Kanye West's 2010-2011 is the Greatest 2 Year Stretch in Music History

I was listening to Rick Ross' "Live Fast, Die Young" a few weeks ago and "I Don't Like" came on next. Then "Christian Dior Denim Flow." Then "Devil in a New Dress" and "Niggas in Paris." And I thought, damn, Kanye had a really crazy 2010 and 2011. 

After discussing with a few friends and strengthening my argument, I landed here: 

Kanye West's 2010 and 2011 is the greatest 2 year stretch by a music artist in history

The Top One Percenters Playlist Volume 24

Volume 24.

Kanye West & Lil Pump - I Love It [Music Video] ft. Adele Givens

Is Kanye finally not taking himself so seriously?

Apparently Kanye was a co-creative director of the first annual PornHub awards in LA last night. While @ the show, he debuted this new song for "I Love It" with Lil' Pump. The video, featuring Ye and Pump in oversized box-like outfits walking down a colorful, neon corridor, was exec produced by Spike Jonze, who Ye has previously worked with for the short film "We Were Once a Fairytale" (2009), "Otis" (2011) and "Only One" (2015). The beat for "I Love It" has a Bay area feel, almost like some slowed down hyphy music. It's dope. But I wonder if there's a verse missing because the way the song is edited at the 1:16 section feels a bit off. I fucks with it though. 4 fucks given out of 5.

The Top One Percenters Mixtape Volume 22

Twice in one year? I'm officially back on my mixtape game lol. After taking 3 years between volume 20 and 21, we're trying to do things a bit quicker these days. The Top One Percenters Mixtape is up and running. See below for the Spotify embed. Included are superstars like Drake ("That's How You Feel") and Pusha T ("What Would Meek Do?"), but also a lot of summertime flexes and remixes from  Cardi B ("I Like It" Dillon Francis Remix) Dagny, Dua Lipa, Sean Paul (yes, that Sean Paul), Rae Sremmurd and more. Check out the rest of the mixtapes here and follow on Spotify.

Kanye West - Lift Yourself (Bad Royale & Chill Pill Remix)

My significant other hates "Lift Yourself". She hates the "poppity scoop" lyrics and even though I love the song, she hates when I play it. So I had to find a remix that made the track a little more bearable for her. Slide in Bad Royale and Chilly Pill for the trap remix. I wanted to put this on the Top One Percenters Mixtape Vol 21 but it wasn't on Spotify.

ScHoolboy Q ft. Kanye West - THat Part [Music Video]

ScHoolboy Q just dropped the visuals for the official first single from his upcoming, untitled album that drops July 8. I seem to be one of the few people who really likes Kanye’s verse. I mean, “Wifey gonna kill me, she the female OJ’? That’s fucking flame — PLUS her pops helped get him off. That line is deep. And there’s the “I just scored 60, man, I feel like Kobe/LA-mar was with me, man, I feel like Kobe” — OMG HOW CAN YOU NOT FUCK WITH THAT LINE AFTER LAMARS FIRST TWO PUBLIC APPEARANCES AFTER HE ALMOST DIED WERE KANYE’S SEASON 3 AT MSG AND KOBE’S LAST GAME AT THE STAPLES CENTER??!

As you can tell, I’m too hype. 

Zoolander 2 [Movie Trailer]

Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson are back in Zoolander 2, the sequel the 2001 movie Zoolander that no one really saw in theaters. But it was one of those movies that develop a gigantic following in the home video market — so here we are. In Zoolander 2, someone's trying to kill the world's most beautiful people and Derek (Stiller) and Hansel (Wilson) must try to stop them. Along for the ride are Penelope Cruz, Justin Bieber, Kristen Wiig, Kanye West, Benedict Cumberbatch, Olivia Munn, and more.

Zoolander 2, directed by Stiller and written by The Leftover's Justin Theroux (he also wrote Tropic Thunder and Iron Man 2), hits theaters February 12, 2016.

