On Monday’s episode of “The Michael Knowles Show,” Knowles talks about Kanye West’s upcoming album, “Jesus Is King.” Video and partial transcript below:
Brunch is church for modern liberals. Even friends have put it that way, [saying] of course brunch is church, that’s my Sunday ritual. I go out, and I have a mimosa, and you know my sacraments are a mimosa and an egg sandwich. That’s true of a lot of people. I like brunch, and most of my friends probably are liberal atheists or liberal materialists, or liberal spiritual but not religious. I mean they’re that kind of thing, that’s what the millennial culture is.
You got to meet people where they are, you’ve got to be all things to all people. And that’s a little bit what Kanye is doing here, I think. The album is called “Jesus is King.” The album isn’t called “Kanye Is King.” The album isn’t called “Kanye Is Jesus.” He’s talked a little bit that way in the past, but that doesn’t seem to be the way he’s talking now. Kanye is not always talking about his political views. You’re just saying that he has the right to have political views. And the other thing is — this is my big defense of Kanye — generally, Kanye West has a pretty good ear.
I don’t like his music that much, but I’ve always said he has a good ear. So the way I would often put it is that Kanye West is really good at listening to good music — he has a really good taste in music — and then he raps over it and ruins it, which is not even a knock on Kanye. It’s kind of a knock on hip hop in general, but he’s got a good ear for music. So “Jesus Walks” is a good example. The song “Jesus Walks” is really good. “Walk With Me” is a really nice song, and then he does “Jesus Walks” and raps over it and makes it not as good a sounding song.
He’s got a good ear for the culture, too — he can hear things in the culture that most people can’t hear. That’s why he’s been on top for a very long time. He’s not just following the crowd; he’s kind of leading the crowd in the culture, and I think he’s hearing that people want meaning. I think that’s why he’s doing these Sunday services, which is not the traditional Latin mass that I go to on the weekends, but it’s something. People want meaning, and instead of putting that meaning into a global warming rally, which we saw a week ago, he’s putting that meaning into a religious — an explicitly religious — rally, an explicitly Christian rally, and he calls the album “Jesus is King.”
People want meaning, and if they can, as they’re looking for meaning — and everybody’s gotta serve somebody — so they’re going to find the meaning in global warming, or they’re going to find the meaning in Christianity, and if he’s leading people in that direction, I think that’s a great thing. If he can bring people around to Christ, I think that’s a great thing. And if they can start at Sunday service and end up at church, I think that’s a great thing. They’re not going to start out at church; they’re going to start out at brunch. Then the question is, where are they going to go after brunch? Are they going to go to a political rally for leftism, or are they going to go to a Sunday service? And then once they go to the Sunday service and they get a little taste, I don’t think they’re going to be satisfied there.
I think, I hope, they’re going to want to start going to church, and they’re gonna want to start reading the Bible, and they’re going to want to start experiencing the sacraments, and they’re going to want to go to mass, and they’re gonna want a transcendent religious experience.
Kanye can bring them there. That’s a good thing.
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