YEEZY Gap Begins National Rollout. It Gives Me Nightmares

What is the fashion industry saying about last weekend’s YEEZY Gap release in Gap’s NYC Times Square store — and about the future of the entire deal? The retailer announced it was expanding the physical offering to 45 of its stores across the U.S. at once. If it happned, it’s quiet time on the Internet.

Highsnobiety

Without judging, Highsnobiety says that Kanye has entirely subverted the brand. They title their new analysis Why the YEEZY Gap Collaboration Is a Truly Historic Moment in Fashion.

We quote: “The collection whose imagery is chock full of edge, darkness, and downright menace was released by the GAP. Let me rephrase that — it was released by the motherfucking GAP, the gold medal Olympic champion of staid mall Americana, the most inoffensive, mind-numbingly bland brand that has ever graced the face of Earth.”

Now maybe this is one more reason why Gap fired CEO Sonia Syngal after 2½ years at the helm. We doubt it’s that simple, but it can be said that Ye’s major difficulties doing anything on a schedule — which is the wheaties GAP and most of big retail runs on — didn’t help the red ink in Gap Inc. headquarters.

Much of the industry — who was super enthused about the partnership initially [not AOC; just sayin] but the most ardent fans of the deal — now question exactly what Kanye and his posse can deliver.

Gap Inc. Revenue Is $46 Million a Day, About 25% from Gap Brand

Ye was hootin that YEEZY Gap sold $14 million woth of black hoodies when they dropped — and that may be true. Gap refused to comment.

But let’s be clear that Gap Inc. sells $46 million worth of clothes every day and Gap stores is estimated to be about a quarter of the total. Depending on how many days the black hoodie collected revenue — and considering all the fanfare that was pent up waiting for it — and countless websites in America promoting it, $14 million may have been great or disappointing. We don’t know.

Ye says it broke all records for sales in one day. But Kanye can be quite like his much-admired pal Donald Trump. Exaggeration is fundamental to the big sale. We just don’t know the facts.

Ye says they only ran the commercial once. But everyone from Vogue to Business Insider was promoting it. And yes, Gap does have an affiliate program, and everybody wanted a piece of the action. The question is was it worth it to the affiliates.

It’s difficult for Ye to process the idea that bloggers and large websites out there — like even ELLE magazine — are delivering customers to Yeezy Gap to be part of the action.

That may be a good thing, because magazines and websites like Highsnobiety need revenue. But for Kanye to think that only his reputation, prodigious talent and one commercial sold his alleged $14 million worth of Perfect Black Hoodies is the typical analysis from a meglomaniac. Lots of little people make things happen, Ye.

Other analysis out this week on YEEZY Gap offers differing views of the business opportunity. The Complex article is quite good.

Chaos and Creation: Inside the Making of Yeezy Gap New York Times

Will Yeezy Save Gap Complex

YEEZY Gap Gives Me Nightmares

I’m far and away not a Gap customer. But I do get bad dreams just looking at this YEEZY Gap Engineered by Balenciaga images. Years ago, a guy dressed exactly like Ye’s above, tried to kill me over my support for Planned Parenthood. I’ll never forget that black-stocking face flying across the hood of my car and onto the windshield, after making my life hell for almost a year.

He also was wearing a black hoodie — but make no mistake, he was a white guy. And of course, we have the Guardians from HULU’s Handmaid’s Tale, keeping all the women in line. When Kanye was running for president in 2020 and talking about shutting down Planned Parenthood to end abortion rights for women. Kanye bought into all the right-wing propaganda about IUDs being murder and also Plan B. He spread more disinformation about women’s reproductivehealth than Donald Trump — and that is damn difficult.

It occurs to me that white nationalists might really like YEEZY Gap, as it’s so dystopian. From polo shirts and khakis to YEEZY Gap. Now that might be just too obviousa deviation from their ‘all American college guy’ carrying tiki torches while shouting “Jews will not replace us”.

But nothing feels like an over-reaction at this point. I can see white nationalists making YEEZY Gap their own. THAT would be one heck of a headache for Gap Inc.

