Does it matter how many producers Kanye had? I didn’t bother checking btw.
You said Beck was the only producer on his album and that is not true. You act as if he walks into a studio alone and comes out weeks later with a fully formed record. He doesn’t, and that fact doesn’t speak at all to his talent.
Kanye’s a jackass, but he’s also hugely creatively talented and dedicated to making interesting music. So is Beck. I can’t say one is better than the other (Beck is probably much less of a jackass), but disparaging the talent and musical ability of either is nonsense.
Beck is the only credited producer on the album in question. Why do you think there are other, uncredited, producers? That would be extraordinarily unlikely on a major album these days.
The page I linked to lists several producers. Further googling seems to confirm they participated in the same ways Kanye’s producers did.
Nope. Only one producer. All the others are engineers or masterers.
Why is it so hard for you to accept that Beck was the sole creative force on his album, when that’s what the credits say and, as yet, no-one’s produced an actual cite otherwise?
I see the wiki which I cited seems to have been edited. Regardless, your latter contention is highly debatable. Just crediting one producer doesn’t at all mean you are the sole creative force.
Kanye clarifies (with Ryan Seacrest):
Btw, that interchange was in the middle of a conversation where Kanye indicated that he and Taylor Swift are planning to go into the studio to record together - interesting times.
Actually, I misread the wiki. My apologies.
Btw, those who think Kanye can’t talk or talks sub-English, needs to listen to the Seacrest interview.
He’s the only credited writer or producer. There’s no reason to think that any of the other people involved did anything but play or engineer the way he told them to. That’s not exactly unusual, and I’ve no idea why you think it’s not happening here. Prince would be another famous example of an artist who could, and often did, create everything himself. Would you have the same doubts about him?
Perhaps when a rapper busts in the middle of a song that is not an artistic choice. It’s an impulse control problem. They just have an uncontrollable need to interrupt singers no matter what they are doing.
The same thing could happen if say Elvis Costello was eating a bowl of Cap’n Crunch. If Kanye was there he would bust in and tell him he needs to respect that bowl with some Count Chocula.
I am saying your contention that he is the sole creative force is nonsense, and would never apply to any other collaborative art form. Is producer/directed of a movie the sole creative force? Few would ever say that in all but the most extreme examples.
And you disregarded or overlooked my alternate cite before you repeated your claim, which was much more clear on the matter.
As someone who can play several instruments, and has fooled with modern electronic methods of editing/creating music. Let me assure you that they aren’t really comparable in terms of the skill necessary to make good music with them. I can make a workable drum track in an afternoon on a drum synth that I haven’t seen before. In contrast, I’ve owned a drum set for 10 years. Despite the afternoons I’ve spent trying to switch between different 4/4 beats, I would be embarrassed to play drums in front of an audience (even if that audience was my wife, who was a better drummer than I am now on her first afternoon behind the kit), even though I often proudly play other instruments in front of an audience.
As to whether the number of producers matters: yeah, it matters. If you have a great song, you don’t even need to be a great performer. If you are are a great performer, you don’t need a great producer, or even great songs. If you are a great producer, you don’t need a great song, a great performer, or any other producers.
And furthermore, if Mr. West is crediting photographers as producers of his songs, his idiocy descends far more than simple narcissism.
And to fall back on an old maxim of mine:
I can’t take Glenn Danzig seriously, because Glenn Danzig takes himself seriously. I can apply the same maxim to Kanye West very easily.
Well, that’s the thing. I don’t really know how seriously Kanye West takes himself. I think he’s just a troll, a publicity hound, and doesn’t really care how he does it. All the stuff he makes the media for just always seems so fake and calculated to me. Frankly, I think he’s playing the folks who take him seriously, but maybe I’m giving him too much credit there.
Well, maybe I’m giving him too much credit by considering him sincere. We judge others by our own measure. Either way, his noise isn’t that consequential in the big scheme.
And I can also play several instruments and have an interest in electronic music, and I can better make a beat that swings by actually beating a real drum vs programming it. Some folks are just incredible at making loops that just sing. I’m not talking just simple step-sequencing. I’m talking about making a beat with power and nuance and layering sounds, especially with looped drum parts or individual samples. Maybe you’re just very good at it. I personally find it very difficult to make good music on the computer. I have to play it. I’m terrible at programming it. That’s its own craft.
Possibly so, I am good at computers, and am clumsy IRL, so my experience may not translate to all. Even so, I was acceptable at stringed instruments from the start, became where I can fake being able to play keyboards to people learning them once I understood theory, but can’t even fake competence at the drum kit - neighbors be damned. Synths/sequencing just seemed easy to me after 20-odd years of music and computers. I don’t deride them as sources of music, but learning how to use them to create a whole seems vastly easier than the old-fashioned ways of doing it (especially if you include sampling in the palette), and I think that comparing them is unfair.
Ah, yes, the old “I don’t do that job, but it looks easy from here” argument so often trotted out by people who’ve no idea what they’re talking about. Old people said that about the Beatles.
Wow, Kanye West talking about how awesome Kanye West is. snore
Of course it’s real. You can tell because KKs’ hair is blowing in the opposite direction they are “traveling” in.
Which is exactly what Kanye did to Beck at the Grammys and after when he said Beck needs to respect real artistry and give his grammy to beyonce.
Not buying it.
“Beck is one of the nicest guys and one of the most respected musicians in the game. It’s nothing that I would want to do as a fellow musician, to disrespect him in any way.”
Yet that is exactly what he did to Beck at the Grammys and what he said about him afterwards. Actions speak louder than half-ass non-apologies.
“And he pointed out that everyone becomes way more famous after he interrupts them.”
Once again Kanye is all about Kanye and how Kanye makes the world a better place for those poor people who are not Kanye.