezus-a-morallyam_b_3...
     


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 12:37pm

    P.S. A tip: ever since the people who reacted badly in 1913 to avant garde music found out they were on the losing side in Western culture, it became increasingly difficult for musicians who wanted to be avant-garde to shock, the bar is always being raised. I'm not going to get into whether Kanye West is an artist, artiste or just a guy getting rich off of being a poseur, because as I said, I'm not even interested in the genre. But it seems very clear to me that he wants to be known as an "artiste," that he wants to shock. And he can't get a break on that, because the critics are raving. He's got only you and a few others it seems....

    Edit to add: Comes to mind Michael Jackson was very different type of "artist" with different goals. He was a performer of great talent who wanted to be loved by his audience, not challenge it. He wanted to rule popular culture, not shock it. Like a great prima ballerina of old.


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 12:58pm

    Well, "Off the Wall" and "Thriller" both were huge shocks to popular culture, including breaking the color barrier and dance & music barriers for MTV. Every white glove he didn't wear, that red jacket... I remember being blown away by Off the Wall playing on someone's ghetto blaster, and I remember a similar feeling seeing & hearing Jackson & Slash together in "Black & White". American dance & aerobics would have been vastly different without the Beat It video. Later albums certainly were successful - I didn't listen to them close enough to see if they broke any new ground.


    by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 1:28pm

    Still very much meant to please the audience, not challenge its thinking. Not only did  those things please Jackson's audience by a huge amount, they grew it.

    The reason The White Album comparison rang so apt is that the initial reaction of many was "this is not the fun entertaining Beatles I know and love, you can't dance to it." Personally I think the influence of Yoko Ono with her Fluxus/Dadaist views are underestimated, were already there, had already changed Lennon. Not about pleasing/wowing an audience, but about challenging their thinking and their tastes.

    I cannot overemphasize the point that if KW is trying to do this, it is not successful if he is getting so many rave reviews right off the bat. I am actually quite cynical about this. He is playing both ends like a lot of famous contemporary visual artists do, like say, Damien Hirst or Jeff Koons. The difference there is that many fine art critics are cynical about them.


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:05pm

    Yoko Ono was only 1 of the many changes affecting the Beatles for the White Album - most songs were written during 1 1/2 months in India with a bunch of other musicians before Lennon got together with her, the Beatles had gotten hold of an 8-track for the first time to improve dubbing (Martin & the Beatles had already done lots of tape looping for years such as Tomorrow Never Knows & Strawberry Fields), they had group tension and Maharishi tension to feed their alienation plus John's breakup with his wife, and increasing use of LSD. Yoko can probably be credited with his turn to heroin which changed the vibe of his music. Yoko was an early colleague of John Cage around 1960 and made a number of experimental films, but many of the same ideas were bouncing around New York with Velvet Underground & Andy Warhol & others by 1966/67 (including similar tape & video actions).

    I'm not sure the Beatles were trying to challenge anyone on the album, just reacting to the rather chaotic events & impressions of the year. Even Revolution #9 probably just got laid down futzing with an 8-track while heavily loaded, and in the "go with it" feel of the times, they just left it as is. Other stuff feels chaotic because they left in extended jams that normally would have been practiced & edited out. Since they were all running their own studios in their mansions by then, they were less disciplined than when George Martin kept them moving in regimen.


    by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 3:50pm

    We do not disagree, was mostly simplifying for the benefit of Orion who on his other thread found the comparison insulting to the Beatles. Didn't want to get into Mid Century Cultural History Survey lecturing. I would only quibble with you that Ono was running with a far more radical and purist conceptual crowd than Warhol, and definitely not pop culture.


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 4:07pm

    Okay, yes, Warhol was a pop acquirer, not an in-depth conceptualist. Velvet Underground was like a more eclectic international ragtag grouping than the Monkees, east coast vs west coast, Ono was much more serious in exploring these genres long term. Just noting that say Brian Jones had been running around New York with Andy Warhol as early as '65, and Jones & Lennon were palling around New York during the same periods or Magic Alex that Brian introduced Lennon to & turned Lennon on to sound effects - i.e. Lennon didn't just discover avant garde with Yoko.

    Possibly the heroin influence is palpable in the mood, turning the good vibes Beach Boys voice-of-God meditation sound into something more chaotic & disconcerting, a bit like heroin reigned over Exile on Main Street.


    by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 4:38pm

    The YouTube comments are a mixed bag like that too. There's a bunch saying he is brilliant but then stuff like "I keep trying to tell myself this is good but good music doesn't sound like this." Even Nine Inch Nails or Marilyn Manson tried to sound melodic while shocking.

    His mom is mentioned indirectly a few times throughout the album, which backs up what I said about his mom's death seriously affecting his mental state. 

