"Through the Wire" and the car accident that nearly ended Kanye's career before it began (2023)

"It was five o'clock in the morning when the phone rang, on October 23, 2002," says Donda West in her memoir.Raising Kanye: Life Lessons from a Hip-Hop Star's Mom. “I picked it up and immediately recognized the voice. It was Sumeke, Kanye's girlfriend at the time. He spoke through tears and said he hated waking up so early, but Kanye had been in an accident. I sat bolt upright in bed, wide awake at the time. Before I could go any further, I started firing off questions, "Where was the accident? who drove He hurt himself?" I asked all in one sentence and one sigh.

In the last nearly 20 years, Kanye West has been many things: a genius, a nuisance, a warning,still my pick for best artist of the century. But regardless of what you think of the man, if things had gone differently that night in late October 2002, we wouldn't be talking about him. The past two decades of incredible, sometimes divisive, Western records? That would never have happened and it would have been a great loss. Thank god it's not very good for the seat belt.

While we wait and wait and wait for West to release the long awaitedan injury, it felt appropriate to reflect on his origin story, that near-fatal car accident that nearly ended his rap career before it even began. But in typically western fashion, he turned what could have been a tragedy into a mission statement and a catchy song. Before most of us knew who Kanye West was, he introduced himself with "Through the Wire."

West's life before fame is well known enough that you can memorize the details. He was born in Atlanta and moved to Chicago with his mother Donda as a child after their divorce. Interested in a music career, he dropped out of college and focused on creating beats that featured soulful, often fast-paced, old-school samples. He caught industry attention after teaming up with Jay-Z and giving the rapper some of the best moments from arguably the rapper's biggest album, 2001.There Plan. However, he didn't just want to be a producer. But what he wanted most, a solo career, was denied to him. "Man, people told me I couldn't rap, I couldn't sell a record, I didn't have a chance," he said.said then. "And it hurt. Nobody believed me.”

For West, who grew up fond of more socially conscious and introspective hip-hop groups like A Tribe Called Quest, his early interest in heavier rapping seemed to put him at a disadvantage. on one2005TempoWestern cover storyDamon Dash, the then CEO of Roc-A-Fella who eventually signed him, recalled, "Kanye wore a pink turtleneck shirt and Gucci loafers. It was obvious we weren't from the same place or the same stuff.” But those hurdles only roused West, who saidTempo, "It was a blow to me that I didn't wear jeans and baggy shirts and that I was never in a hurry, I never sold drugs. But to get the chance to stand up and introduce myself in front of a group of executives, I had to work hard. I can't tell you how frustrating it was that they didn't get it. No kidding, I walked out of meetings crying the whole time."

When West signed to the label in 2002 he had the opportunity to finally explore all the material he had been working on over the years, some of which he tried (unsuccessfully) to sell to other artists. "He worked forever on his debut album," said West's friend and manager, John Monopoly.he said mtvNext year. “[I didn't have] a specific start date. He's been collecting beats for years. I've always produced with the intention of becoming a rapper. There are beats on the album that he literally kept to himself for years."

Shortly after the Roc-A-Fella deal, however, West drove to a Los Angeles hotel after a studio session with Beanie Sigel and Peedi CrakkHad an accidentwith another driverMiguel Villasana, around three o'clock in the morning. (He fell asleep at the wheel., his exhaustion stemmed from the crazy hours he worked, not alcohol or drugs). West's friend Sumeke Rainey called Donda. As an English teacher, Donda disapproved of her son dropping out of college but supported his creative endeavors. “You have to be able to see yourself; You have to be able to see it when no one else can," Donda wrote in her book (co-written by Karen Hunter) about Kanye's early aspirations to stardom. “You have to imagine where you want to be and claim it. Kanye claimed it a long time ago." His success as a producer was encouraging, but his new solo career really felt like the culmination of everything he'd been working toward for years.

