Kanye West’s meteoric rise from hit producer to underdog rapper to superstar is a story that’s been told again and again…often times by Kanye West. His story starts back in 1999 and continues up until present day. People never know what to expect musically from Kanye, but character-wise, it’s pretty damn clear that he will always do something over the top.

Sadly, it’s those antics that stop people from recognizing Kanye West for what he his — one of, if not THE most influential producer of the last 16 years.

A look at Kanye’s path will bring us through the pitch-heavy samples of the mid 2000s, through the Auto Tune/808 sound that’s prevalent today, up to where he is now — an experimental curator of sounds that continues to change how people view rap music. Doing that, will bring us up to modern times.

I have to be 100% honest, when Kanye began his ascent from Chicago backpacked producer to the most promising up and coming rapper, I wasn’t paying any attention.

Honestly, I wasn’t paying attention to rap at all. Yes, I knew about Pharrell & the Neptunes’ songs. Yes, I knew about Timbaland and all of his productions but outside of them…and, to be frank, I never really looked at them as Hip-Hip producers (which isn’t an insult). I always looked at them in the same vein as say a Quincy Jones or someone. Other than that, whatever Hip-Hop I got, it came from Hot 97 (the old relevant Hot 97, not the joke that it is now).

The spirit of Hip-Hop was not in rap music. So I went looking for that spirit abroad and found it in Drum-N-Bass…not just the instrumental music but the mixes that had MCs on them. The tracks were often played like breaks with the MC adjusting to the selection. I took weekly trips to Breakbeat Science looking for the latest Andy C mix— hopefully with Skibadee “rinsing out” over the tracks.

That led to (UK) garage and the group that really had me getting that Wu-vibe, So Solid Crew, a crew that claimed between 19 to 30 members. Unlike the rap that Skibadee or Hyper D would do over Drum-N-Bass, a fast, chant-like flow, So Solid was closer to what an American would classify as rap.

But it wasn’t enough.

When Brit press went bananas about Dizzee Rascal, I jumped to check it out. “I Luv U” was the cut. A tad bit impressed, I decided to research the scene that he came out of. The name of his mentor, Wiley, was all it took. And that yielded the motherlode — Grime.

Long before Judge Kimba Wood put a cease and desist order down, there once was a peer to peer site that allowed you to do the impossible. While often it was used as a site to download music that could be legally bought at your local Tower Records or HMV, the site also allowed you to have a hold of mixes recorded off pirate radio in other countries, not to mention, single songs that never made it stateside. This is how I got into “Tings in Boots,” and “Oi” and “Boys Love Girls.” Many of the tracks were bare bone and recorded with a PC program that many o’ producer acquired via the same peer to peer site mentioned above. That program was Fruity Loops 3. Wherein our story comes back stateside. But we’ll get back to Fruity Loops in a second.

“The Old Kanye” was for my generation. That’s the “chop up a beat Kanye.” The one that required beat machines and a knowledge of records; the so-called Chipmunk Soul Kanye.

Kanye West rode unto the scene proclaiming himself a “backpacker” which was code for Hip-Hop nerds who loved rap in all of it’s purity (I think we lump such people in the disparaging category of “lyrical miracle” lovers now…not sure).

And I wasn’t on board for those first two albums. His raps were so simplistic to me and flow so predictable. But the rap intelligensia sang his praises for his use of soulful samples — whether that was pitching Chaka up +7 on “Through the Wire,” or chopping up all parts of “I Got a Woman” for “Gold Digger,” everyone had saddled up on Kanye’s privates. I bought the albums, listened a couple of times, picked the few songs I liked, and moved on.

I finally came around to the West bandwagon with the Daft Punk sampled, “Stronger.” The first single, “You Can’t Tell Me Nothing,” was MOS (more of the same)…at least I thought so at first. But when the album, Graduation, dropped, I even signed on for that.

