You'll Want to Read Every One of Kanye's Candid Quotes About the Grammys Controversy

Updated on 2/12/2015 at 8:55 PM

Kanye West is making an effort to shed light on all the confusing Grammys drama, including the controversial comments he made about Beck and Beyoncé after the show. In an interview with Ryan Seacrest on Wednesday, the rapper talked about why he walked on stage when Beck accepted his award, what he meant to express in his Grammys rant, and the fact that he's cool with Taylor Swift now — and may even be collaborating with her in the future. Take a look at some of Kanye's candid quotes — what do you think?

On why he went to the stage when Beck won: "I felt like just the whole Grammys, right when that happened, everybody was looking at me and then people started screaming, 'Kanye! Kanye! Go do it!' Okay, that didn't really happen, these were voices in my head. So the voices in my head told me go and then I just walked up like halfway up the stage. You know, what I really wanted to do is just joke around about what had happened before, but I just really didn't want to take away from Beck's moment or the time he's having to talk because you know the Grammys, they play music really quick no matter who you are and everything. So I didn't want anything to take away from his screen time. So I just walked back down because you know, it was kind of a joke like the Grammys themselves."
On what he'd say to Beck: "Well first of all, Beck is one of the nicest guys and one of the most respected musicians in the game. So, there's nothing that I will want to do as a fellow musician to disrespect him in any way. And the weird thing is like, and I don't feel like I have the right to take away from people's moments, but the reality of it is — and case in point by who came up to me right afterwards — is it's almost like a chiropractor. You know, you just get a little crook out like, 'Wow, this crook has been there!' It's just a little jolt of truth, right? And then you know, everyone feels better after the fact, or everyone is way more famous after the fact, or everyone sells way more albums after the fact, and then Kanye just goes on being an a**hole to everyone."
On potentially working with Taylor Swift: "Yeah, she wants to get in the studio and we're definitely going to go in. Any artist with an amazing point of view, perspective, fan base, I'm down to get in the studio and work. I don't discriminate, I don't have an elitism of music because of like how many Grammys or you know, the amount of ratings you get on an album . . . Everyone loves music whether they love hip-hop, alternative, country, and if I could be involved in giving people any type of energy, advice in the studio, whether you're Beyoncé, whether you're Taylor Swift, whether you're Jay Z, whether you're Beck, whoever, and they can be reciprocal with that, I'd like to be involved with that."
On perception vs. intention: "Oh yes, definitely, but the road to hell has been paved with good intentions. You know, I'm at a point where it's ways to do things in a smoother way. And feel like at the Grammys — I don't know exactly what the press has been [saying] because I don't keep up with that — but at the Grammys when I did go up onstage and left off, there was a really good vibe about it, and everybody was laughing and smiling."
On his rant after the Grammys: "Well you know what happened? It's because I sat there and I kind of let that [smolder] and I was asked my opinion and I was given a platform. And when given a platform, it's very hard as we know — and I'm going to talk in third person like I'm a crazy person — but it's very hard for Kanye West to not be very true and vocal to what he feels. You know, it's like people take the Grammys for granted in a way because of the commercials, because a lot of the musicians are very rich and everything, but this is our Super Bowl. You know, and someone's got to be mad that [Marshawn Lynch] didn't get the ball."
On criticism about his stunt relating to racism: "I also wanted to stress to people that it's not a black or white thing at all. It's not me always standing up for a black artist. I feel that racism is a distraction to humanity. We are one race. We are the human race, period. And I feel that we have to base our new society, the future post-Internet society, off of blocks and bricks of truth. And if the Grammys are capitalizing off the amount of views that Beyoncé gets for them and still not laying that brick of truth and being respectful towards [deserving artists] — because Beck says afterwards, literally, says, 'Hey I think Beyoncé should've won it.'"
On why he talked about Beck disrespecting artistry: "I think it came off the wrong way, and that was a mis-wording on my part because obviously Beck is one of the most respected artists and respects artistry. But I felt — and this is my opinion and he's his own man and he's not wrong and we'll still go play basketball and stuff [unless] he doesn't want to do it — but I felt that even though the Grammys sometimes gives awards to people who you wouldn't think should win in the category, as a respect to artists, we mention the other artist's name in our speech. And that was the point I was making about it. There's like many of times I gave other people my award, literally made them come up onstage. Maroon 5, when they won best new artist, [Adam Levine] mentioned me because it was the College Dropout and [it had] 10 nominations and all that."