James Blake has asked for his name to be removed from the production credits of This One Here, the closing track from Bully, Kanye West's long-delayed new album released Saturday March 28.
While it'd be reasonable to expect that Blake might be distancing himself from West due to the artist's anti-semitic behaviour – West has previously released a song called Heil Hitler and sold swastika T-shirts in his merch store – Blake has stated that it's "not personal".
Writing in a message to fans shared on the direct-to-fan streaming platform Vault, Blake said that his original version of This One Here was "a completely different production in spirit" to the final track that appeared on Bully. The song's credits also include Don Toliver, Quentin Miller and West as co-writers.
Article continues below"The way I pitched his vocals and constructed the track from his freestyle is partially there, majorly peppered with other newer vocal takes, but the spirit of my actual production is mostly absent other than that," Blake said.
"Happy for the fans but I've asked to be taken off the producer credits for now as I don't want to take credit for other people's work and this version isn't what I created with Ye.
"It's not personal," Blake continued. "I just hit a point where I don't want to be credited on music where I can't affect the end result."
West's twelfth solo album, Bully was announced in September 2024, with an initial release date planned for June 2025. Guests on the album include Travis Scott, Don Toliver and CeeLo Green, and a number of producers worked on the project, including Blake, Andre Troutman, 88-Keys and Jahaan Sweet.
In January, West took out a full-page advert in the Wall Street Journal apologizing for his anti-semitic remarks and blaming his actions on his bipolar disorder, a condition he says was brought on as a result of injuries sustained in a car crash in 2002. "I am not a Nazi or an antisemite", he wrote. "I love Jewish people".
“One of the difficult aspects of having bipolar type-1 are the disconnected moments – many of which I still cannot recall – that led to poor judgment and reckless behavior that oftentimes feels like an out-of-body-experience. I regret and am deeply mortified by my actions in that state, and am committed to accountability, treatment, and meaningful change.”
James Blake released his seventh studio album, Trying Times, on 13 March.
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