Kanye West on Kris Allen’s “Heartless”: Everyone Who Sings The Song Sings it Better than Me
Kanye West appeared on the View yesterday to talk about his upcoming tour with Lady Gaga and his album 808s & Heartbreak.
At about the 4:04 mark, Sherri Shephard asks Kanye about Kris Allen’s rendition of “Heartless”.
After viewing a clip of Kris’s performance–with a big, big smile on his face–Kanye said, “Everyone who sings the song sings it better than me.” Kanye added, “The Fray, one of my favorite rock bands, covered it, and that song got played on American Idol twice.”
He went on to compare his tunes to Broadway and country melodies, and mimicked what the song would sound like done country. Stick to rap Kanye!
Kanye got a little more specific to Kris when he told USA Today, “I’m so happy that he performed it on his road to victory. I’m just really happy that he involved my song. That my songs are a part of people’s consciousness spirit like that is amazing.”
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38 Responses to “Kanye West on Kris Allen’s “Heartless”: Everyone Who Sings The Song Sings it Better than Me”
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Here’s my translation: Sure I gave Heartless a great melody and the lyrics are mine and anyone with a great voice and the musicianship to rearrange it to fit their style will sing it brilliantly (Kris). I loved his smile at Kris’s singing.
He knows he doesn’t have a great voice, right? The whole autotune discussion was very interesting to me.
This kind of reminds me of Collective Soul’s response to DC singing “The World I know” last year. They said something like, “It’s nice to hear someone sing this song with a great voice.”
I’m sure there are some great songs (filled with emotion) on his album. I may check some out, but could I just have Kris cover the entire album and then I’ll buy it? LOL.
I like Kanye, he’s doing some really good things!
I don’t watch the View. Are these ladies always so mixed up about what’s going on in the interview? BW almost seemed confused (dare I say senile?).
cookcricket, “The Coldest Winter” off his latest album will make you cry. It’s beautiful.
Yayyy Kanyayyyyy.
I said it in headlines and I’ll say it again…you SURE we can’t just release “Heartless” as a full-fledged, promoted-to-radio, stay-on-iTunes-beyond-the-standard-AI-deadline, single, and pretend “No Boundaries” never happened?
lol…. he has to admit that anyone who sings his song shings it better because he, Kanye, use autotune
… lol I still love him and I like the original Heartless a lot…
I didn’t think I would ever hear Kanye make a comment like that. Wow.
Yes, please!
I thought Kanye came across like he liked Kris’ version. Got a kick out of hearing him sing the country version. I’m with cookbunny, release Kris’ “Heartless” to radio!
I remember feeling the same way about David Cook last year. I really wanted some of his AI I-tune downloads to be released. I love about 7 of Kris’s downloads from this year any one of which I would love to be hearing on my radio. Oh wait! I am hearing them on my CD burned from I-tunes instead of my radio because I’m not liking a whole lot of the stuff they are playing on FM radio these days. It seems like they pick 10 songs and play them to death. Give me an entire CD of Kris with a couple of Adam and a couple of Allison thrown in and I am a happy camper.
The live freestyle of “Pinocchio Story” too. He really lets a lot out in that one. I think it gives an insight to what he went through after his mom passed and he and his fiance broke up. It breaks my heart. (the fan screaming is hella distracting though. lol)
I agree with Matt that Kanye is a brilliant musical mind and has earned everything he’s gotten. I’ve said it before, but I think “808’s & Heartbreak” is a brilliant album – his best yet – and IMO, it will be a real travesty if it doesn’t win albumn of the year at the Grammy’s next year.
They actually showed Kanye on my local news doing his concert for the kids. It warmed my heart. He’s really sincere about that.
Like I said above, I heart him and his music. He is a genius, even if his vocals are not. He understands his limits. To me, that’s artistry.
Apparently, I don’t care about ego in performers. Why? Because you have to have ego to do that.
I hate to say this but that was actually a decent interview on The View. The women were all very respectful of him and made sure to bring up the important issues like his foundation’s charitable work with inner city school kids.
I thought KanYe came across very humble, which is quite different from his legendary reputation for oversized ego and arrogance. Perhaps the passing of his mother made him realize the things he needed to improve in himself. The upfront admission about him deliberately embracing Autotune for this album was a surprise for me.
As for Kris’ rendition of “Heartless”, I think KanYe truly enjoyed it, along with the Fray’s version. Personally, I like Kris’ version the best. Before it got pulled from YouTube, Kris’ AI performance of “Heartless” got over a million views. That’s pretty extraordinary.
They need to release that to radio, seriously. How can we make that happen?
I agree about releasing Kris’s version of Heartless on the radio.