Kanye West Apologizes to Beck, Announces Collaboration with Taylor Swift

Kanye West Apologizes to Beck, Announces Collaboration with Taylor Swift

It looks like Kanye West and Taylor 
Swift really did mend fences at the Grammy Awards this weekend. In an interview withRyan Seacrest this morning, West announced that he and Swift aren’t only collaborating on photo opportunities, they’ll be headed into the studio to record together as well.

This announcement, as well as the rest of the Seacrest interview, seems to be a bit of a mea culpa, or at least clarification, on the part of West. The musician came under fire earlier in the week after jokingly repeating his famous 2009 VMA interruption of Swift by hopping up onstage when Beck beat out Beyoncé for album of the year. West took the opportunity to clarify to Seacrest both the light-hearted Beck interruption and the harsher interview he gave post-ceremony.

In that post ceremony interview, West said, among other things:

I don’t even know what [Beck] said. I just know that, the Grammys, if they want real artists to keep coming back, they need to stop playing with us. We aren’t going to play with them no more. ‘Flawless.’ Beyoncé’s video. And Beck needs to respect artistry, he should have given his award to Beyoncé.

But West told Seacrest this morning:

So the voices in my head told me go and then I just walked up like halfway up the stage. You know, what I really wanted to do is just joke around about what had happened before, but I just really didn’t want to take away from Beck’s moment or the time he’s having to talk because you know the Grammys, they play music really quick no matter who you are and everything. So I didn’t want anything to take away from his screen time. So I just walked back down because you know, it was kind of a joke like the Grammys themselves.

And when asked directly about Beck, West said:

Well first of all, Beck is one of the nicest guys and one of the most respected musicians in the game. So, there’s nothing that I will want to do as a fellow musician to disrespect him in any way. And the weird thing is like, and I don’t feel like I have the right to take away from people’s moments, but the reality of it is — and case in point by who came up to me right afterwards — is it’s almost like a chiropractor. You know, you just get a little crook out like, “Wow, this crook has been there!” It’s just a little jolt of truth, right? And then you know, everyone feels better after the fact, or everyone is way more famous after the fact, or everyone sells way more albums after the fact, and then Kanye just goes on being an a**hole to everyone.

This is par for the course for Kanye who often (but not always) follows up his more impulsive, outspoken moments with thoughtful interviewsand personal apologies. If Seacrest’s Twitter feed is any indication, this most recent West apology went a long way to soothe ruffled feathers.

As for Swift, Kanye said:

Yeah, she wants to get in the studio and we’re definitely going to go in. Any artist with an amazing point of view, perspective, fan base, I’m down to get in the studio and work. I don’t discriminate.

If Kanye and Taylor are really headed into the studio together seven years after their original conflict, does that mean we can expect a West/Beck collaboration in 2022? Actually, given how serene Beck has been about all of this, that collaboration could come even sooner.