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I heard a great story about Kanye recently, and it explains where Kanye got his inspiration for “Stronger”. At the ‘06 MTV Europe Awards Kanye was nominated for Best Video, I think it was for “Touch The Sky”. The award was announced and went to Justice vs. Simian “We Are Your Friends”. Kanye had a great video with a huge budget, so fairly enough he thought he was going to win and was pretty angry when he didn’t. So he gets up on stage and interrupts the acceptance speech to voice his displeasure.

(Ok, now a little back story, Kanye has a DJ named A-Trak. He’s awesome, he’s from Montreal and is a prodigy. Kanye saw him spinning in a record store and immediately took him in for a 40 city tour.) So A-Trak is really forward in music, he’s ahead of the curve. When Kanye got mad about Justice winning over him, his DJ A-Trak had to explain why Justice was actually awesome and deserved the award. Kanye, being a smart dude himself, appreciated the new info and A-Trak agreed to show him some other new artists coming up. (See: A-Trak’s girlfriend Kid Sister blowing up with Kanye rapping on her first single, “Pro Nails”) So A-Trak officially became Kanye’s guide for the hottest in underground music.

How does this relate to “Stronger”? Well Daft Punk was obviously another new act for Kanye, and if you know that “Stronger” is heavily based on Daft Punk’s “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”, then it’s pretty easy to see the connection: A Montreal DJ gave Kanye the inspiration for the single that helped him take out 50 Cent.

Posted on Monday, February 11th, 2008 at 1:14 pm by Matt and is filed under Music & Videos.

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