Just yesterday, Rolling Stone had an article: Neo-Nazi Marine Plotted Mass Murder, Rape Campaigns with Group, Feds Say. They wrote: “While tasked with protecting the nation, Matthew Belanger was plotting a killing spree against minorities and to rape “white women to increase the production of white children,” according to federal prosecutors.”

The far-right neo-Nazi America group is called “Rapekrieg.”

I think many younger kids — think Uvalde — will be terrified by Kanye’s dystopian Gap garb. I honestly hope they don’t see it or the ads either. I do want to see Gap thrive again financially. So it’s not as if I want this project to fail. I just don’t understand why it has to be so dark, when America is already so dark.

Actually, maybe I’m not overreacting. DesignTaxi says that in the new YEEZY Gap video game you shoot white doves out of the sky. If you fail to kill them, YOU lose speed and fall to the ground from the sky.

I don’t think this is true, but I haven’t played the game. I watched it being played on YouTube and no avatars caught any doves. There were doves flying around. And I saw no doves being shot from the sky. It didn’t look like much to me. But then, I am not the YEEZY Gap customer, as I keep saying. The idea of dead peace birds really upset me for the last 15 minutes, though.

Just to explain how deeply I am affected by Jan. 6 and all the right-wing rhetoric about controlling women’s bodies, I actually woke up from a deep sleep last summer and saw an apparition of Sen. Lindsey Graham, standing in the doorway. There was a soft light shining over his head and I could see that he was holding a huge syringe, as he stood there staring at me. It was very clear to me as I tried to process this ‘dream state’ that Lindsey Graham intended to kill me with a lethal injection.

As he walked towards me, I woke up. Wow, what a night that was. ~ Anne

Past Ye — aka Kanye West

Remove Kanye from Coachella Petition Just Shy of 50,000 | Kanye on Ellen Blows My Mind

As the Remove Kanye from Coachella Petition cross 49,000 on the way to 50,000 signatures on March 29, Kanye’s honoring of Vladimir Putin’s throwing his opponent to the mat is chilling. Note though, that in Ye’s tweet, he is comparing himself to Putin’s style.

Two months before the election on Sept. 16, 2020, as he sought to be president of America, Kanye — like his good friend Donald Trump — felt totally comfortable celebrating Putin’s style of getting his point across. I don’t mean to be the armchair psychologist with no degree, but I note as an educated woman that Kanye steps into the Putin image metaphorically, writing “Rule Number one: Listen to Ye.”

Now Kanye West will tell you that he wouldn’t hurt a fly, but if you are seriously practicing ubuntu in the universe, you don’t 1) identify with Putin — although Kanye’s right-wing evangelicals loved Putin as the world’s top backer of Christianity as God ordered it; 2) write “Rule Number One” which is more authoritarian talk and 3) and order us to “Listen to Ye.” Kanye’s hubris is just staggering.

This single tweet from 18 months ago is toxic masculinity running amok.

We’ve lived with Kanye stalking his ex-wife Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson with so-called harmless threats of killing Pete in the name of Kanye’s art. I’m almost finished watching ‘jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy’ on Netflix.

I’ve also watched many interviews of Kanye in the last few weeks, including this one on Ellen. It blew my brain cells to pieces.

Note how Kanye is as persecuted as Trump in his mind. It’s our fault that we don’t understand that he is one of the greats. He regrets that we honor Steve Jobs who is dead, when we’ve got Kanye West in our presence. What the hell is wrong with all of us mere mortals that we can’t see his glorious intellect and understanding of everything that matters.

Kanye ONLY WANTS TO DO WHAT’S BEST FOR US. Why do we not accept him as our savior!!!!

Apparently, the GAP bought into this hype. Or Kanye scared the wits out of them in a few meetings. Watch the video.

How in the world Kim Kardashian lived with this man refusing to take any medication is beyond my comprehension. You can say what you want about Kim Kardashian {I’ve long respected her], but if ANYONE is acting like a saint, it’s her. And she would NEVER have the audacity to say that God talks to her in the shower, telling her to shut down Planned Parenthood.

After the Will Smith Oscars Assault, Does Coachella REALLY Want Kanye West on Stage?

