Kanye West Quotes That Completely Baffled Us

(Image credit: Rex Features (Shutterstock))

published 16 September 2016

That Kanye West eh? Barely a day goes by without him saying something hilarious / ridiculous / down right silly. And that's why we love him so much.

Remember that time Kanye waxed lyrical about how he thinks that Keeping Up With The Kardashians really should have won some Emmys by now? In a two hour interview with ShowStudio Kanye said: 'My wife and her family shoulda had plenty of Emmys by now. I feel proud to be in a family that has so many people breaking ground for the generations to come. It's like, whoa, reality show! That's so f***ing new as an art form.'

Kanye continued to say: 'But reality shows are considered to be like rap was when the Mondrian wouldn't let Run-D.M.C. and motherf***ing Will Smith stay there because they were rappers. Or the idea of a reality star not being allowed into a fashion show or not being nominated for their show even if it's the longest running, and the most popular, and everybody I know watches it and s***.'

OK Kanye. Let's be honest though Kanye wouldn't be Kanye without baffling us with us with his abstract thoughts.

After all this is the man who recently admitted that despite the fact that he's running for President of the United States in 2020 he actually hates politics. Saying: ''The whole point is to have someone [in office] that's creative, that's around amazing creatives. This is my theory: I think the world can be helped through design, so it's very important that I stay around creative, forward thinkers. It's very important that I continue to design, to be in practice of trying to make the best decisions possible. I hate politics. I'm not a politician at all. I care about the truth and I just care about human beings.'

And lest we forget the moment he admitted to supporting Donald Trump, whilst speaking at one of his concerts in San Francisco in November 2016: ‘I told you I didn't vote. But I didn't tell you... if I would've voted, I would've voted on Trump. [His] approach was absolutely genius because it worked.’

And in case you didn't think Kanye West's quotes could top that - here are his most brilliant/WTF one-liners to date...

1. 'Whoa by 50 percent [I am more influential than] Stanley Kubrick, Apostle Paul, Picasso... f****** Picasso and Escobar. By 50 per cent more influential than any other human being.'

2. 'When you’re the absolute best, you get hated on the most.'

3. 'My goal, if I was going to do art, fine art, would have been to become Picasso or greater… That always sounds so funny to people, comparing yourself to someone who has done so much, and that’s a mentality that suppresses humanity…'

4. 'One of my biggest achilles heels has been my ego. And if I, Kanye West, can remove my ego, I think there’s hope for everyone.'

5. 'I don’t think there’s a living celebrity with more weapons formed against him, but I don’t think there’s one more prosperous.'

6. 'So, the voices in my head told me go, and then I just walked up, like, halfway up the stage... But I just didn’t really want to take away from Beck’s moment, or the time he’s having to talk. It was kind of a joke – like the Grammys themselves.'

7. 'I am God's vessel. But my greatest pain in life is that I will never be able to see myself perform live.'

8. 'I think what Kanye West is going to mean is something similar to what Steve Jobs means. I am undoubtedly, you know, Steve of internet, downtown, fashion, culture. Period. By a long jump. I honestly feel that because Steve has passed, you know, it’s like when Biggie passed and Jay Z was allowed to become Jay Z.'

9. 'Sometimes people write novels and they just be so wordy and so self-absorbed. I am not a fan of books. I would never want a book's autograph. I am a proud non-reader of books.'

10. 'I will go down as the voice of this generation, of this decade, I will be the loudest voice.'

11. 'I hate when I'm on a flight and I wake up with a water bottle next to me like oh great now I gotta be responsible for this water bottle.'

12. 'One of the problems with being a bubbling source of creativity - it's like I'm bubbling in a laboratory, and if you don't put a cap on it, at one point it will, like, break the glass. If I can hone that… then I have, like, nuclear power, like a superhero, like Cyclops when he puts his glasses on.'

13. 'You should only believe about 90 percent of what I say. As a matter of fact, don’t even believe anything that I’m saying at all. I could be completely fucking with you, and the world, the entire time.'

14. 'I don't even listen to rap. My apartment is too nice to listen to rap in.'

15. 'There's nothing I really wanted to do in life that I wasn't able to get good at. That's my skill. I'm not really specifically talented at anything except for the ability to learn. That's what I do. That's what I'm here for.'

16. 'I'm a pop enigma. I live and breathe every element in life. I rock a bespoke suit and I go to Harold's for fried chicken. It's all these things at once, because, as a taste maker, I find the best of everything.'

17. 'People ask me a lot about my drive. I think it comes from, like, having a sexual addiction at a really young age. Look at the drive that people have to get sex - to dress like this and get a haircut and be in the club in the freezing cold at 3 A.M., the places they go to pick up a girl. If you can focus the energy into something valuable, put that into work ethic.'

18. 'I jog in Lanvin.'

19. About Kim Kardashian: 'Y'all are acting like this ain't the most beautiful woman of all time. Wait a second, wait a second - I'm talking about arguably of human existence. The top 10 of human existence... I don't give a f*ck what type of jacket she got on.'

20. 'Visiting my mind is like visiting the Hermès factory. Sh*t is real.'

21. 'If you read books - which I don't, none at all - about how to become a billionaire, they always say, 'You learn more from your mistakes.' So if you learn from your mistakes, then I'm a f*cking genius.'

22. 'I am so credible and so influential and so relevant that I will change things.'

23. 'I feel like I’m too busy writing history to read it.'

24. 'Fur pillows are hard to actually sleep on.'

25. 'I believe that bad taste is vulgar. It's like cursing. I think the world can be saved through design, because what is the most distasteful thing someone can do? Kill someone. So, good taste is the opposite of that.'

26. 'I’m a designer. A musician. A manager. The media try to dishumanise [sic] people who believe in themselves.' Kanye West even manages to make up a new word during one of his many mid-set rants at Wireless Festival 2014.

27. ‘For me, first of all, dopeness is what I like the most. Dopeness. People who want to make things as dope as possible, and, by default, make money from it.’

28. ‘I will be the leader of a company that ends up being worth billions of dollars, because I got the answers. I understand culture. I am the nucleus.’

29. ‘I am in the lineage of Gil Scott-Heron, great activist-type artists. But I’m also in the linage of a Miles Davis, you know, that liked nice things too.’

30. ‘Just imagine if I woke up one day and I was whack. What would I do then?’

31. ‘I am the number one human being in music. That means any person that’s living or breathing is number two.’

32. ‘Oh my God, I’m one of the greatest rappers in the world.’

33. ‘The Bible had 20, 30, 40, 50 characters in it. You don’t think that I would be one of the characters of today’s modern Bible?’

34. ‘I’m the closest that hip-hop is getting to God. In some situations I’m like a ghetto Pope.’

35. ‘I’m doing pretty good as far as geniuses go…I’m like a machine. I’m a robot. You cannot offend a robot.’

36. ‘I feel like the type of girl I would be with is a fellow superhero. So we get that “already flying and now we’re just flying together” thing.’

37. ‘I paid my dues when I had to wear a kilt in Chicago, and friends would say, “What’s your boy got on?” but there are warriors that have killed people in kilts in the past.’