    It's a horrible album made by a man who is obviously not in a great mental state. There isn't much positive here - the precision of songs he produced like "This Way" for Dilated Peoples and "The Corner" for Common is gone.

    As you said, rap has never really interested you. For the most part, it doesn't interest most mainstream critics either. I suspect they may really like the idea of Kanye - someone from the rap world who better matches their aesthetic values as opposed to the lower middle class values that hip-hop usually professes. They want to be avant garde, brilliant and artistic but.... what is the symbolism Kanye is showing us? That he is Jesus, that he is a God? 


    by Orion on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:05pm

    by a man who is obviously not in a great mental state.

    How do you know that is not a character he is playing for the purposes of this piece of work?

    And how do you know that the character he presents in his celebrity public is not created whole cloth by him and his P.R. people and is the same as his real self?


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:09pm

    I.E., you do know Cary Grant and Rock Hudson were not really heterosexuals?


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:10pm

    His music got really dramatically darker after his mom passed. He had a very steady sound before that. He actually produced some of the best hip-hop tracks of all time. I'm not sure what character he's trying to play now - it would be a relief to know it's all a joke and that we could get the guy who brought us "Through The Wire" and "Diamonds" back.


    by Orion on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:11pm

    To go back to your initial essay, you want artists that make you feel good, do not plumb things like darkness, evil and depression unless they do it with "entertainment value." Which is fine, that's your prerogative. And most people agree with you. That's why the "don't worry, be happy" artists make more money. But just be aware that many people who are serious about being an artist don't think that way, they would forgo success with a big audience to plumb things that aren't so popular, things and ways of thinking that are unpleasant for the audience. To do so even at the risk of being labeled insane. (And yes, this is fairly unique to Western culture. Not that other cultures got where they are by artists trying to please mass audiences, instead, they had to please patrons, the process was top down.)

    Again, I suspect KW would be loathe to forgo the success, hence I am cynical about him doing this kind of thing. It may indeed be a "joke," ironical. My suspicions are more along the lines of "dilettante."


    by artappraiser on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 2:43pm

    Oh no no no, here is an amazing song that is dark as all hell:

    Geto Boys was not only pleasing to the ears (if you like the hip-hop sound, of course, which many don't) but you really get what is tormenting these guys. I'm not sure what is tormenting Kanye - I'm not sure he does either.


    by Orion on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 4:01pm

    BTW a little apology if I got too hot and heavy in some of my posts here - it's just music, not politics, there shouldn't be a lot of arguing involved.


    by Orion on Thu, 06/20/2013 - 3:52am

    I didn't take anything you said as argument with me.

    Discussions about arts/entertainment/sports have people voicing strong opinions, if they much like or hate the piece. It's ridiculous to take that personally, unless you're the creator, or as something one could win an argument about.

    I do find it odd the way you directly address Kanye West the person in the two essays, though. Only because I know you are striving to be recognized rap critic. It's like you buy into the celebrity thing, that you are sure you know him, he is a friend and you know all his problems, and you are giving him advice. Instead of just keeping it to why you like or hate the particular work. That's more like an upset fan than a critic, that you want him to be a certain way, and he's not obliging. Even to the point where you see him ending up like Michael Jackson if he doesn't take your advice....


    by artappraiser on Thu, 06/20/2013 - 1:32pm

    Well, I don't know that Kanye will be molesting children or doing drugs the way that MJ did - it's more that the actual sound and style of his music is getting like MJ's did - really weird and somewhat unpleasant. In addition, him and Kim Kardashian apparently named their child North. Get it - like North West? Intervention time maybe?

    Kanye did some of the best production ever in hip-hop. He is really good at what he does when he does it right. This album is either intentionally bad, lazy or both. I'd really like to see the real Kanye back.


    by Orion on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 7:49am

    Is the middle name Bynorth?


    by Verified Atheist on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 8:11am

    LOLLLL


    by Orion on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 8:48am

    It's like you buy into the celebrity thing, that you are sure you know him, he is a friend and you know all his problems, and you are giving him advice. Instead of just keeping it to why you like or hate the particular work.

    Okay, well here is the thing - there is a reason Kanye West is so significant. He is like a charismatic Dr. Dre - he didn't just make his own music but he produced music for everyone from Mos Def to Jay-Z. He is really talented. He helped shape the genre of hip-hop itself - he is responsible for ending gangsta rap by defeating 50 Cent in sales and creating an ocean of surrogate Kanyes (artists like Lupe Fiasco, Kenan Bell, etc. come to mind).

    Hip-hop is the best genre. Most people who avoid it haven't really given it a chance are have racist or classist prejudices. Hip-hop tells stories in a way no other genre does. The genre itself is diminishing in significance already - this sort of nonsense may do away with it completely.


    by Orion on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 8:55am

    Or if it's diminishing already, maybe this will somehow rejuvenate. Maybe not this album but the one after...