I would like to think that after watching Will Smith slap down Chris Rock on the Oscars stage Sunday night, people would take the Remove Kanye petition seriously. And I remind the owner of Coachella, non-Trump-supporting, conservative Christian billionaire Philip Anschutz that Kanye West has put you on notice that he intends to bring Travis Scott up on stage to perform under Kanye’s protection.

A decade ago I supported Kanye West. Within the last year we wrote two very flattering pieces on Travis Scott, one of them his on-hold Dior Men’s collab. AOC promoted Scott’s Cactus Jack Foundation. I wrote nothing but wonderful words about Travis Scott.

Dior took the same path as Coachella in putting a hold on Travis Scott until the 500 lawsuits against him are resolved. But Kanye says no way is Coachella keeping Travis Scott off his stage.

Just as Will Smith took over the Oscars Sunday night, drowning out all the other important message of the evening with his violent machismo, Kanye West says he intends to have Travis Scott perform under his banner.

If he had a gun handy, would Will Smith have shot Chris Rock instead? IMO, very possibly.

We see these arguments play out in gun deaths all over America every day. And contrary to what some social activists are saying, it IS our free speech right to comment on the Oscar event as white people. In our case, AOC rides the butts of white men far more than Black men, who have no lock on machismo-driven behavior.

When I see Black activists arguing for muzzles put on he mouths of anyone but members of the Black community — well, I don’t mean to be a smart a## — but it sure sounds like segregation to me. Seriously!

My issue has always been with America’s testosterone-driven, Bible-toting, gun-loving culture.

These past and promised acts are just as lawless as the January 6 insurrection. Ye doesn’t have to abide by the laws of America, just as the Proud Boys don’t have to abide by them. And they carried big Christian crosses to the insurrection against the US Capitol.

Kanye West honestly believes his favored relationship with God — who sees his tremendous genius — makes him not answerable to the lowly laws of America or Philip Anschutz, owner of Coachella. Kanye will do as he damn well pleases.

Watch the Ellen video and you explain to me how to rein in Kanye West. I can’t imagine this man in a corporate GAP meeting. ~ Anne

Is Kanye West Headed to Russia, Inviting Putin to His Church Service? For real?

Ye [formerly Kanye West] made headlines every day this week. Nothing new about that fact, but Billboard’s January 11, 2022 story that the entertainer intends to grow his business in Russia with billionaire developer Aras Agalarov and Agalarov's musician son, EMIN was picked up by Forbes and Business Insider giving it credibility.

AOC found the story totally plausible, given Ye’s relationship with the Trump family and Trump’s relationship with the Agalarovs. Kanye dined with Jared Kushner one-on-one in Miami Beach on January 7, with both parties denying that any business was discussed. The story broke four days later.

Trump and the Agalarovs

In 2013, the Russian oligarch and his son EMIN arranged the kind of spectacle in Moscow that Trump adores. Trump arrived as a surprise guest, with an armored Mercedes stretch limo driving off a freight elevator fight into a ballroom where 3000 Russian guests couldn’t believe their eye as Trump emerged to greet them.

Politico refreshed our memories about Trump and Agalarov in 2016. As Trump sought the nomination for the US presidency, the political website published When Donald Trump brought Miss Universe to Moscow. The article fills in much more background about the 2013 event.

It was West’s confidant and strategic advisor Ameer Sudan who told Billboard that they were working on the arrangements. Russia is going to be “a second home” for Ye, Sudan said: “He will be spending a lot of time out there.”

There’s no disagreement that Sudan is tied closely to West.

Another part of the West camp denies the Billboard Kanye and Putin story entirely, prompting Business Insider to publish the denial. But Rob Goldstone, the PR dude who helped set up the infamous Trump Tower meeting in 2016, says he can “confirm there are talks going on” to bring Ye to Russia. This meeting revolved around Trump Inc. expecting to get damaging and dirty documents on Hillary Clinton from Natalia Veselnitskaya.

Rolling Stone finally wrote a headline: Kanye West’s Associates Can’t Agree on Whether He’s Meeting Vladimir Putin. Forbes did not publish the denial.

Based on other stories with Forbes involving West, the prominent media source wants the denials from West himself. As loquacious as Kanye is — after all, he praises himself in public as much as Trump — surely Kanye can take 60 seconds to confirm to Forbes. After all, they have his billionaire’s list and all. Forbes knows a lot about West’s business connections. And they have writers and contacts worldwide. When Forbes runs the story, they do it with conviction, not just dialing for page clicks. And they are a paywall site looking for higher-income readers.