But now a late-night car accident threatens to take everything away. "[The] car is broken and they can't get it out," Donda recalls Sumeke telling him. Donda took a plane to Los Angeles and rushed to Cedars-Sinai to see him. "Now was not the time to give up my steadfast faith in God," he wrote. "I just kept praying. I had been praying non-stop since I got the call.Oh god let my baby be alrightI probably also made a bunch of promises about what I would and wouldn't do if he just let Kanye be okay."

Whether through divine inspiration or good luck, West survived the crash, although the aftermath was both physically and emotionally traumatic for him. "My jaw is broken in three places," West saidsayinga few months later. “I had broken noses: I was talking to people and my nose started bleeding. To this day I can start gagging because the saliva is going the wrong way. The whole area is messed up. But now I'm on the mend and learning how to say words like "What's up" with the "T" and the "S" together without mixing them up so I can rap again. … The first two or three days were like one of the worst pains of my life. I wouldn't wish that on anyone except maybe three people. I was scared because you hear about people dying in surgeries and that [injury] comes from my breathing. A lot of blood came out of my mouth. He had to have one of those sucking things every 20 minutes. It would be a lot of goo and blood.”

The accident brought West a lot of media attention and he decided to address it in his music. While resting in bed, he began inventing lines for what would become "Through the Wire", a detailed account of the accident, his thinking and what he had learned from the experience. His mentor, producer No ID,He recalls speaking to West shortly after the accident: "He said: 'I found everything out'. I replied: 'Yes, you are fine, God bless you'. He said: 'No, I found my address.' For some reason his head clicked Kanye He's always had a mindset and I've learned not to question it.

For West, the accident was both an enlightenment and a wake-up call. "I think I started to approach time differently after the accident," he said.Approved in 2014. "I used to be more willing to spend my time with people and things that didn't interest me because I was somehow brainwashed into working with other people or on other projects that didn't interest me. So the accident just gave me the opportunity to do what I really wanted to do. I was a record producer and everyone kept telling me I didn't have to be a rapper, so it gave me a chance to tell everyone, "Hey, I need some time to recover." But during that recovery period, I spent my whole Time to improve my crafting and craftingDropping Out. Without that time there would be so many calls and so many people pushing me from all directions, so many people I kind of owe something to and I would never have time to do what I wanted to do.

"Through the Wire" is a statement of perseverance and defiance. It's also good fun, with West finding dark humor in the public interest about the accident and his badly injured face. "I lookedTom cruiseemvanilla heaven/ It was televised,” he sings in the song. "There was an accident like GEICO / They thought I burned myself like Pepsi Michael / I must have an angel 'cause look how death let him down /unbreakable, what, you thought they'd call meMr Glass?”

West mixed pop culture references, deftly rhyming "GEICO" with "Michael" and early on demonstrated his superior rap skills, despite skeptical record labels who viewed him only as a producer. In terms of timing, he sped up a sample of Chaka Khan's "Through the Fire," a technique he honed while working for Jay-Z, Scarface, and others. The song sounded familiar and fresh at the same time, although Kahn hated what it did to his 1985 hit.

"He said he wanted to remake the song," she said.said last year. "I said, 'Well, are you a singer?' He said, 'No, no. I just wanted to use your hook.'" But despite her initial reluctance to let him try it, she relented, "I thought about it and said, 'Well, you can't screw that up because I'm gonna sing... It's my voice, but he found a way, by God, he found a way to screw it up.

As he freely admitted, the western middle class didn't have the somber upbringing that other rap luminaries like Jay-Z or Notorious B.I.G. could claim. (He was not thereshot nine times like 50 Cent.) But the accident gave him a risen from the ashes tale that was compelling in its own way. "Through the Wire" not only documented the accident, but also gave listeners a chance to reflect on West's personal narrative in which he defied all odds to first get hired and soon after survive that ordeal. It was only afterwards that his fans realized the seriousness of his injuries: he doesn't sound like himself on the track. ("I apologize for everything now if that's not clear, man," he stutters at one point as an aside during the chorus. "My mouth was wired ... I had reconstructive surgery on my jaw. I looked in the mirror, and half my jaw was in the back of my mouth, man. I couldn't believe it.

