It seems that Kanye West’s latest studio album, "The Life of Pablo," has gotten mostly mixed and positive reviews. Usually, this would be enough to persuade me to give an album a listen. This time, however, it hasn’t been enough. I can’t bring myself to do it. It has less to do with Kanye West's art and more to do with Kanye West as a person.
None of us are new to Kanye’s mischievous, headline-grabbing antics. The first of these that come to all of our minds is his infamous 2009 VMAs stage-stealing move that cost Taylor Swift what could have been a great moment. From then on out, Kanye has been seen by many—especially his fans—as the person that says what needs to be said when no one else will say it. At the time, Kanye's cultural impact and talent could not be disputed as he stood with some of his groundbreaking and profound albums like "Late Registration" and "808s & Heartbreak" behind him. I saw him and his maneuvers as audacious and courageous, a sign of someone who was arrogant with good reason.
As of late, his behavior is reminiscent of that time. However, much has changed. For one, Kanye has become a husband and a father, roles that are seen as huge signifiers of having grown up. He has more control in the business world, having launched a fashion line that just released its third season this past week. But on the music side, Kanye hasn't produced work that has been deemed greatly praiseworthy as his last studio album, "Yeezus," could be considered a "flop." I know this means he has much to prove with this latest album, and I want him to succeed. I really, really do, but his obnoxious behavior is much harder to ignore this time around.
In this past month alone, Kanye has shown himself to be unapologetically misogynistic on a level that matches his undying arrogance. His Twitter rant (later deleted) ridiculed Wiz Khalifa for letting "a stripper [Amber Rose] trap you" showed a lot of us that Kanye will always see Amber as inferior because of the role he played in her fame. It's even more ridiculous for those of us who see the irony and hypocrisy in Kanye's scorn for Amber's beginnings when his wife's fame didn't come about much differently. Then the day before his album dropped, he tweeted that the line, "I made that b**ch famous" from one of his latest songs, referring to Taylor Swift and the 2009 VMAs, without her approval. Instead of acknowledging the slight as even a tiny form of disrespect, he brought out the old excuse that we're all used to "watered down" music so we're now "demonizing real artists" and "compromising art" by expressing our criticism of the line. To top it all off, he then sells his album for $20 asking us to help him pay off his $53 million dollar debt in a manner that says he so obviously believes he is the greatest of all time (as he constantly reminds us), so he deserves it.
Sometimes it feels like he's trolling us, but that it'll never come to an end. Several joking tweets were made today by those who listened to the album. Most acknowledged the general contempt many of us hold for Kanye as a person while also having real love for his music. It's great to see that many of us do not find any value in whatever Kanye says, but couldn't that be a problem for us? I have seen Black Twitter fight tooth and nail to make sure that celebrities are held accountable for their actions, including the once legendary Bill Cosby. For some reason, though, we all have a very lax and dismissive attitude when it comes to Kanye's remarks. Maybe it's because he is consistent with his senseless banter and poses no real threat. Maybe it's because we've become so used to the misogynistic nature of hip-hop that we feel there's no use in addressing it. Either way, it certainly doesn't stop us from listening to his music.
But it annoys me. It annoys me because Kanye should be wise enough to know that his behavior is really not appropriate for someone of his status. It annoys me because I do think we should value our artists for who they are just as much as for the work they create. Once seen as bold, it now comes off as behavior expected from a petulant child. How he has portrayed himself has made me more or less apathetic towards his music. I am not angered or upset by his behavior, but his character has cast a large enough shadow over his music for me to have no interest in it. It saddens me to say that, because of this, I don't know if I'll ever be a full-fledged Kanye West fan again. So for now, I'm just fine not listening to his latest album. It makes no difference to me.
