Subject: Kanye West

• Last Night: Common @ The Fillmore Auditorium

  September 14, 2007

• This Week in Hip Hop

  November 30, 2007

• Friday Rap-Up: Pimp C Dies, Spice 1 Shot, Lauryn Hill Still a Pain in the Ass

  December 7, 2007

• Q&A With Lupe Fiasco

  January 16, 2008

• The Rap-Up: Apostle, Jay-Z, Kanye West, Mos Def, Beyonce

  April 7, 2008

• Over the Weekend... Kanye West, Rihanna, N.E.R.D. and Lupe Fiasco @ Pepsi Center

  April 28, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: Side 3 Studios, Kanye West, Common, Rappers on Sean Bell verdict

  May 2, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: Lenny Lenn, Death Row Records, Shaquille O’Neal and Kanye West

  June 27, 2008

• Kanye West, N.E.R.D. and Wyclef Jean Reportedly Slated for DNC Events

  July 16, 2008

• Kanye West pedicabbin’ in Denver

  August 25, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: BreakEfx, Nas Book, Young Jeezy, Kanye, Jay-Z

  September 5, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: Infinite Mindz, Jermaine Dupri, Daz, Kanye West, the Game, Bow Wow

  September 12, 2008

• Rearview: The Week in Review (9/6/08-9/12/08)

  September 12, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: DJ Vajra, Lil Wayne, Nate Dogg, 50 Cent vs. Kanye: Pt. 2?

  September 19, 2008

• Friday Rap-Up: Suge Knight, Outkast, YouTube Live

  Suge Knight files lawsuit against Kanye West Former Death Row Records CEO Suge Knight has filed a $135,000 lawsuit against Kanye West for a gunshot wound and a robbery of his diamond-stud earring that occurred at West’s pre-MTV Music Awards party back in August 2005. According to TMZ, Knight believes that West should be held responsible for letting the thugs in the party.

  November 14, 2008

• Rearview: The Week in Review (11/17/08-11/21/08)

  Leave the Gun. Take the cannoli. All eyes -- or ears, rather -- in the music world, including ours, were on Chinese Democracy this week. Most of us honestly never thought we'd live to see the release of the mythical Guns N' Roses record, and now that we had a chance to listen to it all the way through, we're sticking by our original assessment, based on hearing just a few songs: meh. Although parts of it are infinitely more listenable than expected, as a whole, it doesn't really seem to have

  November 21, 2008

• Beyond Playlist: Guns N' Roses, Kayne West and T-Pain

  Guns N’ Roses Chinese Democracy Interscope Frankly, after a decade and a half, I’m just happy that only some of this blows, instead of the whole thing – and as a bonus, several of the tracks that do blow are unintentionally funny. Not all of them, of course: “If the World” sounds so much like misbegotten jazz fusion that I kept expecting an alto-sax solo. But hearing Uncle Axl grumble the “Sorry” line “I don’t want to do it” like a pouty Homer Simpson cracks me up every ti

  November 21, 2008

• Top Ten Hip-Hop Albums Of 2008

  Over the next couple of weeks, Backbeat will feature some Top Ten lists from around the Village Voice Media chain. Click here for previous year-in-review coverage from Backbeat and VVM. A couple of weeks ago, an expert on the Harry Potter series told an audience of high school kids how lucky they were to have this Big Shared Experience--these seven books and 41,000 words in common. What does Harry Potter have to do with hip-hop in 2008? In an age when many year-end lists should be subtitled "

  December 31, 2008

• Another reason why death in fight over Kanye West and Jimmy Buffett was senseless

  The case of Richard Lopez, a sergeant in the Army who died outside a Steamboat Springs bar shortly after returning from a tour in Afghanistan, would have been terrible under any circumstances. But the ultra-trivial dispute that led to the tragedy -- a jukebox spat that pitted Jimmy Buffett-loving Lopez against some Kanye West boosters -- makes the situation even more unfortunate. True Kanye fans know that West himself is no hater of music that doesn't resemble hip-hop or R&B. For proof, eyeba

  January 7, 2009

• (hed) p.e.'s New World Orphans tops Independent Records' top sellers

  (hed) p.e.'s concets in Denver and Colorado Springs last week must've fueled sales of the band's latest album, New World Orphans, which was released January 13, on Suburban Noize Records. Kanye West and Ludacris also made strong showings, as did the Notorious soundtrack, which features cuts by Jay-Z, Jadakiss, Faith Evans and Notorious B.I.G's son, Christopher "CJ" Wallace Jr.

  January 20, 2009

• Ludacris Independent Records' top seller

  For the second week in a row, Ludacris grabbed the number-one spot on Independent's top seller's list (week of Jan. 26 to Feb. 1), beating out Kanye West and Bruce Springsteen and Akon. The full breakdown is listed after the jump.

  February 2, 2009

• The Fray covers, uh ... Kanye West?

