10 Amazing Stories Behind Famous Rock Album Music Covers
3. K. West (The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars - David Bowie)
There's a phenomenal conspiracy theory out there that David Bowie predicted the birth of Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West.
This is all stems from the cover of Bowie's masterpiece The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, which features the musician standing under a sign that reads "K. West".
Ziggy Stardust etc. etc. was released in June 1972 and contains a song called Five Years. In June 1977, five years after Ziggy got released, Kanye was born.
Spooky.
To bring this argument crashing back down into reality, the "K. West" in the picture has nothing to do with the future rapper/President candidate/sayer of bad things.
Bowie was ill with the flu on the day of the photoshoot and didn't want to walk very far to take the picture. So, he pitched up underneath the offices of a nearby furriers named K. West, after the owner's surname (Konn) and their location in London.
Unfortunately, the business didn't take too kindly to being featured on a pop record without consent, angrily writing to Bowie's record label to complain. However, those issues vanished as soon as tourists started turning up to take pictures.
Funny that.