We’re not exactly sure what Zane Lowe of BBC1 Radio expected when he sat down to talk with Kanye West, but what he got was an interview nothing short of legendary. Over the course of an hour, Kanye went into more depth than ever before on his aggressive stances regarding fashion, art, design, culture, the Internet and, of course, his own music. Love him or hate him, Kanye West is bar none the most quotable human being on the entire planet, his best in class conviction acting as some sort of turbo rocket fuel for opinions. He might not believe it in 10 minutes, but when Kanye says something, he fucking means that shit and you better believe him.
Of course, Lowe’s interview wouldn’t be complete without the discussion of Fashion, something the world knows all too well is perhaps Kanye’s greatest passion after sonics. As is to be anticipated, Yeezus served up a smattering of epic and controversial statements on the clothing industry, in some cases calling out specific big time designers by name for their lack of vision. If there’s a criticism to be made of West, it’s that sometimes he doesn’t seem to realize that he needs to explain his thought process regardless of the fact that he’s apparently already reasoned through various complex ideas in his own head. Without explanation, his statements can seem completely out of left field or unwarranted, which often contributes to their memorability in the first place. The catch 22 of any Kanye interview is that even with context most of what he can still be taken completely out of context.
We did our best to extract the gems from Ye’s chat with Zane Lowe, hoping in the process to learn a few things about fashion, but, more importantly, about the man who once referred to himself as the Steve Jobs of downtown culture.