Kanye West

A Chicago producer turned rapper who built his sound from soul samples, then rebuilt it for each of the albums that followed, from The College Dropout in 2004 to the abrasive Yeezus in 2013.

Origin: Chicago, Illinois, United States
Years active: 1996-present
Genres: hip-hop, pop rap, progressive rap, industrial rap
Labels: Roc-A-Fella, Def Jam, GOOD Music
Also known as: Ye

Chicago and the beats

Kanye West was born in Atlanta on 8 June 1977 and raised in Chicago after his parents divorced when he was three. His mother, Donda West, was an English professor, and at ten he moved with her to Nanjing, China, where she taught as a Fulbright scholar. He began rapping in third grade and met the producer No I.D., who became his mentor. After a scholarship to the American Academy of Art in 1997 and a spell at Chicago State University, he dropped out at 20 to pursue music. He has since changed his legal name to Ye.

His first production credit came at 19, on Grav's Down to Earth in 1996. In 1998 he became the first producer signed to the management and production company Hip Hop Since 1978, and he was part of the Go-Getters, whose album World Record Holders appeared independently in 1999. From 2000 he produced in-house for Roc-A-Fella Records and is credited with reviving Jay-Z's career.

The College Dropout

On 23 October 2002 West crashed his car on the way home from a Los Angeles studio at about 3 a.m. and broke his jaw, which was wired shut. Two weeks after entering hospital he recorded Through the Wire. It reached 15 on the Billboard Hot 100.

The College Dropout followed on 10 February 2004. He had begun it in 1999 from beats he kept saving, and when it leaked months early he used the delay to add strings, gospel choirs and new verses. It was postponed three times. It entered the Billboard 200 at number 2 with 441,000 copies, won the Grammy for Best Rap Album, and produced Jesus Walks, which took the Grammy for Best Rap Song.

Late Registration to 808s

Late Registration arrived on 30 August 2005 with Jon Brion as co-executive producer. It cost about $2 million, took over a year and opened at number 1 with 860,000 copies. Its single Gold Digger reached number 1 on the Hot 100. Graduation, released on 11 September 2007, sold 957,000 copies in its first week, ahead of 50 Cent's Curtis in a widely followed sales contest, and Stronger, built on a Daft Punk sample, also topped the Hot 100.

His mother died in November 2007. In 2008 he recorded 808s & Heartbreak in September and October, mostly in Honolulu, using Auto-Tune and the Roland 808 drum machine. It came out on 24 November 2008 and is considered to have had a significant effect on hip-hop.

Hawaii and the Fantasy

After interrupting Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards on 13 September 2009, West saw a planned tour with Lady Gaga cancelled and retreated to Hawaii. There, at Avex Recording in Honolulu, he block-booked all three studios around the clock and gathered producers and guests including Kid Cudi, Rick Ross, Pusha T and Justin Vernon. He released free weekly tracks as GOOD Fridays from 20 August 2010, and My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy came out on 22 November 2010.

It opened at number 1 with 496,000 copies, holds a Metacritic score of 94 and won the Grammy for Best Rap Album. Power and Runaway were its best-known singles, and Runaway grew into a 35-minute short film. In August 2011 he and Jay-Z released Watch the Throne and toured it until June 2012.

Yeezus and after

Yeezus was started in January 2013 in a Paris loft and finished with Rick Rubin in the final days before its release on 18 June 2013. West wanted to undermine the commercial, and the record is short, hard and electronic, with Daft Punk, Hudson Mohawke and Mike Dean among its producers. It debuted at number 1 with 327,000 copies. Black Skinhead was its main single, and the Yeezus Tour followed with Kendrick Lamar supporting.

He headlined Glastonbury in June 2015, and The Life of Pablo appeared in February 2016. MusicBrainz also lists ye in 2018, Jesus Is King in 2019, Donda in 2021 and BULLY in 2025. Time named him among the 100 most influential people in 2005 and 2015, and Wikipedia credits him with 24 Grammy Awards.

Records

The College Dropout 2004 · Roc-A-Fella, Def Jam
The debut: soul samples, gospel and a skit-filled school theme, made around a jaw wired shut.
Late Registration 2005 · Roc-A-Fella, Def Jam
The orchestrated follow-up, made with Jon Brion, with Gold Digger on top of the Hot 100.
Graduation 2007 · Roc-A-Fella, Def Jam
The stadium-sized third album, which beat 50 Cent in a publicised sales race.
808s & Heartbreak 2008 · Roc-A-Fella, Def Jam
A sung, Auto-Tuned record built on the 808 drum machine.
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy 2010 · Def Jam, Roc-A-Fella
The Hawaii-sessions album: maximal, crowded with guests, and the best-reviewed record of its year.
Yeezus 2013 · Def Jam, Roc-A-Fella
Ten tracks in forty minutes: an industrial, stripped-down break from everything before it.

Songs

Through the Wire The College Dropout · 2004
Recorded with his jaw wired shut, two weeks after the car crash, over a sped-up Chaka Khan sample.
Jesus Walks The College Dropout · 2004
A gospel sample, a military drum cadence and a rap about faith that executives warned would never get airplay.
Power My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy · 2010
The lead single from the Hawaii album, built from a King Crimson sample and a beat meant for someone else.
Runaway My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy · 2010
A nine-minute toast to his own faults, which grew into a short film and an award-show set piece.
Black Skinhead Yeezus · 2013
Yeezus at its most direct: a pounding Daft Punk beat and the first song the duo made for the album.

Jay-Z, Daft Punk, Bon Iver, Kid Cudi

Where to go next

Reference

Wikipedia: Kanye West A long, well-sourced biography and discography.
MusicBrainz artist Canonical identifiers and dates, as data.
BBC Music The BBC's artist page.
Library of Congress search A search of the Library of Congress collections.

Discography and data

MusicBrainz release groups The album list with first-release dates, as data.

Writing and criticism

Complex: critics review their College Dropout reviews A look back at the 2004 reviews.
Christgau: Growing by Degrees A Consumer Guide piece on West.
Pitchfork: My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy The 10 out of 10 review.

Interviews

Rolling Stone: Rick Rubin on finishing Yeezus The producer's own account of the last two weeks.
Stamp the Wax: Rick Rubin and Zane Lowe A write-up of Rubin discussing Yeezus.
Complex: West talks Yeezus West on the album.
Sound On Sound: Recording and Mixing Kanye West Mix engineer Craig Bauer on Late Registration and the early Chicago years.
DJBooth: Andrew Dawson An engineer on working on West albums.
Studio Talks: Ken Lewis A producer credited on Power.

Live performance archives

Internet Archive search A search for recordings held at the Internet Archive.

Film and video

Mix with the Masters: Runaway A production class on Runaway and All of the Lights.

Sources

Kanye West, Wikipedia
Kanye West (Ye), MusicBrainz
Ye, BBC Music
Recording and Mixing Kanye West: Craig Bauer, Sound On Sound (2006-02)
Andrew Dawson interview, DJBooth (2019-08-21)