Kanye West 'Black Skinhead:' 'Yeezus' Music VIDEO LEAKS onto the Web, SNL Performance Reflected in Video [WATCH]
The music for first Yeezus single "Black Skinhead" leaked online (July 8). Though it's unclear whether or not the CGI clip is an official release or a well made fan video, the visual for "Black Skinhead" plays into the imagery surrounding West's new album.
The dark, black and white clip begins with black cloaked figures and wolves, much like the now famous Saturday Night Live performance West did earlier this year. The vast majority of the video shows a CGI-animated West dancing around and rapping the song's lyrics while shirtless.
Though a spiked figure appears from time to time, the video for "Black Skinhead" is largely simplistic in nature. In addition to falling in line with the look of West's SNL performance, the video plays in to the simple aesthetics of Yeezus, which feature no album cover or artwork on the CD.
Watch the leaked video for "Black Skinhead" below.
Though West initially planned not to release any commercial singles from Yeezus, "Black Skinhead" was eventually announced as the lead track late last month. The abrasive song will reportedly be sent to radio DJs later this month.
The roll out and promotion of Yeezus pre-release was notably bare. Projections promoting the album were aired on the sides of buildings in major cities and hype was built from the lack of a video, single or interviews.
The lack of a single seems to have hurt Yeezus sales-wise. Though the album did debut on the Billboard charts at No. 1, it fell in sales 83 percent in its second week, losing out to J. Cole's second album Born Sinner, showing that while dedicated Kanye fans were going to buy the album, he failed to pick up new listeners along the way.