Kanye West — we all know him, and we all either hate him or love him. I’m sure you remember him storming the stage at the 2009 Video Music Awards taking away Taylor Swift's spotlight and embarrassing her. Nonetheless, the point of this article is not to bash West. In fact, the point of this article is to take a moment and talk about who West is, where he came from and how far he has come. After all, he's a great musical artist whether we want to admit it or not.

Born in Atlanta and raised on the south side of Chicago, West hopped right on the fast track to stardom at a young age. West’s mother met the famous Chicago-based hip-hop producing legend No I.D.’s mother and got him to sit West down and teach him the ropes of producing. In this video, producer No I.D. boasts that West “started getting pretty good at it," meaning producing.

West first hit the scene when he became a college dropout in 1998. His time studying art at Chicago State University was cut short once he decided that he would be better off taking his music career solo. He became part of a Chicago-based group the Go Getters in 1999 and released an album titled "World Record Setters."

This got a small snowball rolling that would eventually help him get his name out on a bigger scale. He took these polished talents of producing to New York, where he started producing for hip-hop giants like Jay-Z. He put Jay-Z’s album "The Blueprint" on the map by producing its first hit single "I.Z.Z.O (H.O.V.A)." You know the “H to the Izzo”? By 2002, he was signed to Roc-A-Fella Records, Jay-Z’s record label, and was officially producing as well as recording his own raps.

However, after his success as a producer, his reputation as a rapper began to be tested as the pessimism behind producers turned rappers huge in the genre of hip-hop. West was quick to defend his reputation as a rapper in 2003.

Finally in 2004, West hit the scene with the critically acclaimed and wildly successful debut album "College Dropout." The album gave the entire hip-hop game a skip in its step when it attained platinum status and won a Grammy for Album of the Year. West made a statement that he was here to say as he handled the production of the entire album, having three singles off the album appear on the Billboard Top 100. The album was a great depiction of West and appeared at number two on the Hot 100 list selling 441,000 copies in the first week.

In 2002, West was in a near-fatal car crash and had his mouth wired shut due to reconstructive surgery on his jaw. He produced several records in this condition, but most impressively recorded "Through the Wire" with the wiring still in his mouth. In the song he said, “I spit it through the wire, man. I’d gladly risk it all right now; it’s a life or death situation man.” He’s referring to the song as a life or death situation paralleling the near-fatal crash. This album is one of the best hip-hop has ever seen, in my opinion, as it was a bar-setting album for West and his competition.

The following year the young rapper worked harder than ever to put out another album on Aug. 29, 2005. "Late Registration" was released and immediately stopped anyone who doubted him as a rapper and thought the producer-turned-rapper from Chicago couldn’t keep up with his first album’s momentum. He kept his distinguished style of production on the album. Taking beats from old classics and using his own hip-hop spin, West made hit after hit. Songs that made an all too expected appearance on the Billboard Hot 100 list included "Gold Digger," "Diamonds from Sierra Leone" and "Touch the Sky." The best performing single "Gold Digger" was number one in the first week on Sept. 6. In that same week, the album became number one on the Billboard Hot 100 as the best-selling album with 860,000 copies sold.

West’s success was vaster than anyone could have imagined, except himself. He claimed that if it didn’t win another Grammy, he was “going to have a problem.” In fact, he would later prove these statements as true, alongside two additional Grammys he added to his collection. He was nominated and won Best Rap Single for "Gold Digger" and Album of the Year was stacked on top of Best Rap Album.

Shortly after the Grammy Awards, he appeared in Rolling Stone Magazine with a bloody, thorn-covered crown on his head, depicted as Jesus. The absurdness of the cover caught the attention of the country, and his buzz was soaring higher than ever before. West was one of the biggest names not only in music but the entire world. Whether you loved him or hated him, one thing was for sure, he was a force to be reckoned with, and would by no means be moving over for anyone in the music industry on he climb to being one of the best-selling artists of all time.

West also made some big news by starting his own fashion line called Pastelle, which would later end, among other things. He said that George W. Bush “doesn’t care about black people” off script on live TV, exploiting his own lyrics about AIDS being man-made at an AIDS Awareness concert, snapping at a radio DJ for interrupting him (which wouldn’t be the last time he did this) and being sued by Evil Knievel. The point is that you couldn’t turn the corner without hearing West’s music playing or hearing about someone talk about him.

West kept his buzz going with “Stronger” on June 26, 2007. The song's success came to no surprise as West was now considered, and often self-proclaimed, a genius in the hip-hop game. He was becoming more than just an artist. He was becoming an icon and an unavoidable persona that everyone was continuing to love or hate. His video for “Stronger” brought the fad of shutter shades into the world along with a brewing feud between him and the well-established contender Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson. Each artist believed that they could sell more records in the opening week than the other. The feud was great publicity for both of the hip-hop superstars as both had highly anticipated albums on the way.

On Sept. 11, 2007, both dropped their new albums. West dropped "Graduation," outselling 50 Cent with a staggering 957,000 copies sold, achieving gold status and nearly going platinum in the first week alone. Other successful singles on the album included "Good Life," featuring T-Pain and "Everything I Am." This album got West nominated for six Grammys, four of which he won. West was now on top of the hip-hop game officially. He was named MTV’s Hottest MC in May 2008.