  Hot on the heels of last week's Valentine's Day challenge in which the Fray reportedly wrote and recorded a love song in 24 hours at the behest of Q Magazine, comes this oddity: Evidently, Isaac Slade and company -- prompted by God only knows what -- recorded a cover of Kanye West's "Heartless" on Radio 1, which he then posted on his blog today (scroll down -- it's toward the bottom of the page). Gotta be honest, didn't see this one coming. Insta-take: far less forced and awkward than the B

  February 17, 2009

• A Tale of Two Rappers

  September 27, 2007

• Freeloader

  The best in legitimate, artist-approved downloads.

  February 14, 2008

• The Game

  LAX
  Geffen

  September 4, 2008

• Nationalistic 2005

  The rest of the planet generated some good CDs this year, too.

  December 22, 2005

• Critics' Picks for 2007

  Backbeat scribes sound off on their favorite releases of the past year.

  December 27, 2007

• Kanye West

  Graduation
  Island Def Jam/Roc-A-Fella

  September 13, 2007

• Common

  Finding Forever
  Geffen

  August 9, 2007

• John Legend

  Once Again
  G.O.O.D. Music/Sony Urban Music/Columbia

  November 16, 2006

• Get Down With Dave

  Chappelle returns with a raucous Block Party.

  March 2, 2006

• Hip-Hop Trends in 2005

  December 29, 2005

• Hip-Hop Sans Hova

  Still no Jigga, but Kanye, some lovable limeys and a great Beyoncé substitute held it down.

  December 29, 2005

• Twista

  Sunday, October 30, Fillmore Auditorium, 303-830-8497.

  October 27, 2005

• Wild Wild West

  Hip-hop's brightest hope occasionally goes off the deep end on his spotty but stellar new LP.

  September 1, 2005

• Common

  Be (Geffen)

  May 19, 2005

• Legendary

  It's a very good time to be John Legend.

  March 3, 2005

• John Legend

  Get Lifted (Columbia Records)

  January 6, 2005

• God Save the Scene

  Sassy Brits, hoochie mamas and a dude named Beans attempted to invigorate a stagnant year for hip-hop.

  December 30, 2004

• Nationalistic

  Backbeat scribes weigh in on their favorite national releases from 2004.

  December 23, 2004

• Mobb Deep

  Amerikaz Nightmare (Jive Records)

  October 14, 2004

• Now Hear This

  April 8, 2004

• Twista

  Kamikaze (Atlantic)

  March 18, 2004

• Kanye West

  The College Dropout (Roc-A-Fella)

  February 26, 2004

• Kanye West says he's sorry. Again. Do you believe him?

  All right, by now you've seen the clip of Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swift's acceptance speech at this past weekend's MTV Video Music Awards (see the clip after the jump if you haven't already), an act of utter douchebaggery that's been universally condemned: Katy Perry likened the outburst to stepping on a kitten; Kelly Clarkson unabashedly denounced West in a blog post and even President Obama reportedly called dude a jackass (off the record, of course). Last night, West appeared on The J

  September 15, 2009

• The Westword.com blog shortcut, September 16 edition

  ​Picture this. Today in Backbeat Online: • Flier of the Week: Lipgloss. • Heavy Rotation, our top spins for the week of September 14, 2009. Today in Cafe Society: • Amnesia wins the Mix Master Bartender contest, appropriately enough. • Hosea Rosenberg hosts Colorado harvest dinner at Jax Boulder. • Chef and Tell: Paul Reilly of Encore. • Our Weekly Bread: Cafe Options. • Under Fire: Sugar and spice. Today in The Latest Word: • Mario Solis-Marich to stop "boof"-ing the CU

  September 16, 2009

• DJ Craze

  September 24, 2009

• Kanye West tour canceled/Paramore show rescheduled

  ​Kanye West and Lady Gaga's Fame Kills tour, which was just announced on Monday, has been canceled. The tour was to include a stop at the Pepsi Center on December 2 and tickets were scheduled to go on sale Saturday, October 3. There's no word yet on why the tour was scrapped. Paramore's show at the Fillmore Auditorium originally scheduled for Sunday, October 4 has been postponed to Sunday, November 8 due to singer Haley Williams getting laryngitis. Tickets for the postponed date will be honore

  October 2, 2009

• Twitter Tuesday: Lauren Cook, our featured twit

  Lauren Cook.​This week, we asked actual twits why we should follow them. And among the many, many amusing responses we got, the tweet by Lauren Cook (@laurencook) took the prize for its timely nods to two great figures in western history. Find out what she tweeted to sell us, as well as what she tweets regularly about and why -- all in 140-character bursts, after the jump.

  October 6, 2009

• Moving Pictures: The Fray may be heartless, but that doesn't mean it's art less

  ​ Don't know how we managed to miss this, the Fray's video for its version of "Heartless," the Kanye West cover, but we just came across it earlier today, and you know what? It's a pretty swell video. Directed by Hiro Murai (Bloc Party) and produced by Ross Girard, featuring animation from Titmouse Inc. and Cinematography from Ibis, the clip is probably the most visually captivating the act has produced so far. Admittedly, we're animation geeks, though, too, so take our fawning for what it's

  October 20, 2009