Trevian Kutti Revisited

This news about Kanye meeting Putin comes also on the heels of reports of West’s publicist Trevian Kutti. The Republican operative is caught on video threatening two Georgia election workers 61-year-old Ruby Freeman and her daughter Shaye Moss with imminent harm if they didn’t admit to manipulating ballots that were Trump votes.

“Trevian Kutti was not associated with Kanye West or any of his enterprises at the times of the facts that are reported in these articles or since these facts occurred,” said Pierre Rougier, West’s spokesperson, in a statement to Reuters, the original source of the story.

Reuters did publish the Rougier denial, but Forbes took issue that they want to hear the denial from either Kutti or West.

'Source' Says Kanye Is Headed to LV Men's; Ye Worked with Donald Trump to Overturn GA Election; Kanye Tells Kim K to 'Run Right Back to Me, Baby' Pt.1 AOC Fashion

AOC did cover that story and notes that Forbes still hasn’t published the denial from the West camp that they were no longer affiliated with Kutti. Furthermore, Forbes also puts Trevian Kutti backstage at the West-Drake December 9 concert, writing:

Neither Kutti or West responded to requests for comment to Reuters, and Kutti’s online biography lists her as West’s “Director of Operations”—footage she posted on social media appears to show her behind the scenes at a Los Angeles benefit concert where the rapper performed on Thursday evening.

There is no doubt that serious media including the Washington Post and New York Times are investigating the truth to all these political stories about Kanye West that keep breaking nonstop.

Trevian Kutti Was Early Promoter of Kanye West Going to Vuitton Men’s Story

AOC documented from her Instagram that Trevian Kutti was promoting the story that Kanye West should replace Virgil Abloh at Louis Vuitton men.

It was this possibility breaking throughout media that prompted us to protest the possibility of West at Vuitton Mens. We then discovered all the other headlines about West on the same day.

For the sake of clarity and documentation, the LVM post is also shown in sequence from Kutti’s entire Instagram feed, which is an ode to Kanye and Kyle Rittenhouse.

Is it possible that Kutti was the source of the story about Kanye and Vuitton Men’s? Perhaps. But in the endless claims and barrage of words coming out of Kanye’s Drink Champs podcast, he again commented on the fact that Vuitton should have been his position, not Virgil Abloh’s.

So it could have been a joint effort to launch the story and also to thrown it out as a decoy against more damaging stores. Clearly, the Arnault family saw the West v. Abloh opportunity for LVMH differently.

Kanye also references himself as a young Putin in the two-part Drink Champs podcast. That’s a jaw-dropper. One minute Kanye is God in waiting and the next minute he’s a future authoritarian leader. AOC links into YouTube below for the Drink Champs podcast, but most probably the yellow shirt videos on Kutti’s feed are also from that same interview. They may not be the Putin quote, as over 2 hours of video have been released in two podcasts.

Why Putin and Kanye Together Makes Sense

The Billboard story about Ye coming to Moscow and hopefully meeting with Putin resonated for multiple reasons.

1) Ye fancies himself a member of the Trump inner circle and has an ego commensurate with those of both Trump and Putin.

Note that Kanye insisted that he no longer has the brotherly love for Trump that he once expressed, but he reversed this claim in the Drinks Champs interviews. The intersections of Trump connections in Kanye’s life are prolific and political, including his tight relationship with Jared Kushner.

It’s possible that Kanye’s ego and sense of genius status are so massive that he doesn’t know the ways he’s being used as a pawn to advance Republican politics. Reports that West spoke with Kushner daily during the White House days often advanced the theory that Kushner was manipulating West.

AOC doesn’t pretend to know the extent of West’s involvement with Trump and the Republican party. But Kanye has major headaches ahead.

Recently, it’s reported that Kanye is in some serious trouble over his presidential candidate election violations. And the extent to which his campaign was run by Trump people does beg the question of his genuine independence from Trump and West’s real motive for running for president in the first place.

