Kanye West - ye & Kids See Ghosts (June 1 & 8 2018) Album • Page 221

And even if the albums were longer than 7 songs too.

 

The numbers would be bigger if he had a massive song on the album. Length doesn't mean a whole lot, most people never listen to songs later on an album anyway.

AEU is basically 1500 streams = one album buy. One song can make an album. This album had no hits. That hurt it way more than the length.

 

The surprise Eminem album did around 450k first week, not 200.

To echo the rest of what you and others have said, yeah Kanye definitely isn't the music superstar he once was. Still pulling in solid first week numbers, but I bet most people outside forums like this would have a tough time naming a song he's put out in the last 2 years. Hell I just checked, Ye isn't even in the Top 50 album this past week, meanwhile DAMN is still on there and that came out almost 2 years ago.

 

I definitely think he’s declined *comparatively* to his previous commercial highs, but I’d argue that as far as sales/cultural relevance are concerned, Kanye was the exception rather than the rule for a LONG time as far as having a long shelf life at the top of hip-hop commercially.

The list of rappers who had consistent commercial success and a steady stream of hit albums/singles for as LONG as he had is very few... and I think it was inevitable that he’d eventually have a period where he fell out of step with where the genre is at now, and *comparatively* fell off to still be huge, but no longer be in contention for biggest current hip-hop artist. So I agree that the decline *is* happening to some extent... but it seems to me to be more of the shift to “legacy artist” status as opposed to being a current hot star.

Will he totally destroy his legacy to the point of irrelevance? It’s possible. But I think as a site of mostly extremely politically active and socially conscious music fans, we overestimate how much the average listener will care about his antics. His future success or failure is gonna depend almost entirely on the music.

 

I disagree with this because of I Love It, but other than that you’d likely be right for this album cycle.

 

Did 200 just in sales. Not SPS.

 

im actually shocked Panic at the disco is that popular

 

this is exactly it

 

Literally what I said.

 

I guess I just misread. I thought the implication was that the drop-off was connected to his recent controversies, and that's where I mostly disagree. And I also think it was gonna happen eventually, and the bigger shock is that it didn't happen more noticeably years ago.

 

I don't think the MAGA stuff hurt him much earlier this year but I think if he keeps it up it'll start to accelerate his decline at least a little bit.

 

Yeah I think it’ll probably have some impact. I don’t think it’ll be the primary cause though, I mean I Love It blowing up proves that it’s not gonna be an insurmountable obstacle by any means if the music catches on enough (big “if”).

 

Drake put out 5 Kanye albums in one this year so we can’t compare those numbers given how streams are counted

 

Kanye is largely irrelevant to the youth. They don’t give a shit about him. I Love It would have been huge with just about any other artist on it. Bigger, imo, with certain people. It isn’t about Ye. He doesn’t dictate the culture anymore and hasn’t since MBDTF. His main fans nowadays are nu-skool white hip hop nerds. He doesnt even have the oldheads like Eminem

 

I see lots of young kids listening to him and posting about his music, saw lots at the Pablo tour too.

 

That’s baffling to me then. White kids?

 

Yeah idk my kids talk to me about hip hop a ton and he’s never brought up. I Love It gets played, but like I said that’s more Pump. J Cole, Logic, Drake, XXX, 69 and Nicki/Cardi are pretty clearly the favorites. Kanye is usually only talked about when I bring up how baffling his actions have been and shit on Ye, and I dont get pushback at all, especially compared to me saying J Cole or Logic arent for me

 

Good mix here in Houston. I see Kanye merch, Yeezys, hear his music more often than none.

 

Shit idk if he was relevant here since Yeezus honestly. Idk if I’ve seen a kid in Ye merch

 

Pablo I think lifted him up more, people really liked it. Most of the tour stops were sold out and the show was talked about non stop I feel.

 

I work in a very affluent, very white town and I see a fair amount of yeezys. my colleague grew up here and for some reason is always listening to Ye.

It’s weird

 

He didnt make it to Philly so idk

 

i've never in my life seen a person wearing kanye west merch, i see maybe one person every 3 month wearing yeezys.

 

Have you seen the shit he’s been doing and saying? That’s not weird at all lol

 

I come from a small town that’s relatively conservative but with people that wouldn’t dare talk politics. I saw Pablo merch and Yeezys all the time throughout that album’s era. He was immediately discredited after his MAGA talks, like “I don’t know what he’s on now...” even if old Ye is on.

I’m still personally processing through the confusion. Huge stan, even liked Ye, but he’s just blantantly hurting people mentally at this point with no real rhyme or reason to back it up. Like him trying to explain his viewpoint on black history without context or hm, even a basic understanding of their reality in order to provide a factual portrayal of his ideas in regards to moving forward today? If you’re trying to change a viewpoint or anything for that matter, precision is your artform (as his once was). He’s reckless and as much of a big picture figure he claims to be has no perspective on the consequence of his actions outside of himself. His platform, or whatever’s left of it, represents so much more than himself and his ideas.