If there’s one thing that makes me mourn for the Kanye West we once lost, it’s the ninth song on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy: Runaway. Arguably one of West’s greatest tracks of all time, it contains a toast to the awful men in the world, himself included: “Let's have a toast for the a**holes, let's have a toast for the scumbags. Every one of them that I know [...] Baby, I got a plan. Run away fast as you can.” Maybe we should have listened.
West debuted Runaway at the 2010 VMAs, back when he still seemed relatively self-aware and mentally cogent. He was always controversial — the infamous ‘I’ma let you finish’ VMAs incident with Taylor Swift happened almost exactly one year beforehand — but based on his writing and old footage of the fledgling rap star, it’s fair to say he was smart, capable of critical thought and self-reflection.