Highest Level Right-Wing Conservatives Ran West’s Presidential Campaign

2) Substantial information has recently emerged at just how involved Trump’s right-wing conservatives were in running Kanye West’s presidential campaign. The West campaign took steps to disguise their involvement with “a secretive network of Republican Party operatives, including advisers to the GOP elite and a managing partner at one of the top conservative political firms in the country,” wrote Politico in late December 2021.

Kanye has problems that he didn’t report any of this information as required by federal law.

“The importance of disclosure in this matter can’t be overstated,” Paul S. Ryan, vice president of government watchdog Common Cause told The Daily Beast. “It’s no secret that Kanye West’s candidacy would have a spoiler effect, siphoning votes from Democrat Joe Biden. Voters had a right to know that a high-powered Republican lawyer [Holtzman Vogel, one of the most powerful and well-connected law firms serving major Republican political and nonprofit organizations today] was providing legal services to Kanye—and federal law requires disclosure of such legal work.”

AOC didn’t report this information when the story broke, not wanting to be perceived as having a particular grievance with Kanye West. I don’t pretend to be indifferent to the man and his recent actions confirm my worst fears about him. But the only person AOC has bird-dogged daily in almost 15 years is Donald Trump.

Now we’ve decided to follow Ye daily, because it’s a rare day when Kanye West isn’t making news. Kanye is like Trump, wanting his “genius” on display to the entire world with daily headlines. It doesn’t matter if the headline is good or bad. Ye eats up press the same way Trump does.

In November Kanye West Explained Why He Is ‘Young Putin’

West actually compared himself to Putin, calling himself “Young Putin” during an interview on the popular Drink Champs podcast discussed earlier in this article. West told hosts N.O.R.E. and DJ EFN, “Culture is an oil. Culture is an energy, and I’m the king of culture for the past 20 and the next 2,000 years.”

What are more reasons why a Kanye West connection to Putin and Russia seem totally plausible?

3) You may struggle with this idea, but it’s not new and the assertion about evangelical Christians and Putin is rock-solid. Trump Republicans love Vladimir Putin because he is their religious savior. #Truth. Putin has positioned himself as a defender of traditional morals and invoked the Russian Orthodox Church in his speeches.

Putin is very anti-gay rights, but he has been reluctant to take on abortion rights, fearing a backlash. Ordinary people can’t own guns in Russia but Putin champions the NRA, holding conventions in Russia. Imagine that Americans are flying to NRA conventions in Russia.

A 2019 Senate report revealed that the NRA was a foreign asset to Russia ahead of the 2016 campaign.

Kanye West has no fear of trying to end abortion for women worldwide. He’s on it, telling the world that God spoke directly to him in the shower, telling him to shut down Planned Parenthood. Why is this relevant, you ask? Because Billboard wrote that Ye planned to hold Sunday Service performances in Russia.

Billboard wrote in breaking the Kanye in Russia story on Tuesday:

The Sunday Service shows will be Ye’s first performances in Russia in his 25-year career and, according to Sudan, the concerts and the meeting with Putin are something Ye’s been wanting to do since he debuted the Sunday Service project in 2019. The Sunday Service performances will likely be held at the Crocus City Hall theater, which holds more than 7,300 people, or Grand Sports Arena at the 81,000-person Luzhniki Olympic Complex, Russia’s national stadium where much of the 1980 Olympic Games were held. Ye plans to invite Putin to attend the gospel performance as a special guest.

There’s no doubt that this week will bring new Kanye West news of a political nature. His personal life is spiraling in very strange ways as well.

As I’ve written before — having been in police protection for a year over my support for Planned Parenthood and the white dude who was determined to kill me because of it — Kanye West is just another right-wing, patriarchal, authoritarian, ego-maniac in my opinion. Kanye unsettles me as much as Trump.

West lies recklessly, just like Trump and as pressure mounts on him, he is lying about routine matters that concern Kim Kardashian.

I was formerly a West supporter, but no more. Personally, I think Kim Kardashian is in for a very rough ride with this man. He has ALL the habits and mindset of a man who believes women are subordinate to men.

When Ye bought the house across the street from Kim Kardashian to be “close to his kids”, I found the news chilling. I’ve been there and know this screenplay. Just sayin’. ~ Anne