Paul McCartney recently expressed some slight befuddlement about his past collaborations with Kanye West, telling DIY magazine that the process of co-writing “FourFiveSeconds” involved “tootling around on guitar” while Kanye looked at photos of his wife on his computer. Macca seemed more amused about the whole experience than angry, but that didn’t stop Damon Albarn from defending his honor in a new interview.
For whatever reason, the French publication L’Obs asked the Gorillaz and Blur mastermind for his thoughts on the sampling in Kanye’s production for Pusha T’s Daytona, to which he responded with something like, “I do not sample, I create music.” (Albarn’s answers were evidently translated from English to French for the L’Obs interview, and were translated back to English by Stereogum, so take all of the precise verbiage with a grain of salt.)
The mere mention of Kanye’s name sent Albarn off on a tangent about his distaste for the man, which centered on Kanye’s McCartney collabs. (McCartney is credited on “All Day” and “Only One” in addition to “FourFiveSeconds.”) Here’s what Albarn said, again with the caveat about translation:
“Do not get me started on Kanye West…Kanye West trapped Paul McCartney…
“It’s rude…I have a problem with this abusive collaboration: we’re talking about Paul McCartney, anyway! Kanye West thinks only about Kanye West, uses a name to make headlines, to say ‘McCartney is in my song,’ and puts McCartney in the video but not in the song itself… “
Albarn finished by saying he sent a text to McCartney urging him to “beware” when he heard the two were working together, which McCartney apparently disregarded. Anyone who was hoping for Kanye to play the Del the Funky Homosapien role on the new Gorillaz album will be sorely disappointed.
