How do you solve a problem like Yeezy? How do you catch a cloud and pin it down? Yeezy Season 3 has landed and in its wake this reporter feels a little tipsy (no alcohol was consumed during the show, alcohol was consumed immediately after the show). If you ever wished to peek inside Kanye’s mind, Being John Malkovich-style, this was your chance and oh, was it a trip. Was this a fashion show? Was it a music show? Was it a reality show? It was Kanye’s show and as such, it was great. No other designer and label will cut a chunky 2-hour slice out of the fashion schedule cake, get people to buy $275 tickets for it, fill Madison Square Garden and wait in long lines for merchandise and then sit back and let the guy in charge play songs from his laptop as if we’re all sitting around his lounge ('hold up, hold up, let me play you this…') with Apple alerts chiming in the background while a vast army of 1200 models in a makeshift camp stands eerily still. Nothing happened and everything happened.
'Tell me how y’all feel about the clothes this season,”' Kanye asked the crowd and you know what, he really wanted to know. I think I heard someone shout, 'Make them cheaper!' The clothes, from what the Jumbotron showed, were a neat continuation from last season’s knit bodysuits and crop tops and hybrid outerwear all patched up and ribbed with some new geometric patterns in a palette of rust, ochre and orange. A coincidence that Kanye later confessed his dream to be the next Creative Director for Hermes?
Yes, Naomi was there in big black fur and so were Veronica Webb and Liya Kebede. But they soon strode off stage leaving behind Vanessa Beecroft’s extras, the most diverse casting you’ll see for the entire season, behind looking solemn, determined and bored, all at once. That was their act and they were remarkable. Oscar for Best Ensemble Cast? And yes, the Kardashians were there and Caitlyn and Lamar, shining bright in white - as Kanye told us, they all wore Balmain by Olivier Rousteing. And Kanye thanked Carine Roitfeld and his design team and Adidas 'for paying for all this', and he danced around with his pals and the audience, and he shouted instructions to the crew, and he said 'ah, Soundcloud' when the music wouldn’t play and he led the crowd to a chant against Nike. I really think he’d still be there tonight if they let him. And most of that crowd would have stayed with him.
