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Artist News
Kanye West reveals collaborators
By CMU Editorial | Published on Monday 16 August 2010
Although originally scheduled for release next month, Kanye West’s new album will now not make it to stores until November, as he’s still got a few finishing touches to put on it. However, West has revealed a number of the guests who will appear on the LP.
Last week, West played a new track on Hot 97. Called ‘See Me Now’ and produced by West with No ID and Lex Luger, the track features Beyonce on the chorus, as well as vocals from The Gap Band’s Charlie Wilson. According to reports, the track was only completed last week, and Rolling Stone noted that, when West played the track for them two weeks ago, Beyonce’s vocals weren’t on it. As well as this, Mr Beyonce – Jay-Z – has apparently laid down a verse for a remix of the album’s first single, ‘Power’.
West also confirmed a less obvious collaborator for the album, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon. West told Rolling Stone last week that the indie-folk star will appear on a track called ‘Lost In The World’, having re-recorded the vocals from his song ‘Woods’. West explained that he’d first heard ‘Woods’ when Ed Banger boss Pedro Winter played it to him, and said that he planned to sample it on a track. West asked if he could use it instead, and gave Vernon a call. The rapper said: “I called [Vernon] and we ended up becoming like really good friends, playing basketball together everyday, and going into the back studio and just recording his parts. He’s similar to me, like where he just does shit just so people would be like, ‘Oh shit how did you do that? How did that happen?’ He’s just a really cool guy to be around”.
Speaking to Pitchfork, Vernon revealed that the pair had actually worked on more than one track together, saying: “[‘Lost In The World’] was kind of bare so I added some choir-sounding stuff and then thicked out the samples with my voice … After that first week he was like, ‘I want you to come back’. So I came back a few weeks later and it was the same kind of thing, throwing ideas around – there are a bunch of other songs I’d just throw down on, write a little hook, whatever … I asked for a separate studio because I’d do so much overdubbing to get my ideas out. So I ended up recording in this tiny back room, and then Kanye would come back and listen to what I came up with, and then we’d work on changing the lyrics. We’d just sit there and collaborate. It was fucking fun, man”.
