Kanye West’s temperament has been extremely erratic as of recent. First, he fired at Pete Davidson, unleashing a tirade that ended up with Davidson in trauma therapy. Then the billionaire rapper and producer took aim at GAP and Balenciaga, slamming them for stealing his designs and last but not least but he unleashed his wrath on Adidas as he proclaimed the company “[Didn’t] want no more smoke”.
However, only last week, he publicly apologised to his ex-wife and Pete Davidson on Good Morning America, in a sudden shift from anger to remorse. However, offline and outside of his high-fashion bubble, Kanye has still been hard at work in the studio, crafting hits, as evidenced by a clip that has surfaced of West showcasing new material in London that he created in collaboration with producer James Blake.
James Blake is respected within the worlds of hip hop and R’n’B and has already worked with the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Beyoncé, Vince Staples and Frank Ocean. The 34-year-old producer and vocalist has even won a Grammy as a result of his outstanding vocal contribution to the song ‘King’s Dead’ by Kendrick Lamar at the 2019 awards. Furthermore, he won the 2012 Mercury Music Prize for his second studio album, Overgrown. With so many accolades to his name, it is not hard to see why Kanye would want to collaborate with him.
With Kanye in London, it is nice for fans to see that he is not hiding away in his Wyoming studio but is actively travelling the world in his quest to make quality music. In a tweet, one user claimed that Kanye had sampled Blake’s track ‘Always’. However, Blake was quick to debunk this claim and swiftly declared it a falsehood as he revealed that he, himself, had produced both tracks from scratch. Taking to Twitter, the musician wrote, “Doesn’t sample ‘Always’ it’s new”.
Ecstatic about the fact that he was working with Kanye, Blake also Tweeted, “It’s my birthday, and [West] is playing tracks we made I’m good for presents, thanks.” Blake has wanted to work with Kanye for some time now and has been vocal about his desire to collaborate with the Chicago producer and billionaire. In 2015, the producer said that West would feature on his third studio album, The Colour In Anything. However, that did not end up happening. Talking about that failed collaboration, Blake told Pitchfork, “Something was supposed to happen; I don’t really know how to describe how that didn’t work out,” he continued, “I wanted Kanye to be on the song ‘Timeless’, but the verse didn’t materialize.”
Maybe the timing was not right back then, but it is now, as the two have obviously been collaborating for some time. With a new creation on the way, it is not yet obvious if the tracks will be released as Ye tracks or Blake tracks, but regardless fans are excited to see what West has been up to on the music front. You can view the music snippets below.