While Kanye West might be one of the world’s most influential rappers, the artist has a hard time staying away from controversies. Over the years, he has gone on to give his fans many moments where it seemed as though the artist might have been having a breakdown in public, which also sparked the debate on whether art should be separated from its artist. But it seems as though the debate might still be going on after all.

When anyone thinks of Kanye West controversies, there are a few recurring ones that come to people’s minds. Whether you love or hate the artist, it is hard to forget his 2009 VMA incident with Taylor Swift. But one thing is for sure, no one saw the artist’s 2015 VMA Vanguard speech coming.

Kanye West’s 11-minute-long thank you speech

Back in August 2015, the music world came together for another MTV VMA. But what no one expected was that they would be forced to listen to Kanye West drag on a thank-you speech for eleven minutes. After it was announced that the rapper had won the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award for his creative music videos that he had released in the previous year.

After accepting the award from Taylor Swift, the rapper went on to thank her for “being so gracious” and then ended up in a spiel about power and creativity and even mentioned a plan for a future presidential run, which ended up coming true in 2020. But the artist had everyone confused about what he was saying since he jumped from story to story without seeing one to completion.

But the most surprising part of Kanye West’s iconic speech was him revealing why he had grabbed the microphone out of Taylor Swift’s hand and left the singer in tears after she had won Best Female Video. The incident, which happened back in 2009, left other artists and even the audience stunned.

Kanye West addressed his 2009 VMA controversy

While it may have sounded like one of the artist’s rap lyrics, in his 2015 VMA speech, Kanye West, who might be planning a new album, finally addressed his rude behavior back in 2009. The artist went on to tell the audience that “the problem was contradiction.” While he did “fight for artists”, he believed that the contradiction happened during the battle, and he ended up being “disrespectful to artists.”

But that was not all. The artist also tried to excuse his behavior by saying that he had seen “Justin Timberlake and Cee-Lo lose” and he thought that Timberlake “deserved to win Album of the Year.” While not a lot of people agreed with the rapper’s justifications, it was still seen as progress that he was accepting his past mistakes.

While the speech may have been long and a little hard to follow, the rapper tied it up pretty nicely at the end. Kanye went on to talk about the future, which is children. After talking about how millennials have “a new mentality”, the rapper left a shocker for his fans at the end, which was his announcement to run for president in 2020.

What do you think about Kanye West’s 11-minute-long 2015 VMA speech? Let us know what you think in the comments below.