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Seeing as how so many of you reading this have blogs of your own, and no doubt receive the daily wave of promo emails that every blog is blessed with, there's a good chance that you all got the same email as I did earlier this morning. At around 4 AM the following was sent out with the subject line, "Re: Me and Lilly," addressed from "Kanye West":

*nooooo, only 2 days? make sure to contact me before the session we have to discuss "spaceship" i will upload them when i have time.*

On Tue, Jan 27, 2009 at 1:16 AM, TBG NAMEREMOVED@gmail.com wrote:

> I need the ones from the show the night before. Yeah They Did a piece,
> Relay the message to Warren for the mail. Also the mixed version I need
> because I am meeting with John tomorrow, he is only in town for 2 days.
>
> On Tue, Jan 27, 2009 at 1:11 AM, Kanye West NAMEREMOVED@gmail.comwrote:
>
>> *The rest of the pictures will be in your inbox for tomorrow. Congrats I
>> read Your piece on MTV.COM *
>>
>> --
>> G.O.O.D MUSIC
>> http://www.myspace.com/kanyewest
>> kanyeuniversecity.com
>> > >

-- G.O.O.D MUSIC http://www.myspace.com/kanyewest kanyeuniversecity.com

At first glance, the email seemed rather intriguing. A conversation between Kanye West and someone named TBG (Tokin' Black Guy), interrupted midstream, with an mp3 labeled "rough draft" attached; who could resist that? Of course, it did seem a little strange that Kanye would throw in a link to a promo for TBG on MTV.COM, but I'm guilty of overlinking myself so I can give him a pass on that. And one had to wonder whether 'Ye really would feel the need to end each email with a link to his myspace page and website, but he certainly wouldn't be the only blogger to promote his site in his email sig. The man does post an update every 15 minutes, so he might as well let everyone know about it.

Yet the authenticity of the email became a little more questionable after listening to the "rough draft" mp3 that was attached, as it turned out to be the first single from Tokin' Black Guy which, not 24 hours earlier, had been blasted out to just about every music site by a p.r. firm with an announcement that it was Kanye's latest project. Add to that the fact that Kanye's email was "accidentally" bcc'd to every music blogger on earth (as if he'd have that list stored on his blackberry), and it's hard to see this as anything other than a marketing gimmick. The song is, to be blunt, wack, and not surprisingly the blog reaction to the initial p.r. blast was lukewarm at best. So why not take a second crack at promoting the new single, but this time make it seem like Kanye accidentally leaked his own song? Throw in a few vaguely personal details in the email (I do hope Kanye gets to meet up with John before he leaves town!) and the odds of someone listening, or better yet posting, the song increase exponentially.

A few hours later, the following e-mail popped up with the subject line, "Message Mistake!":

*Unaware as to how you may have receive one of my emails, thank you for
respecting my messages. As for the rough version of the song, it is out
there now, so you may use it for personal use or have it as a stream on your
website please. *
*Thank you and wish everyone nothing but the best.*

*Side Note: People Stop sending me Spam, it is uncalled for.*

-- *G.O.O.D MUSIC
http://www.myspace.com/kanyewest
kanyeuniversecity.com
*

There is a rather healthy dose of irony in asking for people to stop responding to the original email with spam of their own, of course, but I have no doubt that Mr. West's inbox was filled to capacity with requests to check out blogs, demo tapes and myspace pages shortly after the first email was released. That's the downside to including your email address in a viral marketing campaign, I suppose.

Today's edition of the New York Times had an article in the Business section that Kanye West, or rather his P.R. team as its unlikely Kanye had much to do with this event (much less took the initiative to write an email in response to it), would do well to read. The article discussed how many of the companies with high brand recognition, such as Nike and Nintendo, refuse to lower their prices even in light of the current economic downturn, as they feel that the negative long term consequences - customers expecting less of their brand due to the lowered price of their goods - far outweighed the short term boost in sales that it would create. That is essentially what Kanye has done with this email stunt, he's devalued his brand. A grammy winning artist shouldn't have to resort to blasting out emails to his blogroll with his latest single, as the mere fact that the name Kanye West is attached to it would have most blogs rushing to post it anyway. Instead, by doing this email stunt, he's reduced himself to the level of every other struggling rapper looking to get a few extra blog links. Of course, it did get me to put up the song and write an entire post about it, so what do I know? Here's the song:

Tokin' Black Guy - "Rough Draft" aka Body Clock

As a final sidenote on this whole thing, Allie is Wired suggests that TBG may be an alter ego for Kanye West. I'm not sure I buy that, as the voice just doesn't sound like Kanye and the delivery doesn't sound like him, either, but it certainly would fit in with the entire marketing gimmick. At least he's not singing through Auto-Tune this time around.

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