Kanye West - Last Call Lyrics
[Intro: Jay-Z (Kanye)][laughing]Yo ***** you, Kanye, first and foremostFor making me do this shit. Muh'*****erHad to throw everybody out the mother*****ing room'Cause they don't *****ing..(I'd like to propose a toast)(I said toast mother*****er)[Chorus: Kanye]And I amAnd they ask me, they ask me, they ask me, I tell themRaise your glasses, your glasses, your glasses to the skyThis is the last call for alcohol, for the..So get your ass up off the wall[Verse 1]The all around the world Digital Underground, PacThe Rudloph the red nosed reindeer of the RocI take my chain, my 15 seconds of fameAnd come back next year with the whole *****ing gameAin't nobody expect Kanye to end up on topThey expected that College Dropout to drop and then flopThen maybe he stop savin' all the good beats for himselfRocafella's only niggaz that helpMy money was thinner than Sean Paul's goatee hairNow Jean Paul Gaultier cologne fill the air, hereThey say he bourgie, he big-headedWon't you please stop talking about how my dick head isFlow infectious, give me 10 secondsI'll have a buzz bigger than insects in TexasIt's funny how wasn't nobody interested'Til the night I almost killed myself in Lexus[Chorus][Verse 2]Now was Kanye the most overlooked? Yes sirNow is Kanye the most overbooked? Yes sirThough the fans want the feeling of A Tribe Called QuestBut all they got left is this guy called WestBetter take Freeway, throw him on tracks with Mos DefCall him Kwa-lI or Kwe-li, I put him on songs with Jay-ZI'm the Gap like Banana Republic and Old Navy, and ooohIt come out sweeter than old SadieNice as Bun-B when I met him at the Source awardsGirl he had with him - ass coulda won the horse awardsAnd I was almost famous, now everybody love KanyeI'm almost reignin'Some say he arrogant. Can y'all blame him?It was straight embarrassing how y'all played himLast year shoppin my demo, I was tryin' to shineEvery mother*****er told me that I couldn't rhymeNow I could let these dream killers kill my self-esteemOr use my arrogance as the steam to power my dreamsI use it as my gas, so they say that I'm gassedBut without it I'd be last, so I ought to laughSo I don't listen to the suits behind the desk no moreYou niggaz wear suits 'cause you can't dress no moreYou can't say shit to Kanye West no moreI rocked 20,000 people, I was just on tour, niggaI'm Kan, the Louis Vuitton DonBought my mom a purse, now she Louis Vuitton MomI ain't play the hand I was dealt, I changed my cardsI prayed to the skies and I changed my starsI went to the malls and I balled too hard'Oh my god, is that a black card?'I turned around and replied, why yes but I prefer the termAfrican American ExpressBrains, power, and muscle, like Dame, Puffy, and RussellYour boy back on his hustle, you know what I've been up toKillin y'all niggaz on that lyrical shitMayonnaise colored Benz, I push Miracle Whips[Chorus]"... last call for alcohol, for my niggaz"[Outro]So this A&R over at Rocafella, named Hiphoppicked the Truth beat for Beanie. And I was in the session with himI had my demo with me. You know, like I always doI play the songs, he's like "Who that spittin?"I'm like "It's me." He's like "Oh, well okay."Uhh, he started talkin to me on the phonegoing back and forth, just askin me to send him beatsAnd I'm thinking he's trying to get into managing producerscause he had this other kid named Just Blaze he was messin withAnd um, he was friends with my mentor, No IDAnd No ID told him, "look man, you wanna mess with Kanyeyou need to tell him that you like the way he rap"[No ID:] "Yo, you wanna sign him, tell him you like how he rap"I was all, I dunno if he was gassin' me or notbut he's like he wanna manage me as a rapper AND a producer[Hiphop:] "I'll sign you as a producer and a rapper",I'm like oh shitI was messin with, uh, D-Dot alsoPeople were like this, started talking about the Ghost productionBut that's how I got in the game. If it wasn't for that, I wouldn't be hereSo you know. After they picked that Truth beatI was figuring I was gonna do some more workBut shit just went poppin off like that. I was stayin in ChicagoI had my own apartment. I be doin' like, just beats for local actsjust to try to keep the lights on, and then to go out and buyget a Pelle Pelle off lay-away, get some Jordans or somethingor get a TechnoMarine, that's what we wore back thenI made this one beat