S. Samuel
Major retailer Wal-Mart has discredited rapper Kanye West's claims that the initial cover art for his upcoming My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was banned from its stores.
According to a Wal-Mart spokesperson, the illustration was never presented to the company.
“We’re excited about Kanye West’s new album and we look forward to carrying it in our stores on November 22nd,” a Walmart spokesperson says in a statement provided to EW. “As always, it’s our standard practice to carry the edited parental advisory version. We did not reject the cover artwork and it was never presented to us to view.” (Entertainment Weekly)
An industry source reportedly claims that stores such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy still account for a significant portion of album sales.
At issue, said the high-placed industry source, was whether or not mass-market retailers such as Best Buy and Wal-Mart would carry an album featuring venomous nudes, and one that would no doubt inspire controversy. Though sales at mass merchants have been declining in recent years, data from Nielsen SoundScan for the last two years still had the likes of Best Buy and Wal-Mart accounting for at least 10% or more of physical CD sales. (Los Angeles Times)
Over the weekend, West tweeted an image of his “banned” cover art.
“In all honesty … I really don’t be thinking about Wal-Mart when I make my music or album covers #Kanyeshrug!”
“I wanna sell albums but not at the expense of my true creativity.” (Kanye West’s Twitter)
Earlier this month, West said producers like Q-Tip and RZA would be attached to his LP.
“I wanted to take it back to the essence, like the soulful people who brought knowledge–like RZA and Q-Tip. At a certain point, you need to find a better way to do it; it’s like people [in basketball] who dunk and hurt their wrist and come down on their knees too hard. Your knee’s gonna give out at a certain point. Some of my social and public-persona knees are starting to give out. I still want to run the games. I’ve just got to not get kicked up quite as hard.” (Vanity Fair)
My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is scheduled to drop Monday, November 22nd.
Check out a recent Kanye West interview below:
