8 Things Kanye's Old Blog Predicted (And 9 It Didn't)

Do you guys miss Kanye's old blog as much as I do? It was way better than most celebrity blogs, though that's not saying much, for a multitude of reasons, chief amongst them being that he actually shared things he was into rather than simply putting on brands that were paying him to do so (shouts to his baby moms for eating off that though). He took the time to dispel celebrity gossip and get weirdly (read: brilliantly) personal at unexpected times, keeping daily readers like myself borderline thirsty for more. For many modern-day Internet hustlers, KanyeUniverseCity.com/blog was some type of education on the best of the best in fashion, streetwear, shoes, music, film and crazy ass woodland architecture. Its departure was somewhat painful—our digital alma mater had officially closed its doors forever.

Yet the blog wasn't just an educational tool for aspiring culture writers. Its value as an online representation of Kanye's perpetual knack for trend forecasting becomes extremely evident by looking deep into his archives. He championed styles, artists and behaviors that, while commonplace today, were seldom heard of an Internet lifetime ago. Of course, that's not to say Kanye was ALWAYS some sort of modern day Blogstradmus. He put on tons of things that never really made it into the pop culture landscape or even off of his own website. But at the end of the day, whether or not his blog was always correct in forecasting trends does not detract from its significance as a portal into the mind of one of today's most polarizing and complicated celebrities.

Left picture of lead image courtesy of Angel Laws.

Jake Woolf is a writer living in New York City. You can read his blog here and follow him on Twitter here.

What He Got Right:

Givenchy's Rise

In 2013, Givenchy and its Ricardo Tisci designs are inescapable. The Parisian label's overplayed prints and baroque graphics are at the forefront of nearly every "fashion discussion". GQ even named Ricardo their 2012 "Designer of the Year". But back in 2007 that wasn't even close to being the case, in part because Tumblr wasn't around as free marketing for brands, but mostly because no one cared about Givenchy or Ricardo Tisci even a little bit. That is, everyone except for Kanye. Kanye attended the label's Spring/Summer 2008 show, which puts him at least 2 years ahead of what has since become the fashion industry's perpetual Givenchy boner.

Aziz Ansari's Success

Nowadays Aziz Ansari effortlessly sells out national tours and appears on NBC Parks & Rec as fan favorite Tom Haverford. In 2008, Aziz was simply the up-and-coming chubby Indian comedian with a solid stand up act and a viral Human Giant sketch or two. That was until Kanye endorsed him. Later, he would endorse Aziz yet again through the now infamous post dedicated to Aziz's younger cousin, Darwish, with whom Yeezy had "beef". It's fair to see that Kanye's blog cultivated a lot of Ansari's early press (and classic jokes), while helping catapult him into the national spotlight.

Jak & Jil AKA Tommy Ton: Street Style God

While street style as a form of legitimate art (or even legitimate form of photography) seems to be on the way out, there was a time when it was an exciting new genre of fashion documentation. Perhaps no one has become more well-known for their street style photos than Tommy Ton, who burst onto the seen with his blog Jak & Jil. Back in early 2010, Kanye shouted out Tommy via a photo he took of then 'Ye boo Amber Rose. This helped solidify the talented Tommy as one of the genre's key players and helped validate street style in general as something every day folks should probably start paying attention to. The rest is history.

Welcome To Reblog World

The inside joke amongst #menswear dudes is that Tumblr's birth began with jjjjound, but you can't discredit Yeezy's contribution to the reblogging craze. For better or for worse, Kanye pulled content from a host of others, such as Hypebeast, HighSnobiety and more, while seldom contributing his own unique content aside from the occasional, and fucking incredible, rant. Today, this behavior is known simply as Tumblr.

THE ALL CAPS RANT, MOTHERFUCKER

IN 2013, AN INTERNET RANT AIN'T EVEN SEMI-OFFICIAL UNLESS YOU'RE WRITING IN ALL CAPS TO LET 'EM KNOW YOU MAD. IT MAKES EVERYTHING SEEM WAY LOUDER AND INSTANTLY PUTS ALL YOUR PROSE INTO "REAL TALK" MODE. THE KING OF THE ALL CAPS BLOG RANT WAS WITHOUT A DOUBT KANYE, OFTEN DISPELLING WACK ASS RUMORS AND ISSUING HALF-HEARTED APOLOGIES TO TAYLOR SWIFT.

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy Would Be His Greatest Album To Date

After the less than perfect, albeit highly influential, 808s & Heartbreak, the Taylor Swift debacle and his Amber Rose period, fans of Lord Yeezus questioned his sanity and what his new album would hold in terms of sonics and content. The release of his 5th studio album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, was lauded as one of the best albums of the year and quite possibly Kanye's best effort to date. Although it's not like he has any lack of faith in his own abilities. Kanye, of course, knew it all along. In early 2010, Kanye gave one of his final signature rants, in the process comparing himself to the great poets Maya Angelou and Gil Scott-Heron. He alluded to his own observations that almost all rappers get worse as their careers go on, but Kanye claimed he would get better. He did.

