Friday, April 27, 2018

Friends reunited

Only last week I concluded a post about Kanye West's nonsensical and vacuous cod-philosophising on Twitter by saying "at least, I suppose, he's not Morrissey". It seems I spoke too soon.

The furore about his meeting with Donald Trump in December 2016 had been largely forgotten until West decided to reiterate his fondness for the current president: "You don't have to agree with Trump but the mob can't make me not love him. We are both dragon energy. He is my brother." He also shared a photo of his Make America Great Again baseball cap signed by Trump, who reciprocated with a tweet thanking the rapper.

In fairness to West, he isn't quite on Morrissey's level yet - he doesn't seem to be playing the part of calculating provocateur, and is more like a blissfully ignorant imbecile who can't understand what all the fuss is about. When John Legend urged him not to align himself with Trump, West offered the sort of response that suggests he's been absorbing a lot of right-wing media: "You bringing up my fans or my legacy is a tactic based on fear used to manipulate my free thought."

Criticism has inevitably been widespread and swift from everyone from Snoop Dogg to Moby, and as long as West maintains this ridiculous stance his credibility among fans as well as fellow musicians will surely nosedive. Suddenly I'm not feeling quite so much in the minority.

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