1. We Became More Confused Over Kanye's Brilliance Than Ever
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTAT431aV1Q This is becoming all too regular a trend, isn't it? Kanye makes an almost concerted effort to come across as the most arrogant, self-entitled person on the planet and piss off as many people as he can, before releasing a new album that blows us all away and challenges every notion we have about the guy. It happened in 2010 when he followed his incident at the VMA's up with one of the greatest Hip Hop albums of all time, and this year he did it again, with the release 'Yeezus' bookending a series of increasingly outrageous episodes. Kanye found himself in an array of controversies this year, to absolutely no one's surprise. He put the beat down on at least two pesky papparazzi, got into one of the most hilariously pointless feuds with Jimmy Kimmel and even called out Obama for his infamous, but understandable, 'jackass' comment, telling him to never mention either him, or wife Kim's name. His ego reached all new dangerous levels however when he publicly announced himself 'the nucleus of culture'. Yeah, he really said that. But Kanye somehow managed to silence his haters yet again with 'Yeezus', which was met with the rave reviews and astronomical hype we've only come to expect from his work. 'Yeezus' was hailed as some of his darkest, most experimental work yet and is already being chosen as many critic's Album of the Year. And so, the theories on Kanye's brilliance, or non-brilliance, continue with more fervor than ever. Is Kanye's eccentric and egotistical persona a carefully structured facade of walking publicity, that ratchets up more and more of his fame every time his music outshines his bravado? Or is he really just that big-headed? Why then, do the lyrics in his music seem to be in direct contrast with the person he portrays to the public? Why is it that the man in his music seems so drastically different from the man we supposedly know? Who can say, but Kanye's usual fanfare was a lot of fun to watch in 2013, but was made all the more satisfying when he still managed to live up to his own hype, a seemingly insurmountable feat.