Awesome Car Collections: Kanye West
Posted on: 02/10/2014Kanye Omari West was born June 1977, in Atlanta Georgia, but essentially grew up in Chicago Illinois (with a spell in China, when his mum landed a job there).
Unlike so many of his compatriots though, he did so in a distinctly middleclass home; his father a photojournalist and Black Panther, his mother a Professor in English, who taught at universities.
He took to singing at a very young age and was supported by his parents in his endeavours, although his mom took a pretty dim view when he dropped out of college aged 20, to pursue his music career.
She was cool enough to recognise it was probably the correct decision though, after his first album ‘The College Dropout’ hit the charts in 2004. He made his mark first as a music producer however, eventually landing a role within Jay Z’s Rock-a-Fella Records in 2000, producing for Alicia Keys and Janet Jackson, among others.
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Jay Z admitted he initially saw West as a producer, rather than rapper and employed him as such. However, in 2002, Kanye was in a near-fatal car crash, amongst other things, smashing his jawbone when he fell asleep at the wheel. His jaw wired up, he wrote much of the album as he convalesced and indeed, recorded the song, ‘Through The Wire’ whilst his jaw was still wired up. This became one of the breakout hits on his debut album, ‘The College Dropout’.
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Four out of five of his albums have gone on to reach the coveted top spot in the American charts and he has won 53 major awards to date, including 21 Grammy Awards. He has worked with pretty much everyone he has wanted to within the music firmament, including John Legend, Mobb Deep, Taleb Kweli, Common and of course, his long-term collaborator, Jay Z.