The Common Acceptance Of Common Projects

Common Projects are the go-to minimalist sneaker of #menswear, but that wasn't always the case, especially not when Kanye blogged about the Italian kicks in both 2007 and 2008. A testament to Kanye's influence is reflected here in pricing. In 2007, a guy could pick up a pair of Achilles Low's for around $225 bucks—a fraction of their current roughly $400 MSRP. Common Projects' arbitrary price increases circa 2010 after Kanye's public love is on some serious influencer anti-trust shit.

Complex's Dopeness

Kanye believed in Complex and Complex believed in Four Pins and Four Pins is fucking dope, if we do say so ourselves.

What He Got Wrong:

His Own Use Of Twitter

As you can see above, there was a time when Kanye REALLY fucking hated Twitter. And yet, just a year later, he became host to one of the most memorable stretches in Twitter user history. I guess this is in line with Kanye's whole "artists evolve" philosophy, but this ridiculous 180 degree shift should be highlighted.

Consequence And GLC Becoming Successful

In a way, Kanye kind of had to put these guys on via his blog because no one else really gave a shit about them. But still, if a voice as powerful as Kanye's can't make you a star, then maybe, just maybe, your music just sucks. Welcome to when G.O.O.D. Music goes badly.

His Foundation

The Kanye West Foundation was set up to help at risk kids graduate high school, but sadly folded in 2011. It didn't exactly go quietly into the night either, as tax reports would later show that the foundation didn't really do anything at all, rather using collected donations to pay the salaries of employees. While I don't think the foundation was a scam, and was more than likely poorly managed, in hindsight this may be seen as a true stain on Kanye's legacy as a philanthropist. At the time, however, none of this stopped him from promoting the foundation and its efforts via his blog. He promoted one the foundation's auction of the original Air Yeezy, as well as posting about the benefit concert he put on for Chicago students with good grades and perfect attendance.

Bape's Dominance In The Next Decade

There's no doubt A Bathing Ape was one of, if not, the greatest streetwear label of the late 90's and early 2000's, but by 2009 the label's reputation had started to fizzle. The brand's once distinguished graphics were becoming ubiquitous by 2011, the label was sold to a Chinese apparel brand for the relatively small sum of $2.8 Million USD. Today, Bape's relevance is questionable at best.

People Giving A Single Fuck About Cellphones Not Made By Apple

It's actually hilarious how many photos of "designer" phones Kanye posted on his blog. I guess he was more concerned with Scandavian tree houses than innovative technology, but it didn't take a fortune teller to know that eventually we'd all just have iPhones. Also, note that Kanye said he had a Motorola Razr in 2008, which is an incredible fact in and of itself.

That You'd Be Wearing Pastelle

In likely the biggest blue balls inducing streetwear stunt of all time, Kanye teased photos of his collection PASTELLE (sometimes spelled "Past Tell") for years before eventually deciding the whole thing wasn't happening, which, after the showing of his DONDA womenswear collection in Paris, might have been a blessing in disguise. That being said, we did get to see a couple of pieces from the collection over the years, such as clearly Bape-inspired hoodies, a few fuego varsity jackets and the wonderful wall of Japanese fabrics seen above.

That He Would Remain #1 On MTV's Hottest MC's In The Game List

In 2013, MTV deemed Yeezy only the 7th Hottest MC in the game, but in 2008 that was not the case. Back then he was on top, riding high off of nearly a million in first week sales of his 3rd record, Graduation, and the amazing Glow In The Dark Tour. While to Yeezy this #1 spot might have symbolized his eternal dominance, just a few months later he would release the almost rap-less 808s & Heartbreak and instantly fall off the top of the MC totem pole.

Graduation Would Outsell Tha Carter III

Right after Tha Carter III dropped, Yeezy promoted the album via his blog, but in true Yeezy backhanded compliment fashion. You see, while Weezy was projected to sell anywhere between 800K and a million records, Kanye let the world know that Graduation had moved just above 950K in its first week on shelves, implying in that moment he was clearly superior. Just a few days later it was officially reported that Weezy scanned above the million record threshold. Kanye later acknowledged his mistake on the blog, but like The Louis Vuitton Don once preached, "There are some things you just can't take back." This serves as a valuable lesson that taking on Wayne is not like taking on 50 Cent.

That He Would Not One Day Glorify Himself As A Diety

In the above rant you can see just how mad Kanye was that Harper's Bazaar reported he owned an actual painting depicting himself as an angel. Naturally, Kanye was enraged that the reporter simply assumed the painting was of Kanye without asking because it looked him and because, well, this is Kanye after all. Besides, no self-respecting man would ever commit such a blatant act of hubris as commissioning a painting of themselves as an angel, right? Not so fast. Sure, Kanye still doesn't have a painting depicted himself in a godly fashion that we know about, but, then again, we have yet to see the cover art for his upcoming 6th studio album. Rumors are currently swirling around that Kanye is poised to name said album "I Am God". More reliable sources claim that this is in fact the name of a single due shortly from Kanye, actually titled "I Am A God," which is a very important distinction.