Chuck D is often quoted as calling hip-hop “the black CNN.” These days, it’s more like TMZ with a beat.
No sooner did Kanye West’s latest single, “Theraflu,” surface late Wednesday night — in which the Chicago-native rapper says, “I admit I fell in love with Kim” — than gossip sites reported Thursday morning that West and reality TV star Kim Kardashian are indeed a couple.
“Kim and Kanye have now just started dating,” a source told People magazine, adding that the two high-profile celebs are keeping things “light” and “seeing where it goes.”
Where it went Wednesday night was to dinner and a movie (“The Hunger Games”) in New York. Thursday morning, TMZ.com published photos of Kardashian “leaving from the building where Kanye lives … wearing the same clothes she rocked to the movies last night.” Kardashian is scheduled to host NBC’s “Today” show Friday morning.
West, 34, has appeared with Kardashian, 31, on “Kourtney & Kim Take New York,” one of several Kardashian family-brand reality TV series.
“We’ve been friends for years,” Kardashian told Ryan Seacrest in a radio interview last month. “We just support each other. That’s what friends do.”
In fact, their relationship goes back at least as far as West’s previous romance.
West split up with former girlfriend Amber Rose in 2010, and Rose later claimed that Kardashian was the cause. But Kardashian last year wed NBA player Kris Humphries — the marriage that infamously lasted 72 days. Meanwhile, just last month, Rose married another rapper, Wiz Khalifa.
Most of this drama is covered in the middle of “Theraflu”:
Only n—- I got respect for is Wiz And I’ll admit, I fell in love with Kim Around the time she had fell in love with him Well that’s cool, baby girl, do ya thang Lucky I ain’t had Jay drop him from the team Break out your gossip-decoding rings for this one.
The “him” for Kim in that lyric is Humphries, and the last line refers to Jay-Z, West’s current touring partner and co-owner of Humphries’ team, the New Jersey Nets.
(Chicagoans may enjoy another part of “Theraflu,” the final minute of the song in which DJ Pharris chimes in with a Google Maps-specific shout-out to Chicago’s South Side, including calls to “47th Street! Garfield Park! / 79th! Stony Island! … 64th and King Drive, what up!? / 83rd! Cottage Grove! The Gardens! / This Chicago, n—-! / The Dearborns! 55th! / Cabrini Green! Terror Town! / West Side! Pocket Town, it’s Chicago!”)
“Theraflu,” however, was not the song fans were expecting to hear first this week from Kanye’s camp.
Overnight, West was expected to unveil the song “Mercy,” an official single release from an upcoming mixtape compilation from West’s G.O.O.D. record label, a branch of Island Def Jam. “Mercy” features West collaborating with Pusha T, Big Sean and 2 Chainz. The full album is expected to include G.O.O.D. artists John Legend, Common, Kid Cudi, CyHi da Prynce, Mr. Hudson and others.
But according to Chicago hip-hop blog Fake Shore Drive, “Theraflu” actually was a leak from West’s next solo project. West released the acclaimed “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” album in 2010, and last year saw his collaboration with Jay-Z on “Watch the Throne.” Most online streams of “Theraflu” were yanked by midday Thursday.
West has used the Christian holiday as a G.O.O.D. marketing gimmick before. He began posting tracks from “Fantasy” on Good Friday in 2010.
No release date for the new G.O.O.D. compilation has been set, but producer Mannie Fresh recently told MTV News it was “pretty close” to being finished. “Songs phenomenal, everything,” he said. “It’s an album that’s all over the place, it’s not just one thing. It’s not just that you’re gonna hear some Southern hip-hop or whatever.
You’re gonna hear everything.”
Meanwhile, “Theraflu” is produced by Hit-Boy, who also helmed West and Jay-Z’s “Watch the Throne” hit single “N—-s in Paris” (the song they enjoy repeating and repeating as a concert encore). West and Jay-Z will take their “Throne” tour to Britain this summer, and Jay-Z has hinted that a second “Throne” album may be coming:
“You might see a Jay, then Kanye and a ‘Throne’ album next year. We’ve really found our zone.”