Travi$ Scott - Piss On Your Grave ft. Kanye West

I was never a Travi$ Scott fan. In fact, I was kind of anti-Travi$ Scott because the guy can't actually rap well, and even tho there's this "Travi$ Scott sound", he doesn't really produce anything, either. When Rodeo came out last month, neither of those two things changed — but what did change for me was the flame beats and crazy energy he was droppin. "90210" goes in, and even more than that, "Piss On Your Grave" makes me wanna suplex niggas. It makes me wanna drink champagne and smash the bottle over someone's head like it aint nothin. The Kanye verse, even tho he doesn't say anything, gets me amped as hell — I'll be in the shower tryna get ready for work all I wanna do is run through a brick wall. When the beat drops and Kanye yells "Can't hide from the truth, now we bout to go ape"? It doesn't matter what I'm doing. I'll stop and just start turnin up. "ME AND LE FLAME? IS YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?"

Yes, Kanye. I'm entertained. Now fucking drop SWISH already, god.

Throwback: Kanye West + Ludacris + Game - Where You At? (The Whole City Behind Us)

Somewhere around 10 years ago, Boost Mobile came out with a advertising campaign titled "Where You At?" It was about using the Boost Mobile chirp to call people, often times with the phrase "where you at?". The focal point of that campaign was a song by Kanye West, Ludacris and The Game titled "Where You At? (The Whole City Behind Us)".
They also did a commercial/music video for the song, too. The two biggest things I want to know before I die aren't the secrets of the world, but 1) Did Nike pay Nelly to make "Air Force Ones" and 2) I need to hear the WHOLE story behind the making of this song and campaign. Getting three of the biggest rap stars in the world (at the time) to make a song for a corporate retailer? That shit must've been a monstrous headache between egos, creative control, money and timing.

Song of the Day: Autre Ne Veut - Counting

I'm at a loss for words right now. Have you ever listened to a random album and fell in love with the first track? And then you get a little uncomfortable because you love the second track as well? And then you start to get really uncomfortable because you fear that you might equally love the album? It's not a fear of loving the album or that artist; it's quite the opposite. You fear that you'll start to love other songs and other album a little bit less. Not because they don't stack up to whatever album you're listening to for the first time, but because you're afraid this new album/artist will soak up every ounce of you and leave nothing left for the rest of the music in your playlist.

That's how I feel listening to Autre Ne Veut's Anxiety album for the first time. It doesn't happen when I listen to a new Kanye album, or every three years when NYPC drops a new record, or whenever N.E.R.D. releases new shit because I know (and expect) to fall in love with those pieces of art. It only happens when I get "Sharkeisha'd" and it hits me out of the blue.

Show love and check out Autre Ne Veut's Facebook, Twitter, and website.

Throwback: Kanye West - We Were Once A Fairytale [Short Film]

Back when Kanye made short films and actually released them (cough cough Cruel Summer film), he linked up with director Spike Jonze for this hypnotizing —if incredibly awkward — short film titled We Were Once A Fairytale. "See You In My Nightmares", one of the standout tracks from 808s and Heartbreaks gets major play in this piece. If you don't recall the short, an uber inebriated Kanye obnoxiously trolls people at an upscale bar. AND THEN shit gets weird. But when you watch the clip now it's easy to see Kanye was ahead of the Molly trend because dude is obviously ROLLIN HARD.

This. Kanye West x "Mean Girls"

Throwback Thursday: Can't Tell Me Nothing [Zach Galifianakis Remix]

Before Zach Galifianakis blew up in a major way, he gave us one of the greatest music videos/music video spoofs in the history of ever.

Kanye West Performing "All Day" at the 2015 BRIT Awards

Kanye took a break from releasing shoes and working on the YEEZUS follow-up to perform at the 2015 BRIT awards earlier today. Instead of showing us a glimpse of already released tracks "Only One", "FourFiveSeconds" or "Wolves", Ye hit us with the previously unreleased but widely circulated and poorly ripped "All Day". The somewhat muted performance, in which West and Travi$ Scott rap in front of a mob of hooded hype men and 2 (two!) flamethrowers, still served as a nice actual premier of "All Day".

Throwback of the Day: Rich Boy - Throw Some D's + Kanye West - Throw Some Ds

And the much, much better Kayne version. It's all about getting fake D-cup tits. Genius, Kayne, genius. "Now she done went to school and got all type of degrees, but I bet you that she never had them Ds!"