I was impressed with the entire album. From the Takashi Murakami album cover to the fact that he was able to get the finicky Steely Dan, one of my favorite 70s bands, to allow him use of “Kid Charlemagne,” even his rap flow seemed to have improved, I became a fan. I revisited the other albums (with the same, original results).

I eagerly awaited Kanye’s next release. Boy was I thrown for a loop.

When one of the founders of House, Jesse Saunders, made “On and On,” it became an instant hit. But what many say was it’s greatest quality was the fact that it was inspiring — and not because it was an excellent song — quite the contrary. “On and On” was considered inspiring because of it’s simplicity. When young Chicago producers heard the song, many of them thought, “I can do THAT…and better.”

No one would have ever thought that about Thom Yorke’s Eraser. Released in 2006, Thom Yorke tapped into his love for Warp Recordings and went all the way electronica in a way that he only attempted with Radiohead’s Kid A.

Kanye loved this album. He loved it so much so that he hopped on the title cut for “Us Placers” on his Can’t Tell Me Nothing mixtape.

I’ve always believed that Kanye wore his influences on his sleeve as big as that heart he started wearing in 2008 leading up to the release of 808s and Heartbreaks.

This was no exception. My first impression of “Love Lockdown” was, “this is an awful impersonation of Thom Yorke,” a comment I reiterated whenever someone asked my opinion about the song.

Of course, I had no proof that Kanye was influenced by The Eraser until the November 2008 Fader cover story where Mr. West says that “Love Lockdown” is just a great accomplishment in the idea of, like, Thom Yorke in the strip club.”

Then I heard the album. I was underwhelmed. I had finally signed on for the rapping Kanye, finally appreciated his sampling, and here was this auto-tuned, incredibly simplistic album.

They’re like, “It sounds like he wrote this in five minutes,” and I’m like, You’re right, it took me five minutes! Is something better if it took five years than if it took five minutes? Kanye West

I appreciated his fearlessness and the fact that, above all else, Kanye is an artist, but I did what Kanye would have wanted — I held 808 next to Eraser — I didn’t put him in the rap category for my judgement of the album — and concluded that it was ga’bage.

But the album wasn’t for me. (My first lesson in redeeming myself from hate) This album was for a generation of kids that I didn’t know — they were still in middle and high school.

This album is a complete new idea, some whole different shit that’s gonna change music again. Kanye West

A year later, Kanye’s protégé and collaborator on 4 of 808's songs, Kid Cudi, dropped Man On The Moon which he says, “wouldn’t exist on a major label without the success of a left-of-center hit like 808s.” That album solidified the new world of rap that Kanye ushered in and the technology ain’t hurt either.

Stevie getting busy on the Talk Box

Stevie Wonder had his Talk Box designed by Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff. His skill with playing the harmonica helped. It’s said that Roger Troutman’s desire to use the Talk Box came watching Wonder dazzle the kids of Sesame Street. He popularized it with “More Bounce to the Ounce.” Herbie Hancock even dabbled in the Vocoder using the Sennheiser Vocoder VSM 201 in 1979. Stevie and Roger needed to put that tube in their mouth and “play” their voice on a keyboard. Plus you had the whole fainting, losing teeth, stomach virus thing. Not the most convenient set-up.

Enter — Andy Hildebrand.

Hildebrand, a retired oil engineer turned software developer, and others were at a National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) conference in 1995 when it was suggested to him that he make an invention that would allow for a person to sing on key. He didn’t pay much attention to the suggestion at first but eventually it hit him — a pitch correction software. Nothing like it existed.

Hildebrand succeeded in solving the mathematical problems necessary for the software to work and in early 1996 Auto-Tune was born. He took the software to the 1996 NAMM conference and people were “grabbing it out” of Hildebrand’s hands. Soon after, he employed a sales team and sold Auto-Tune to studios all over Los Angeles — their little secret. And it remained that way for three years until producer Mark Taylor wanted to try something different.