In just four years West became one of the best rappers in the game. After releasing some of the best music hip-hop had seen in some time, West took to changing it up with a common theme people began to take part in — auto-tune. On Sept. 7, 2008, he performed "Love Lockdown" for fans at the VMAs.

It displayed the diversity he had in his style of not only producing his beats but his overall music.

The second single "Heartless" would be released on Nov. 5, shortly before he released his fourth studio album "808s & Heartbreak" on Nov. 24, 2008. The unique style of production was introduced right in the title of the album. The 808 drums that West used gave the album a different sound, and the slower, melancholy songs sang in auto-tune made the album one to remember. Unlike his first three studio albums that were flashy and loud to make a statement of who West was, this album gave us a different side of his as an artist and some of his true creative ability. Of course in the first week, it would go number one on the Billboard Top 100, selling 450,000 copies in the first week. Although he had only one Grammy nomination for "Amazing" featuring Young Jeezy, the album stood as solid. During another successful year West collaborated on a Louis Vuitton sneaker and continued his ranting through blogs to fans, had one account of assault on the paparazzi, and performed in shows around the world including "SNL," yet again.

On April 9, West become the first non-athlete to produce a full collaboration of sneakers with major distributor Nike. With one foot in the music industry and the other in the fashion industry, West seemed more dominant than ever. It was around this time that perhaps his most notorious stunt “of all time” happened at the same show he usually left people in awe, the VMAs, but this time it was in a negative light when he embarrassed Taylor Swift on stage.

I must say that I respect his consistency because this was most certainly not his first time storming the stage. He even gave away an award that was originally given to him in 2007.

West sure did recover from that night at the awards when he apologized live on Jay Leno.

He stayed true to his word, though, and stuck by the fact that he thought Beyoncé had the better video.

In the summer of 2010 the release of the first single off "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" came in early August. "Power" was a hit single that let people know West was back to being the West they fell in love with but had something different about him. It showed that West was done with the games of playing around with auto-tune and making the slow, sad songs over loud drums and scratchy voice-overs. This time, West put out what many consider to be his best album to date.

Traditionally, West showed up to the VMAs again in 2010. He debuted his next single, "Runaway" featuring Pusha-Tto close out the show. He not only gave more exposure to his new album at the show but also to new artists.

West was always on the look out for new talent. In fact, that’s how he found one of his biggest successes, Big Sean, who is one of the biggest names in hip-hop now.

"Fantasy" was an enormous hit. With songs like "Monster," "All of the Lights," and "Lost in the World," on top of the first two singles Rolling Stone gave the album five stars labeling it as “epic." This album encapsulated himself as an artist to show everyone a lot of his true colors. He talked about a major breakup with model Amber Rose with the extremely emotional song "Blame Game" featuring John Legend, another signee to G.O.O.D. music West found. Although the album was good, the only bad thing that seemed to come out of it was the artwork being "banned" Despite this, the album went platinum by Jan. 16, 2011. He was a superstar in every sense of the word who made enough good music for me to still like him despite his underlying negative image in the press.

Due to the success and unbelievable performances he put on at countless venues on tour and in addition to them (Coachella, SXSW Vevo PowerStation, NBA All-Star game and American Idol) West was awarded MTV’s Man of the Year award and TIME's Person of the Year in 2010. Then, by June 2011 his Label G.O.O.D music was officially under Def Jam Records.

On Aug. 8, 2011, he would go on to drop yet another album, this time with his long co-working businessman and rapper Jay-Z. Together they released "Watch the Throne" and just like that, in two years, West had two more Platinum records under his belt. West performed "Otis" featuring Jay-Z at the 2011 award show. Who else can say that for half a decade they performed one of their hit singles every year at one of the biggest award shows in music?

We move on to West being heavily involved with G.O.O.D music, putting out successful singles off the album included "Mercy" which became double platinum, and "New Gold Flow." The album proved that West and his team (Common, John Legend, Big Sean and 2Chainz) were a force that could keep up with other labels like Young Money and MGM.

More recently. West put out the album "Yeezus." It quickly went straight to number one on iTunes. Like me, a lot of people thought it was trash, but some thought it was genius. The album had too much going on with new sounds he was using that seemed to have been sent over from Skrillex and other house party dubstep musicians. The creativity that is usually demonstrated on the albums he put out in the past seemed distant like he tried so hard to be different, and it didn't in his favor. "Monster," released in 2010, went platinum and he became the top-selling artist in digital sales.

I can’t even begin to indulge in the fiasco of events he got into between "Watch the Throne" and "Yeezus." If he wasn’t yelling exaggerating the 140 character limit ranting on Twitter, he was yelling at talk show hosts. If he wasn’t hitting paparazzi in the streets he, was ranting at his shows to his fans.

But when he wasn’t acting up in public he was making shoes, music, or clothes, and expressing himself in every other was possible. Many people can’t seem to find the heart to like West. Personally, I can. The bottom line is that West went from Atlanta to Chicago, to New York, to becoming one of the most famous and best-selling artists in the world. There is no denying the fact that West has an irreplaceable amount of talent and that his music especially is great. So I say, bravo Kanye West.