I made a point of watching Kanye West’s performance at Glastonbury last saturday saturday (on the BBC). I’m not a fan (although I really like Hip hop), but as an observer of contemporary Pop culture I felt it could have been an interesting experience. It was: mr West’s fascinating ability to polarize opinions has once again worked its magic. Alone on stage for most of the performance, he went through his hits (often cutting them short), managed to mangle bits of Pop history (his rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody was below karaoke standards) and called himself the greatest popstar in the world. Now, I don’t know much about selfies, but I know a thing or two about entertaining an audience – and about music. Kanye obviously is way too cool to entertain: he’s an Artist, or so he seems to think. That apparently allows for sloppiness, fragmentation, self indulgence and self importance. He is truly a digital native, clearly more at home on Instagram than on a stage. A concert for Kanye is a photo opp, and a chance to polarize the audience (his true talent). The music? Sounded like low quality Mp3s: tinny, shallow and autotuned. No surprise so many people failed the Mp3 or not test, if such crappy sounding music is the standard. What’s truly sad? While Kanye embarassed himself on the main stage, George Clinton (one of the most influential Pop artists of the 20th century) was performing on the smaller West Holts Stage.
The world’s greatest popstar? Last night, Pete Townsend got it right: “It must be Elvis Presley”.