where I sped up this Hal Melville sampleI played it for Hip over the phone, he's like "oh, yo that shit is crazyJay might want it for this compilation album he doin, called The Dynasty."And at that time, like the drums really weren't soundin' right to meso I went and um, I was listening to Dre Chronic 2001 at that timeand really I just, like picked the drums off Xxplosive and put it likewith it sped up, sampled, and now it's kind of like my whole stylewhen it started, when he rapped on 'This Can't be Life.'And that was like, really the first beat of that kind that was on the Dynasty albumI could say that was the, the resurgence of this whole soundYou know, I got to come in and track the beat, and at the timeI was still with my other management. I really wanted to roll withHiphop. 'Cause I, I just needed some fresh air, you know what I'msayin, 'cause I been there for a while, I appreciated what they didfor me, but, you know there's a time in every man's life where hegotta make a change, try to move up to the next level. And that day Icame and I tracked the beat and I got to meet Jay-Z and he said, "ohyou a real soulful dude" [Jay-Z: "you a real soulful dude"]. And heuh, played the song 'cause he already spit his verse by the time I gotto the studio, you know how he do it, one take. And he said[Jay-Z:] "check this out, tell me what you think of this, right here""tell me what you think of this." And I heard it, and I was thinkinglike, man, I really wanted more like of the simple type Jay-Z, I ain'twant like the, the more introspective, complicated rhy- or the, in mypersonal opinion. So he asked me, "what you think of it?"[Jay-Z:] "so what you thinkin?"And I was like, "man that shit tite,"you know what I'm sayin', man what I'ma tell him? I was on the trainman, you know. So after that I went back home. And man I'm, I'm justin Chicago, I'm trying to do my thing. You know, I got groups. I gotacts I'm trying to get on, and like there wasn't nothin really likepoppin' off the way it should have been. One of my homeys that was oneof my artists, he got signed. But it was supposed to really go throughmy production company, but he ended up going straight with thecompany. So, like I'm just straight holdin' the phone, gettin' the badnews that dude was tryin' to leave my company. And I got evicted atthe same time. So I went down and tracked the beats from him, I tookthat money, came back, packed all my shit up in a U-Haul, maybe aboutten days before I had to actually get out. So I ain't have to dealwith the landlord 'cause he's a jerk. Me and my mother drove to[Mother:] "Come on, let's just go"Newark, New Jersey. I hadn't even seen my apartment.I remember I pulled up[Mother:] "Kanye, baby, we're here",I unpacked all my shit. You know, we went to Ikea, I bought abed, I put the bed together myself. I loaded up all my equipment, andthe first beat I made was, uh, 'Heart of the City.'And Beans was still working on his album at that time, so I came upthere to Baseline, it was Beans' birthday, matter of fact, and Iplayed like seven beats. And, you know I could see he's in the zonehe already had the beats that he wanted, I did nothing like already atthat time. But then Jay walked in. I remember he had a GuccI buckethat on. I remember it like, like it was yesterday. And Hiphop said"yo play that one beat for him." And I played 'Heart of the City.' Andreally I made 'Heart of the City,' I really wanted to give that beat to DMX.[Hiphop:] "No I think Jay gon' like this one right here".And I played another beat, and I played another beat. And I remember thatGuccI bucket, he took it and like put it over his face and made one ofthem faces like 'OOOOOOOOOOH.' Two days later I'm in Baseline and I seenDame. Dame didn't know who I was and I was like "yo what's up I'm Kanye."[Dame:] "Yo, you that kid, Kanye?""You that kid that gave all them beats to Jay?Yo, this nigga got classics"[Dame:] "Jay got classics, G."You know I ain't talkin shit.I'm like "oh shit." And all this time I'm starstruck, man. I'mstill thinking 'bout, you know I'm picturing these niggaz on the showThe Streets is Watching, I'm lookin, these were superstars in myeyes. And they still are, you know. So, Jay came in and he spit allthese songs like in one day, and in two days... I gotta bring up onething, you know, come back to the story, the day I did the 'Can't beLife' beat on track, I remember Lenny S, he had some Louis Vuittonsneakers on, he think he fly. And Hiphop was there, I think Tata, JohnMinnelli, a bunch of people. I didn't know all these people at thetime they was in the room, and I said, "yo Jay I could rap." And Ispit this rap that said, uh "I'm killin y'all niggaz on that lyricalshit. Mayonnaise colored Benz, I push miracle whips." And I saw hiseyes light up when I said that line. But you know the West, the rapwas like real wack and shit, so that's all the response.He said "man that was tite."