Op-Ed: Kanye West Must Be Stopped

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Last night I was watching a broadcast of the Live Earth concerts on television. I saw several great performances by everyone from Lenny Kravits to Pink Floyd. The shows were full of energy, entertaining and well performed for the most part.

My eyes bulged as I heard the Message In A Bottle guitar riff start to play and I knew I was about to see the newly reunited and touring international super group The Police who's latest (and possibly final) tour I'd actually missed. I turned up the sound and zoomed in to see and hear the spectacle.

John Mayer was onstage helping out with guitars and The Police were on fire. Stings voice sounded unchanged even though he originally recorded the vocal part some 20 years ago. He was all but pitch-perfect, Stewart Copeland was dead on with the drum parts... it was amazing...

and then, near the middle of the song... something happened.

Kanye West, a big name in the hip hop world as a producer and entertainer, known for his self-centered egotistical behavior at many high profile music awards shows appeared out of nowhere and started yelling "Uh! Yeah! Uh!" and my body cringed as I prepared myself for the impact.

West started freestyling about Live Earth and The Police and the message and everything and held it together for about the first 2 measures... then fell apart. I've been to many freestyle battles and have actually participated in and done well in some myself and there's always a point, you can see it... when an inexperienced or untalented rapper runs out of things to say and panics. They normally move in close on someone and look them in the face in an attempt to "hide" the rest of the crowd and focus just on what they're doing.. or they start yelling "So Wave Your Hands In The Air!" and let that carry out the rest of their freestyle session.

Kanye freestyled the following lyrics, spoken like a drunken 6 year old.

I'm sending a message in bottle
I said we need a new tomorrow
We need some new leaders to follow
and we need some new leaders to follow
I'm telling you everything that I know
Al Gore *** surely has my vote
And I'm gonna tell you this cuz I should
Sting, you and Police would be good in the hood
And put your hands in the air
and we're gonna elect John for Mayor (John Mayer)

Kanye then proceeds to yell and say Yeah! and S.O.S. offbeat, out of time and in the wrong place. It was as if no one had ever sat him down and played him the song before and he just thought "I'm Kanye... I can do this".

Well Mr. West, you did something, you ruined a classic song being played by some of the greatest musicians of our time. You looked like a fool onstage in front of millions of people and now... you are the butt of a billion jokes about the rapper that ruined Live Earth.

Great job. Now how will Kanye turn this one around? Who's fault will this one be and will be blame in on his ear monitors not working or that George Bush hates him?

Extra Fun:
For extra fun, fast forward the embedded video to about 4:45 and watch Kanye's face as he realizes he has no idea what he's doing. Classic.