Kanye West
LOS ANGELES, CA - JULY 24: Kayne West attends LACMA Director's Conversation With Steve McQueen, Kanye West, And Michael Govan About "All Day/I Feel Like That" presented by NeueHouse in association with UTA Fine Arts at LACMA on July 24, 2015 in Los Angeles, California. Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for LACMA

KEY POINTS

  • Consequence said Kanye West was worried his career was over after his interruption of Taylor Swift's speech
  • The rapper said West launched "G.O.O.D. Fridays" in an effort to improve his image amid the backlash
  • West said the incident contributed to his acclaimed "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" album

Kanye West feared that his career was over after his 2009 MTV Video Music Awards incident with Taylor Swift, rapper Consequence has claimed.

During the music awards show, the "Midnights" artist was in the middle of her acceptance speech after winning best female video for "You Belong With Me" when West went on stage and snatched the microphone from her, according to Us Weekly.

"Yo, Taylor, I'm really happy for you, I'mma [sic] let you finish. But Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time [with 'Single Ladies']! One of the best videos of all time," West proclaimed at the time before shrugging his shoulders and returning the microphone to Swift.

Although it has not been confirmed what prompted West to interrupt Swift, according to Billboard, the rapper had been spotted passing around a bottle of Hennessy throughout the night as he attended the awards show with then-girlfriend Amber Rose.

West faced intense backlash over the incident, which was dubbed one of the "worst decisions in music history" by Rolling Stone. Then-President Barack Obama even called out West for being a "jacka--" during an interview with CNBC days after the awards show.

In an interview with HipHopDx's Jeremy Hecht last week, Consequence revealed how the incident affected West, claiming that the rapper was worried that it had cost him his career when his 2010 single "Power" failed to reach the level of success of his previous tracks.

"To be 100% honest, 'Power' is 'Power' now, but that was the first record off that cycle, and 'Power' was [kind of] the first time it didn't go all the way," the 45-year-old rapper, whose real name is Dexter Raymond Mills Jr., said. "It didn't do what 'Gold Digger' did, it didn't do what 'Can't Tell Me Nothing' did, and it didn't do what 'Stronger' did."

He continued, "So it was [kind of] like, 'What [are] we [going to] do?' We ain't got no out-the-gates smash. We got a single and they playing it, but it wasn't that one."

Consequence, who was featured on West's first two albums "The College Dropout" and "Late Registration," said that in an effort to rehabilitate his image, West launched "G.O.O.D. Fridays," dropping a new song every week until the release of his fifth studio album, "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy."

"It doesn't eradicate the Taylor Swift incident. It's not big enough to K.O. that. Brands [aren't going to] forget that, touring [isn't going to] forget that, so forth and so on [sic]. So this put Kanye in a corner, and he came out flying with 'G.O.O.D. Fridays,'" Consequence concluded.

West, who now goes by Ye, previously admitted that the 2009 VMAs incident was a contributing factor to 2010's "MBDTF," which is considered one of the best albums of his career and was awarded best rap album at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards.

"After the infamous Taylor Swift moment, I sort of did a little self-exile, just to get away from paparazzi and to have people not, you know, just f—king with me constantly," the rapper said during his acceptance speech at the Footwear News achievement awards in 2020, according to People.

"I went to Hawaii and took all the creative energy that I wanted to express, and we put it into an album called 'My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,'" he added.

West also shared that he traveled alongside his creative director friend Virgil Abloh to several countries including Japan and Sweden to brainstorm ideas for the album.

"It was fun. It wasn't too bad. It wasn't as miserable an experience as some might think. My exile was pretty fun and stuff. 'What does Kanye do when he pissed every person off on the planet?' He goes [to] Stockholm and dances," he concluded, laughing.

Kanye West
Kanye West is seen in New York in November 2019. AFP/Angela Weiss