Humility was not a principle in West's career, but amid the enthusiasm for his jewelry and his ability to "make music that is fire," Through the Wire was utterly charming in its inherent fragility. He was full of courage, but we could hear in his speech what the shock had done to him.

The single wasn't released until the following year, and the video hit MTV in late summer. Directed by Coodie Simmons and Chike Ozah (better known asCoodie and Chike), the clip was inexpensive but creative and featured a wealth of West's private footage, including a visit to the dentist after the accident, all designed to look like a bunch of pictures on a cork board. "[West] said, 'We can do the whole video through Polaroids with documentary footage,' SimmonsI remembered. "We teamed up and built the bulletin board, Chike and I. When we edited it, we just made sure it told a story. By the way, we go to MTV every night to work on the video. When Chike got home from work, we'd sneak out and try to use his gear, but we couldn't get the polaroids out. So we presented it to Damon Dash in Roc-A-Fella and he said, 'Let's put it on, let's put it on.' But we said, 'No, no. Let's do it right. Give us some money so we can make it right," and he did. Kanye put money first and we made it happen and it was history in the making."

The video only further refined the heroic origin story that would launch West's debut.Dropping Out, which hit stores in February 2004. By then, "Through the Wire" had already made the top 20, but by the time the album came out, West, spurred on by hit singles "All Falls Down" and "Jesus Walks," was a sensation. .Dropping Outled the prestigious yearthe voice of the peopleCritics Poll and was nominated for Grammy Album of the Year. (Interestingly, it's the only Kanye West album not to reach #1 on the charts.billboardcharts reaching number 2).

The years that followed were even more bewildering as West achieved further commercial success with the following:late registration, and its major lead single "Gold Digger". No longer just a favorite, Kanye West was, without exaggeration, the biggest hit in pop music for years to come. The trauma of her near-death experience faded into the background, replaced by outrageous fame, notorious public tantrums and a slew of incredible songs. That last point might be hard to remember: his marriage to Kim Kardashian, his erratic behavior, hisvery real mental health problemsand his devotion to Trump began to overshadow the quality of his work. But when I needed to reconnect with the west I fell in love with, I went backDropping Out. There, his arrogance mingled with the mischievousness of a boy who was sweetly insecure and hungry to conquer the world. "Through the Wire" embodied that time when he was so grateful for the opportunity that was presented to him.

Interestingly, West also used "Through the Wire" to imagine what the accident must have done to his mother, who had supported him since childhood. "How do you comfort my mother or give her some light support?" he joked. "Tell her her son is on life support?" There weren't many love songs on a Kanye West record, but I heard him sing Donda's praises, devotedlylate registrationFor them it means "Hello Mom". It's insultingly easy to say that her life has never been the same since her2007 Death after complications from plastic surgery. And yet the megalomania of their subsequent albums, apart from those of 2008, only grows808 and heartbreakOften viewed as a breakup album, but also heavily consumed by the grief of losing her mother, it seems bound up with a deep pain she never got over.

That might be why he's naming his new albuman injury: Years ago you hinted that the record would be your way to finally release the anger you felt towards the surgeon you blamed for his death. (In a since-deleted tweet, he wrote: “I want to forgive and stop hating, could not then imagine the tragedy that was to come.

"Only the physical body dies for me," Donda West wrote increate Kanye, "not the soul, not the spirit." while we waitan injuryFirst off, I've been thinking a lot about Kanye and his mom. When I listen to "Through the Wire," I hear a guy about to take off. But I also think about what it must have been like to be Donda and get that call at five in the morning.Oh god let my baby be alrightThe song is the story of Kanye West finding his purpose. But it's also about connecting with the woman who probably meant more to him than anyone else.