[Jay-Z:] "That, that was cool. That was hot."That was it. You know, I ain't get no deal then, hehe.Okay, fast forward.So, Blueprint, H to the Izzo, my first hit single. And I justtook that proudly, built relationships with people. My relationshipwith KwelI I think was one of the best ones to ever happen to mycareer as a rapper. Because, you know, of course later he allowed meto go on tour with him. Man, I appre-- I love him for that. And atthis time, you know I didn't have a deal, I had songs, and I hadrelationships with all these A&R's, and they wanted beats from me, sothey'd call me up, I'd play them some beats. "Gimme a beat that soundlike Jay-Z." You know, they dick riders. Whatever. So I'll play themthese post-Blueprint beats or whatever and then I'll play my shit. I'llbe like, "yo but I rap too." Hey, I guess they was lookin' at me crazy'cause you know, 'cause I ain't have a jersey on or whateverEverybody out there listen here. I played them 'Jesus Walks' and theydidn't sign me. You know what happened, it was some A&R's that *****edwith me though, but then like the heads, it'd be somebody at thecompany that'll say "naw." Like, Dave LottI *****ed with me, mynigga Mel brought me to a bunch of labels. Jessica Rivera, man[Jessica:] "Man, you niggaz is stupid if y'all don't sign Kanye, for real."I'm not gonna say nothin to mess my promotion up"Y'all niggaz is stupid". Let's just say I didn't get my deal.The nigga that was behind me, I mean,he wasn't even a nigga, you know?The person who actually kicked everything off was Joe 3H from CapitolRecords. He wanted to sign me really bad.[Joe:] "We gonna change the game, buddy."Dame was like, "yo you got a deal with Capitol,okay man, just make sure it's not wack."[Dame:] "you gotta make sure it's not wack."Then one day I just went ahead and played it, I wanted toplay some songs, 'cause you know Cam was in the room, Young Guru, andDame was in the room. So I played... actually it's a song that you'llnever hear, but maybe I might use it. So, it's called 'Wow.'"I go to Jacob with 25 thou, you go with 25 hundred, wowI got eleven plaques on my walls right nowYou got your first gold single, damn, nigga, wow."Like the chorus went. Don't bite that chorus, I might still use it. SoI play that song for him, and he's like "oh shit"[Dame:] "Oh shit it's not even wack.""I ain't gonna front, it's kinda hot."[Dame:] "it's actually kinda hot."Like they still weren't looking at melike a rapper. And I'm sure Dame figured, 'like man. If he do a wholealbum, if his raps is wack at least we can throw Cam on every song andsave the album, you know. So uh Dame took me into the office, and he'slike "yo man, we, we on a brick, we on a brick"[Dame:] "you don't wanna catch a brick"You gotta be under an umbrella, you'll get rained on.I told Hiphop and Hiphop was all, "oh, word?" Actually, even withthat I was still about to take the deal with Capitol 'cause it wasalready on the table and 'cause of my relationship with 3H. That, youknow, 'cause I told him I was gonna do it, and I'm a man of my word, Iwas gonna roll with what I said I was gonna do. Then, you know, I'mnot gonna name no names, but people told me, "oh he's just a producerrapper" and told 3H that told the heads of the Capitol, and right--the day I'm talking about, I planned out everything I was gonna doman, I had picked out clothes, I already started booking studiosessions, I started arranging my album, thinking of marketing schemesman I was ready to go. And they had Mel call me, they said"yo... Capitol pulled on the deal"[Mel:] "Yo, Capitol pulled out on the deal."And, you know I told them that Rocafella was interestedand I don't know if they thought that was just something I was sayingto gas them up to try to push the price up or whatever. I went up... Icalled G, I said, "man, you think we could still get that deal with Rocafella?"
