Kanye West held his Yeezy Season 3 Fashion Show in Madison Square Garden. During the show, he premiered music from his latest album entitled The Life of Pablo. One song, in particular, talks about his infamous MTV Video Music Awards run in with pop icon, Taylor Swift. In his song Famous, he says:
"I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / I made that bitch famous" — @kanyewest's "Famous" ft. @rihanna https://t.co/TW1xmQrlv6
— Pitchfork (@pitchfork) February 11, 2016
We all remember when a drunk Ye, off the henny, might I add, stormed the stage as Taylor Swift prepared to give her speech for her ‘Best Female Video’ award win. He snatched the mic from her then says that Beyoncé had the “one of the best videos of all time”.
Now Ye is claiming that he ‘made’ her famous. Is he right? Let’s take a look at the numbers shall we?
According to Nielsen SoundScan, the country singer’s first album, 2006′s “Taylor Swift,” sold 4,821,000 albums (plus 10,760,000 digital songs from the album). Her second album, 2008′s “Fearless,” sold 6,027,000 albums (plus 15,165,000 digital songs from the album) and, in the wake of the incident, became the best-selling album of 2009.
Via Forbes, In 2009, Taylor made her debut at No. 69 on the Forbes Celeb 100 power list with earnings of $18 million. West ranked No. 46 with $25 million.
Since then Swift has released three #1 albums all doing around the same all selling around the same amount as before the incident, but increasing her mainstream celebrity rocketing to No. 12 with $45 million in 2010. She has remained in the top 20 every year since, and her earnings have risen steadily to this 2014’s peak of $64 million.
Taylor’s music was already selling well before Kanye pulled a Kanye on her. There is literally no way knowing if the incident had any tangible effect on her career going forward. Would she have been less or more likely to be the star she is now without Kanye’s interference, that is something you can debate for the end of time.
Hit the flip to see Kanye’s infamous ‘Imma let you finish’ MTV Awards speech.