Marx’s Base and Superstructure Against Pop Culture

In 2009, Taylor Swift was awarded Best Female Video at MTV’s Video Music Awards. During her acceptance speech, Kanye West iconically got on stage and drunkenly professed how Beyonce had a better music video. The phrase “Imma let you finish” has now become one of Kanye’s most iconic quotes to this day. However, due to the backlash of Kanye’s behavior and comments, he was vilified by the media, fans, and critics alike; this led to not only a character crucifixion but a self-imposed exile by West himself. In the year to come, West began working on what is considered to be his best work of all time and of the decade, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. The album was essentially an unapologetic apology to the world but moreover, a big “f*** you” to the criticism he drew from the VMAs incident; the album, was lauded by critics and listeners but most importantly it was West’s way of accepting his asshole persona that the media labeled him. The incident, although iconic, represents much more than just a pop culture moment but symbolically it is an example of the base and superstructure; the incident being the base and the superstructure being My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.

When talking about how the VMAs incident functions as the base (means of production) as it supported the making of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (superstructure), it is important to look at the lyrics in his songs to legitimize the base. Throughout the album, West talks about many themes and ideas but his most prominent message is the unapologetic personality that he had taken post-VMAs, it is noticed when he talks about having “a toast for the douchebags…a toast for the assholes…a toast for the scumbags” (Runaway 10–12). This call back is more than just a reference to his personality but the personality the whole world thought he had when he interrupted Swift; an iconic lyric such as that was not written so West could brand himself as rude, it was written in retaliation of the public scrutiny he had undergone because of the VMAs. When talking about the superstructural it is important to acknowledge the ideology that came from it, and as the album still holds up as one of the best albums ever made it reinforced the VMAs incident (base). Due to the fact that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was a powerhouse of an album and received widespread acclaim across critics, fans, and artists the whole incident became somewhat of this glorified moment. People saw how such an event launched him into creating a career-defining album. According to Jake Woolf of GQ (2015), that the release of “Runaway” helped West gain the public’s favor back. In CNN article (2010), Mariel Concepcion, an associate editor at Billboard stated that not only had people gotten over the incident but that West had even redeemed himself with tracks such as “Runaway”, “POWER”, and “Monster.” In a way, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy being the superstructure created this public ideology that West was to be forgiven because even if the album seemed to be a part of his redemption story, it should be acknowledged that there would be no My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy without the VMAs incident. Moreover, in seeing the response (ideology) from audiences of West post-album, it reinforces the whole VMAs incident in which, what seemed like a career-ending event became a forgivable and forgettable moment. In many ways, what the album did for the base was that it legitimized it and due to this, the VMAs incident became less of something that should not have happened and more of a moment in time that inspired West.

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy can be seen as the superstructure, which, is not so strange considering that the album itself catapulted West as one of music’s best producers but it did what any superstructure does, it created a radical rethinking of the base (VMAs incident). The importance of the base-superstructure model is that both sides use each other; the base is the means of production so it shapes the superstructure to become something then the superstructure is exposed and returns to reinforce the base’ work. Thinking in terms of this Kanye-Taylor incident it is important to notice the overlap in both the model and how their incident is reflexive of that. A good example comes from his song “Blame Game” featuring John Legend in which he grapples with this personality and how it has affected his relationships but most importantly his persona to the media. One of the overall themes of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is the acceptance and celebration of West’s braggadocious attitude that allowed his fans and other listeners to do so. Over time, there have been hot takes on the incident, West, and Swift and it all comes at the hands of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy as it was the album that helped catapult this conversation. According to Drew Landry (2019), the world would be very different if West had never interrupted Swift; he asserts that West would make one of his worst albums under a ridiculous title and Swift would fade and that her career would crumble. Landry suggests that a domino effect would occur if the once-controversial night did not occur, then many artists and works would never come into fruition. In a literal sense, it also shows that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy does radically change people’s perception of the VMAs incident; it seems unprecedented considering that, at the time, West was under a character crucifixion that many thought would end his career but what My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy did was reverse the “cancellation” of West’s career and earned him respect from critics and his contemporaries alike. Moreover, the rethinking of the base is actually very important in this case because it suggests that the superstructure is reinforcing the means of production (base). By reinforcing the means of the production, it exemplifies how the base-superstructure model is able to function and it shows that there is a correlation between West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy to the VMAs incident. Although, a radical rethinking of the base should be one of rarity, or of something worth rethinking which is where West’s album overturned career-ending incident to the rebirth of an artist. So, a base should not have to be changed unless the superstructure has profoundly created a new perception of the base. However, a radical rethinking is another way the superstructure legitimizes/reinforces the base.

The VMAs incident and its relation to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy exemplifies the relationship as a base has with its superstructure in which the former shaped the latter; it is also important to recognize both as part of popular culture as it is relevant in culture and relevant in the base-superstructure model. Moreover, it is important to understand how the superstructure — in this case, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy — reinforced the base which turned into a radical rethinking of the VMAs incident. A radical rethinking of the base is all a part of the nuanced approach to the model and what My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy follows that. The relationship between the base and superstructure are exemplary of Marx’s idea of something producing art and although this can be seen in most works, it is important to see how such a simple event can snowball into something great and how even ordinary things that seem far off from something like base and superstructure could correlate.