Kanye West interrupting Beck at the Grammys
As Kanye West replicates Swiftgate, Getintothis’ Shaun Ponsonby definitely doesn’t question his motives for sucking up to Jay-Z’s wife. Again.
Cosmic Slop is a place where one can muse over the various music news items of a given week, in a hopefully entertaining fashion. It is not, I repeat not, a place to just outwardly call somebody a douche. That would be crass and I would hope beneath Getintothis.
Having said that, some people occasionally make that rather difficult.
For example – and this is purely hypothetical, of course – let’s take a gander at Kanye West.
If we cast our minds back six years ago, you may recall West rushing the stage at the MTV Video Music Awards to tell Taylor Swift that she didn’t deserve to win whatever bloody worthless piece of plastic she’d just been handed, that in fact the honour belonged to Beyoncé for that video where she encouraged that if one liked it, as a consequence of this, the only rational reaction would be to place a small circular band of precious metal set with one or more gemstones on it.
It was a wonderful song that impacted all of our lives. If I like something, I now insist on putting a ring on it. If I’m enjoying the cup of tea I’m drinking and fancy a biscuit, I’ll only go for Party Rings. If I get the water in the bath just right, I’ll blow up a rubber ring. And it works both ways; the keys I don’t like have no key rings. Unfortunately, it hasn’t quite worked out as Bey intended. I lose my keys, my baths go cold and have you ever tried dipping Party Rings? Eugh. Her logic may be flawed.
In fairness to Kanye, it’s safe to say that a lot of people agreed with the sentiment if not the practice. The last half-decade has seen that Beyoncé’s video has become the more iconic. Although, the VMA’s is hardly the place to reward something for being good. It is, and always will be, the place that teenyboppers get to have their love of the soulless pap thrust upon them justified. In fact, whether or not Taylor Swift deserved any award that isn’t prefixed with the word “Worst…” is a debate in itself. Is there a music equivalent for the Razzies? There should be.
Following this event, the big deal about Kanye West appearing at awards shows for some hasn’t been about his performances, it’s been about whether or not he’ll lose his shit. At the Grammys last Sunday it finally happened. And, boy was it déjà vu.
Once again, Kanye rushed the stage. This time while Prince was awarding the Album of the Year award to Beck for his excellent Morning Phase album. He disappeared just as quickly, and many assumed it was a prank of sorts. But his comments to The Hollywood Reporter afterwards suggest otherwise.
“I just know that the Grammys, if they want real artists to keep coming back, they need to stop playing with us. We ain’t gonna play with them no more, and Beck needs to respect artistry and he should’ve given his award to Beyoncé,” he twatted. “Because when you keep on diminishing art and not respecting the craft and smacking people in their face after they deliver monumental feats of music, you’re disrespectful to inspiration, and we as musicians have to inspire people who go to work every day, and they listen to that Beyoncé album and they feel like it takes them to another place,” he continued like a pompous rectum.
Where to start…
First of all, for some reason Beyoncé is the second most honoured person in the history of the Grammys, behind only Stevie Wonder. That’s like saying she is the second greatest artist of the last 57 years, which is so far from the truth that it borders on parody. In any case, she ain’t gonna miss another Grammy. She’s had her share.
Unlike Beyoncé, Beck is pretty much a one-man band. He is a multi-instrumentalist, he writes everything himself and he is his own producer. Beyoncé is none of these things. How is that a slap in the face to “real artists”? How is Beck not a real artist? Who the fuck is Kanye West to infer that someone isn’t “real artist”, especially someone with Beck’s credentials? Who died and made Kanye West the arbiter of the entire world’s art?
He also seems to be suggesting that the record that most people buy is automatically the best. Well, the Teletubbies theme sold 1.3 million copies in the UK alone. Consider that.
And Beck needs to respect artistry and give his award to Beyoncé? No, Kanye West needs to respect other people’s artistry and not assume Beyoncé deserves every single award under the sun and throw a tantrum when she doesn’t.
Because that’s the lingering question here; why is he so obsessed with Beyoncé? So far, the only rational explanation I can draw is that he wants to boink her. To pork her. To glaze the donut. To go like a belt-fed motor. To have his banana peeled. To introduce the Captain to his pie. To shove the beaver with the leaver (feel free to leave your own euphemisms for coitus in the comments below). But, of course, that would be preposterous, potentially libellous and a little bit sexist, so I wouldn’t even come close to suggesting that.
The funny thing about the Grammys is that it is usually so predictable. The fact that Beyoncé has won at least 20 awards is a signifier of that. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no point in big gaudy awards ceremonies where you know exactly who is going to win. So it’s actually a good thing that Beck won, because it throws a spanner in the works and honours somebody else for a change.
But, as per above, Cosmic Slop isn’t the place to just outwardly call someone a douche. So, it’s a good job we didn’t publish any of that.
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Madonna self-confirmed herself for the BRIT Awards on Twitter…and nobody cared. No kidding. The only people who re-tweeted her worked for ITV.
Culture Secretary Sajid Javid doesn’t support the Put Fans First campaign by artists to change ticket re-sale laws in the UK to prevent us – that’s me and you, the people who buy tickets – from missing out on events and being ripped off by online touts, which in turn is rising ticket sales to a point where oftentimes you can’t afford to see your favourite artists. I’m guessing he doesn’t face this problem all that regularly, so please feel free to tell him your woes here.
