Kanye West: 8 June 1977

No one predicted Gemini Kanye West would pick up 10 Grammy nominations and win best rap album in 2006 – a rap artist singing about God? But Kanye’s word is more than this. He uses his everyday experience, a Gemini preoccupation, to fuel universal truisms. Gemini synthesizes by absorbing bits and pieces of information around him – the goal is to communicate what he sees, hears and knows. Kanye’s rhyme weaves stories he’s lived – mortality, spirituality, drug use and street life into a musical genre often lyrically less than compelling. What motivates Gemini? Curiosity. By meticulously observing patterns, then re-arranging them, he expresses something new and conceptually relevant. “I’ll use old school patterns, I come up with new patterns in my head every day. Once I found out exactly how to rap about drugs and exactly how to rap about say no to drugs, I knew that I could fill the exact medium between that. My persona is that I’m the regular person. Just think about whatever you’ve been through in the past week, and I have a song about that on my album.” Straight from the mouth of Gemini!