Rhymefest talks about ghostwriting for Kanye "there are songs my name isn't on"

[Ronald]

“It does kind of bother me that I go to my friends’ $20 million houses, and last year I was trying to figure out how to pay my mortgage. It’s not their fault, totally. When you look at the way artists get paid now, streaming has decimated the income of the writer, so the writer doesn’t really have a career anymore. My ASCAP royalty checks went from a lot to almost nothing.”

on Jesus Walks

“I stumbled upon the sample, and it was supposed to be on my demo,” recalls Rhymefest. “But Kanye had access. He was already signed to Def Jam and had an album slated, so this is the point where you could become selfish or practical. He rapped the song better than I probably would’ve at that time. He knew more about the industry, and he made that song a success. So he should get the credit for that. But he wouldn’t have all that without my words.”

Many have even called it Kanye’s most personal song—which strikes Rhymefest as a tad strange, since he wrote virtually all of the lyrics. “It was a personal song, but it was my words,” he says with a polite shrug.

Now, in Ice-T’s documentary The Art of Rap, Kanye claimed that the raps on his first four albums only flowed through him. “I didn’t write my raps down for my first four albums—like all, I did it from the head straight to the booth,” he said. He added that he only began putting pen to paper on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, and that he “spent 5,000 hours” writing “Power.”

But according to Rhymefest, he’s been writing with Kanye since The College Dropout, and hasn’t received credit on a lot of the songs he’s worked on.

“I’ve written for all of Kanye’s albums with the exception of 808s & Heartbreak,” he says, adding, “There are a lot of songs that my name isn’t even on.”


Does Kanye write any of his own music? I ask him.

“Anymore? Or ever?” he replies, with a grin.

“There are 21 writers. I wouldn’t be a part of that,” says Rhymefest, before taking a long pause to ponder the question of whether or not Kanye writes his own raps anymore.
“I think sometimes people get to a point where they’re so busy—I’m doing fashion, I’m doing this, I’m doing that—that you lose focus with the foundation of what it is,” he says. “I think sometimes we… we have so many things, that we’re just trying to keep our things, so we lose track of the fact that it wasn’t about the things. You shouldn’t be trying to keep the things, you should be trying to make new things.”

Kanye West’s Songwriter Wants His Due

 

[DatFellaOnDaTrack]

konye classic snake

 

[kpw]

 

[Rymas]

Drake gets ghost writers too

It's basically the only requirement for being a GOAT these days

 

[The_King_of_Everything]

Drake learned from koonye.

Like father like son

 

[Rymas]

I welcome all ghost writers into the industry

no one wants too see their ugly asses anyways

just look at the-dream

 

[Never Broke Again]

How he come he never said this the 30 other times he's been asking about writing for kanye. Why the sudden switch up



trying to get your name out there so someone actually watches your lil documentary

 

[Poh SIti Dawn]

Dang, and to think kanye had an 8 minute speech at the end of College Dropout, explaining his life and he's over here having people pen his music. Not even after he dies down but right out the gate.

I should of known though, working with Jay Z will rub off on you.

 

[Poh SIti Dawn]

How he come he never said this the 30 other times he's been asking about writing for kanye. Why the sudden switch up



trying to get your name out there so someone actually watches your lil documentary

Lool don't seem bad tho

 

[Long Live The Kane]

He’s listed as a “co-writer” on songs like Kanye West’s “Black Skinhead,” Common and John Legend’s Selma anthem “Glory,”

But you’ve never seen the man formerly known as Che Smith onstage accepting any of these coveted trophies at awards shows, and his name is rarely—if ever—mentioned in connection with these treasured tracks.

“I wasn’t onstage,” he says of the most Academy Awards ceremony, where Common and Legend collected their Oscars for the MLK anthem. “They didn’t mention me when they talked about it.”

He pauses. “It does kind of bother me that I go to my friends’ $20 million houses, and last year I was trying to figure out how to pay my mortgage. It’s not their fault, totally. When you look at the way artists get paid now, streaming has decimated the income of the writer, so the writer doesn’t really have a career anymore. My ASCAP royalty checks went from a lot to almost nothing.”

“But the love that I’ve grown for Common, I want Common to be successful forever, because he has a good heart.”

Damn, didn't know he wrote for Common too...I might have to go through and check the credits

 

[Ronald]

Drake learned from koonye.

Like father like son

Still my favorite artist

oh ok

 

[Julius Skrrvin]

 

[sharky]

yall gonna forget about this by tomorrow and go back to shytting on drake when all ya favs had ghostwriters

 

[The_King_of_Everything]

oh ok

Uh, uh, uh I think I need some Robitussin

 

[SunZoo]

The 6 Fraud and his Fraudfather

Both of them.