Kanye West’s Original Plan for ‘Watch the Throne’ Was to Include the N-Word in Every Song Title
On the latest episode of ItsTheReal’s A Waste of Time podcast, former Grantland and Awl publisher David Cho discussed Kanye West and Jay Z‘s 2011 collaborative album Watch the Throne. According to Cho, West and Jay had a bit of a disagreement regarding the title of Throne single “Niggas in Paris.” In fact, West had a vision for each song title on the 12-track album.
“Jay wanted to call [‘Niggas in Paris’] ‘Ball So Hard,’ and Kanye was like ‘No,'” Cho recalled. West then outlined his vision for the Watch the Throne tracklist. “We’re gonna put the n-word in every single title on this album so everyone has to say it and they have to confront it,” West said, according to Cho. Though it’s unclear whether the final version of “Niggas in Paris” is the result of a compromise between West and Jay, the hit single is the only Throne track to feature the word in its title.
Check the full two-hour podcast below. The Throne talk, spotted by DJBooth Monday, starts at around the 1:48:20 mark. The A Waste of Time team also discussed West’s “barometer for cool,” the Pastelle era, and more:
During a Saint Pablo tour stop in Seattle last October, West blamed the ongoing streaming wars for the nonexistence of a Watch the Throne sequel. “There will never be a Watch the Throne 2,” West told the KeyArena crowd. “You know why? Because that’s the reason I wasn’t on [Drake’s “Pop Style”]. I wasn’t on the song because of Hov, because of some Tidal/Apple bullshit.”
The original Throne album was, of course, a a critical and commercial success. The album opened on the Billboard 200 in the top spot, selling more than 400,000 copies in its first week. Throne maintained the top spot in the following week, moving an additional 177,000 copies.
