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In June, comedian Jensen Karp released Kanye West Owes Me $300: And Other True Stories from a White Rapper Who Almost Made It Big, a book about his time as Hot Karl, a rapper from Calabasas, California. During his days under the silly moniker, Karp collaborated with Kanye West, who was a producer on his 2003 song "Armande Assante." In an interview with Sam Roberts on his Sirius XM show, Karp shares stories about Kanye before he became a rapper.
One story about Kanye's confidence and self-prophecy is particularly baffling. Karp explains that the two would send texts to each other using two-way pagers, and Kanye would sign off with a mostly-accurate prediction of his first three album titles and the release dates. Karp explains:
At the bottom of every two-way, in the same way that emails now have signatures... It would say, 'Look out for these albums.' And it was a list of five or four album titles with years next to them. And they were all the titles he ended up using, until 808s [and Heartbreaks], because he didn't end up using Good-Ass Job, which was the last one on his signature. So, he was gonna [release] them exactly.
Later on, Karp confirms that College Dropout, Late Registration, and Graduation were all listed in order on Ye's signature. He clarifies though, "The years weren't perfect, but they're very close." Watch the exchange around the 4-minute mark below.