Brooklyn Eatery Offering Kim Karshashian/Kanye West-Inspired Valentine's Day Menu

Brucie, a Brooklyn eatery, is entering year two of having pop culture inspired Valentine's Day menu options. Last year, it was Beyonce and JAY Z, with dishes like Blue Ivy, Surf Board, I Am Pasta Fierce, Diva is a Female Version of Brusstla, and more. For 2015, Brucie is going Kimye. You can pick from one of two course selections: The Kim or The Kanye. Kim's dishes replace all the "C's with "K"s and the Kanye dishes play on song titles and range from "All Foie's Down" to “BOUND 2” PORK ROULADE BOURGUINON, from "The North West" to "NO CHURCH IN THE WILD" MUSHROOM POLENTA"

Dishes are $100 a person. 

Theophilus London ft. Kanye West - "Can't Stop"

Theophilus London just dropped his new album, Vibes, a few weeks ago and "Can't Stop," featuring Kanye, is the standout track.

Why Kanye's Marketing Plan For YEEZUS Was Genius and Idiotic All At the Same Damn Time (Future Voice)

As we all know, because it was impossible to escape, YEEZUS came out two weeks ago. It debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 album charts and sold roughly 330 thousand copies during its debut frame. A week before it debuted, Billboard projected the album to sell around 500 thousand copies, which would  have been similar to what Watch The Throne (436K) and My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (497K) sold in their first week.

Now, the smaller than expected debut isn't what's really out of wack. In it's second full week in stores, YEEZUS tumbled from the pole position as the album had a monstrous 80% decline to 65K. Of all #1 album debuts, YEEZUS has the fourth steepest decline in week 2. From Billboard, the top five drops (not including YEEZUS, which would now be number 4).

April 21, 2012 - Madonna, "MDNA" - 86.70% (from 359,000 to 48,000 at No. 8)

June 18, 2011 - Lady Gaga, "Born This Way" - 84.28% (from 1.11 million to 174,000 at No. 1)

Dec. 3, 2011 - Mac Miller, "Blue Slide Park" - 82.54% (from 144,000 to 25,000 at No. 24)

Dec. 16, 2006 - Jay-Z, "Kingdom Come" - 79.42% (from 680,000 to 140,000 at No. 6)

Dec. 11, 2010 - Kanye West, "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" - 78.14% (from 496,000 to 108,000 at No. 7)

How did this happen? Kanye eschewed all traditional forms of album marketing in favor of a "This is What the Fuck I Want To Do" type of campaign. It fits with the album because that's a major theme throughout YEEZUS, but the majority of America never heard, and still hasn't heard, any of the material. The album's been out for nearly 3 weeks (if you count the leak time) and I'm still introducing the album to people who haven't heard anything from it.

If people still haven't heard the album, either through stream, leaks, bootlegs, word of mouth, people playing it in the car/club/crib, or radio, how can you expect them to purchase it in its second week and beyond?

The way Kanye decided to promote the album was revolutionary, wild, creative, awe-inspiring, genius, and a whole list of other adjectives. But one thing we have to ask ourselves it, "Was it efficient?" I think it was up until the album dropped, and after, it no longer was.

On May 2nd, 6 weeks before YEEZUS came out, Kanye sent out a tweet that simply said "June Eighteenth", and that was the beginning of the promo. Two weeks later, he premiered "New Slaves" on the side of 66 buildings in 10 cities, in 6 countries and 3 continents. Kanye made the internet go nuts with technology that was created in the 1920s. Think about that shit. The next day, he performed "New Slaves" and "Black Skinhead" on Saturday Night Live.

And that was it. Kanye didn't release a music video, he didn't do any more nationally televised performances. He didn't send a single to radio. He didn't even release anything through iTunes. In fact, the only incarnations of the music we had was a YouTube video of a half-decent version of "New Slaves" projected onto the side of a building in Brooklyn and the performances from SNL. We didn't have a CDQ of a single song until the album leaked the Friday before its release.

So when you think about it, Kanye did enough to make the internets go wild, which they did, and then...nothing. Why/how did that happen?

Is that an effective way to promote an album? 

