Kanye Omari West was born in Atlanta, Georgia in June 1977, moving to Chicago with his mother when he was 3 after his parents divorced. While attending school, West produced for local artists, and he went on to take art classes at the American Academy of Art, and also enrolled at Chicago State University, but dropped out due to poor grades and a primary interest in developing his music career.

West's sound featured heavily on Jay-Z's album “The Blueprint”, released in September 2001, and became a major name in hip hop production, but struggled to find a way to get a record deal, with record companies not interested as he didn’t fulfil the ‘street image’ of a stereotypical hip hop artist. However, he found work as a producer – the first major label song he produced was Beanie Sigel’s “The Truth”, and the first major release featuring his trademark vocal sampling style was "This Can't Be Life," a track from Jay-Z's “The Dynasty: Roc La Familia” compilation.

In October 2002, West was involved in a near fatal car crash while driving home from the recording studio - this crash provided inspiration for his first single "Through the Wire". Debut album “The College Dropout”, released on Jay-Z's Roc-A-Fella Records in February 2004, featured guest appearances by Jay-Z himself, Ludacris, GLC, Consequence, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, Common, and Syleena Johnson, and was eventually certified triple platinum.

West released his second album, “Late Registration”, in August 2005, the first 2 singles being "Diamonds from Sierra Leone" (featuring vocals from Shirley Bassey's "Diamonds Are Forever") and "Gold Digger", featuring Jamie Foxx, (which contains an interpolation of Ray Charles's "I Got a Woman"). “Late Registration” sold over 860,000 copies in its first week, earned 8 Grammy Award nominations, including “Album of the Year” and “Best Rap Album” (which it won) and like it’s predecessor, was certified triple platinum.

July 2007 saw West change the release date of his third album “Graduation” by a week to the same date as 50 Cent's album “Curtis”. In response, 50 Cent's is alledged to have claimed that if “Graduation” were to sell more records than “Curtis”, he’d stop releasing solo albums, although these comments were later dispelled.”Graduation” has been certified double platinum.

West was nominated in 8 categories for the 50th annual Grammy Awards, winning 4 of them, including “Best Rap Album” (for “Graduation”) and “Best Rap Solo Performance” (for "Stronger", from “Graduation”). During the awards ceremony, West performed "Stronger" (with Daft Punk) and "Hey Mama" (in honor of his recently deceased mother).

In May 2008, Kanye West was crowned the year’s number 1 “Hottest MC in the Game” by MTV. The year also saw the release of 4th album, “808s & Heartbreak” which features the single “Love Lockdown", the first single by West not to include any rapping (instead it is sung using an auto-tune device).

West's mascot and trademark is "Dropout Bear," a teddy bear which has appeared on the covers of his first 3 albums as well as the singles "Stronger" and "Homecoming”. West runs his own record label, GOOD Music, and has produced hit singles for the likes of Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Janet Jackson, Talib Kweli, Brandy, Keyshia Cole, Twista, Cam'ron, Paul Wall, Common, Mobb Deep, Jermaine Dupri, Scarface, The Game, and John Legend.

In non musical ventures, August 2008 saw West reveal plans to open 10 Fatburger restaurants in the Chicago area, with the first coming in September 2008 in Orland Park (his company, KW Foods LLC, had bought the rights to the chain in Chicago). He also has plans to release his own clothing line called Pastelle.