Let Kanye be Kanye

"Every great story starts with a vision." That's how the first part of jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy, the Netflix docuseries that traces the early stages of Kanye West's career starting with just one word, vision, begins. The first is that of Coodie, who in 2002 decided to abandon his career as a comedian to pursue an intuition, making a documentary about a young Chicago producer following him in his career, what Coodie saw as a path already written, destined for success. The second vision is that of the young producer, Kanye West, aware from the start of what would have been his destiny, so sure of himself that he changed cities, moving from Chi-town to New York to try to convince Roc-A-Fella Records.

Among the many things that emerge from the first episode of jeen-yuhs, whose title is just "Vision", is that Kanye West has always been Kanye West. There is not an old Kanye or a new Kanye, but simply Kanye West, the same who well before signing his first contract as an artist said "I don't give a fuck about the industry". He was 25 years old and was already rehearsing his speech for a Grammy that would arrive three years later, but at that moment, in that dialogue in the car with Coodie and a journalist probably unaware of what he was listening to, in West's head it was already reality. The truth is that today as in that moment we have never been able to understand Kanye West, too lazy to really watch a genius at work, probably not accustomed to witness the genesis of what would become and who is still a genius, an artist able to believe in himself to the point of entering the offices of Roc-A-Fella Records and let listen to All Falls Down to anyone who was free at that time. In spite of everything, in spite of the fact that nobody from the label paid attention to him, West did not give up and on August 18, 2002 he signed the first contract of his career.

Shortly after receiving the news from Dame Dash, West stunnedly walked around Times Square wearing a Blade Runner shirt, at that moment everything was changing: pop culture, music and in a small part even fashion. It's incredible to be able to witness the genesis of a part of history, a front row seat to the Big Bang to understand how it all began and to dispel the myths of both creationists and those who have always seen and experienced West in a superficial way. Because if jeen-yuhs is a dream for Kanye's fans, it is definitely a nightmare for his detractors, for those who have mocked and belittled him, but also for those who have never wanted to understand him. "I can believe it, the way you are. You play tracks like Michael Jordans shoots free throws" says Donda West to his son in one of the last scenes of the episode, just before the two of them start talking on the stairs of Kanye's childhood home in Chicago, the same one seen in the last events of Donda and that testifies once again how Ye, twenty years later, is still the same teenager with braces arrived from Chicago to live his "American dream". The only difference? He was eating at Burger King.