For someone not of Kanyes stature, sure, maybe. That could work for an independent band with limited resources, but Kanye has the full power of Def Jam behind him. He's not lacking for a marketing budget. Kanye is a big fucking deal, one of the top 20 most popular artists worldwide, I would guess. He's blockbuster status, at the very least.

How did Def Jam fuck this up?

I mean, there's a reason why major movie studios spend the most money marketing their biggest releases. It's because those releases have the best chance of reaching the widest audience. A Kanye album is the same thing. No matter how you feel about him as a person, you can't deny that the dude is one of the best musical talents to hit the scene in the past 25 years. He has not released a subpar album, ever. You may not be feeling YEEZUS or 808s & Heartbreaks, but those albums are still fucking dope. You need a major marketing push when releasing a signature album.

Jay Z is now doing something similar with Magna Carta Holy Grail. He isn't releasing a single before the album drops in 14 hours (July 4th at 12:01am). That's never happened before with a major artist. Shit, that maybe hasn't happened, ever. But the difference? Samsung is spending a crazy amount of money promoting the album and the fact that it's exclusive to certain Samsung devices for the first 3 days of release. THEY HAD A FUCKING 3 MINUTE PROMO DURING THE NBA FINALS, FOR FUCKS SAKE. In additional to all the free internet promo, they've spent a massive amount of money to make sure everyone knows about the album/has heard one of the various snippets in the present within the various promos.

Word is that deal came together in about a month, which means they were likely working on it in May and June while Kanye was promoting YEEZUS. Did they take pointers from that marketing campaign and learned what not to do, which was ignore the enormous financial coffers at their disposal?

I know this is Kanye's "fuck it" album, not from a creative standpoint, but from a commercial stance. No traditional marketing, no video, no single, no album art/cover, no pandering to the masses. By agreeing to Kanye's vision for the album marketing, Def Jam — his record label — left several thousand copies of this album on the floor because, while awareness was high that Kanye had a new album, awareness was terribly low concerning what the album actually sounded like. But was that a mistake? For him, no, but for Def Jam, abso-fucking-lutely.

Def Jam dropped the ball on the promotion of the album. If everyone knows the album is dropping, but no one's heard the music, and thus can't decide if they want to purchase the album or not, that's an epic fucking fail on the part of the record label. I know Kanye is Kanye, and there really isn't any arguing with Kanye, but someone at the label should have said, "Look, we need a single to send to radio, so pick a song off the album and we'll send that. We also need a video, so pick a song, film the video, and we'll release it after the album drops. Whichever song is fine, we just need something to show."

I don't think Def Jam has much to show for their marketing efforts.

The Top One Percenters Mixtape: Volume 7

What's good, all? We're back with the latest mixtape, The Top One Percenters Volume 7. Remember, these are individual tracks, not one long mix. On deck this time around is Kanye, Calvin Harris, Game, Cazzette, Martin Solveig, Kendrick, Casket Girls, CHARLIE XCX, and more. Tracklist and link below.

Nig-Unit Nation Presents: The Top One Percenters Mixtape Volume 7

1. Calvin Harris ft. Florence Welch - Sweet Nothing (Diplo Remix)

2. Rihanna ft. Kanye West - Diamonds Remix

3. B.O.B. ft. Iggy Azalea & Mac Miller - Best Friend

4. Cazzette - Beam Me Up (Kill Mode Radio Edit)

5. Martin Solveig ft. Dragonette - Can't Stop

6. Calvin Harris - School

7. Ke$ha ft. Juicy J, Wiz Khalifa & Becky G - Die Young (Remix)

8. Yelawolf ft. Travis Barker - Funky Shit

9. Ladyhawke - Better Than Sunday

10. Ryan McDermott - Paradise

11. Kendrick Lamar - good kid

12. Game - Black Jesus

13. Casket Girls - Heartless

14. Kendrick Lamar ft. Lady Gaga - Bitch Don't Kill My Vibe (Original Demo)

15. CHARLIE XCX - Forgivenes

The Top One Percenters Volume 7 | Alt 1 (Dead)

I'd like to include a Spotify playlist on here, but a decent amount of the tracks aren't on Spotify because they haven't been released officially, they have been but Spotify hasn't gotten them yet, they're a radio rip, a leaked track, or an artist too new/underground/without a rights deal :/