    Sometimes the best successes come from the biggest failures, and sometimes shifting from one groove to another means a pretty jarring hop out of the tracks.

    Dylan freaked a lot of people out when he went electric. The Joy Division => New Order shift was bizarre but ultimately successful & industry changing. James Brown transformed when he went from soul to his P-Funk allstar backing, while Miles shifted drastically from cool jazz to fusion.

    Somehow you're disappointed both as an audience / hip hop advocate, but also on a personal level - his relationship with his wife, etc. Not sure what to make of that. At the end of the day, he's just another dude doing his best, ups & downs.


    by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 9:19am

    Well no - it's not that serious. LOL maybe it came across like that in the article but if so, it's my fault - I have a tendency toward dramatizing due to all the political writing. There's still alot of great stuff going on still. 

    Also, Kanye was sounding totally on point only a couple months ago: 

     

    Cruel Summer sounds like it was made for a hardcore rap audience, however. Yeezus is for the hipsters - they're the ones who buy his albums. The hardcore rap audience - we bootleg. Hipsters are about irony - like the irony of listening to music that doesn't actually sound good or say anything of any significance.

     


    by Orion on Fri, 06/21/2013 - 1:38pm

    Ever listen to Einstürzende Neubaten or Throbbing Gristle (the Hamburger Lady?). Or Ian Curtis' vocals for Joy Division. No, not everything shocking tries to be melodic.

    I never said "rap has never really interested me". Muse Sick in Hour Mess Age is one of my favorite albums, enjoyed some rap ever since Grandmaster Flash & Blondie's Rapture - Man from Mars. Just have my opinions.

    I like tortured albums by tortured artists. Pain is a great inspirer. Neil Young's "Tonight's the Night" was unlistenable to many, a work of genius to quite a few - all about his dead friend.


    by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 3:19pm

    Einsturzende Neubaten is great but again, they're good. "I Wish You Were My Colour" didn't sound like a dying elephant.


    by Orion on Wed, 06/19/2013 - 4:10pm

    Try these:

    Sinnsuche http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkASjf8Efss (esp. after 1:51)

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SV3R5vdxnMk

    Or the Hamburger Lady after Gyn did his trannie thing


    by PeraclesPlease on Thu, 06/20/2013 - 5:14am

    very interesting review, helped me understand the controversy, and addresses some of the things that seem to bother you, though he mostly lauds those things:

    http://entertainment.time.com/2013/06/20/kanye-wests-yeezus-is-manic-mel...


    by artappraiser on Thu, 06/20/2013 - 1:30pm

    That review was bad. Sorry if that seems dismissive but I don't understand the writer's enthusiasm - the best review came from Okayplayer, the oldest hip-hop website: http://www.okayplayer.com/news/kanye-west-yeezus-review-by-big-ghost.html

    And there's nothing brilliant about what Yeezy said about institutionalized racism. That has been said by a bunch of rappers previously over a melodic and rhythmic beat.

    There are hundreds of very talented rappers and producers who are trying to break in to the music world. It isn't fair or just that they are cast aside while Kanye gets attention for defecating on our eardrums.


    by Orion on Thu, 06/20/2013 - 4:25pm

    Lou Reed reviews Yeezus.


    by artappraiser on Sun, 07/07/2013 - 3:26am

    That's a brilliant review - it's like Willie Wonka giving you a tour of the album."the boats keep rowing, and the danger keeps on growing..." Maybe it's a factory Yeezus after all, caught between laughter & despair, enjoyment & pretentiousness, being fresh & being robotic.

    Only thing I can't figure out is how Lou could think Metal Machine would hold up for 4 whole sides. Everyone else said he did it to get out of a record contract, but he's sticking with his story 40 years later - not that it wasn't a great statement to make in the summer of disco with "Kung Fu Fighting" and KC & the Sunshine Band getting all the radio & club play - soon we would have Patti Smith & the Sex Pistols & the Ramones and Joy Division and Neubauten to heal our saccharined souls. A "giant FUCK YOU" as the great critic Lester Bangs said at the time. Or as Lou says of Kanye, "kill Taylor Swift and it's all over".


    by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 07/07/2013 - 3:59am

    "Now that you like me, I'm going to make you unlike me." That must sum up whatever Yeezy is  doing nowadays. At first I thought that drugs, his mother dying and his marriage to Kim Kardashian had been all working together to make him crazy and strange but Kanye had been producing top notch material for other rappers only last year.

    This album was made to be horrible on purpose - you can tell that from the minimalist packaging - no liner notes, no track list and nothing printed on the CD. I agree with Lou Reed that Kanye is really talented - his work with Dilated Peoples or the Cruel Summer compilation he produced show that - but you wouldn't know it from this trash.


    by Orion on Sun, 07/07/2013 - 7:33pm