Yeezy is a huge Will Ferrell fan and has gone so far as to compare himself to Ron Burgundy. His lyrics often contain references to Ferrell’s other movies. He has also been known to reference co-star Jon Heder’s previous work.

Ferrell himself was “completely flattered” by the homage and even gave Kanye a cameo as MTV News Reporter Wesley Jackson in Anchorman 2.

A hook that sums up many of the concerns of the album on its penultimate song. The two first couples of the civil rights movement (and of black America as a whole), Martin Luther King, Jr. and his wife Coretta Scott King; and Malcolm X and his wife Betty Shabazz are set up as icons. Jay and Kanye position themselves here as inheritors of their legacy, and also thank them for establishing the groundwork that allowed the two rappers to become the new black elite.

Additionally, these heroes are given just as much thanks for our protagonists' success as Jesus' mother and father, as well as Christ Himself.

As a final note, notice the titles used for the two civil rights leaders. While “King Martin” is an obvious pun on his name, “Brother Malcolm” is the usual way of addressing fellow members of the Nation of Islam (and his later splinter groups).

Grandma’s banana pudding would still be getting shout-outs a decade later

Jay, Bey, & Jay’s Grandma Hattie White at a Yankee game

A double meaning to end the song – “truly yours” could be a final goodbye, as in a letter. Or it could also mean that black excellence could be “truly yours” – as in, it could be something the listener could, and should be a part of. This effort at including and celebrating the listener as opposed to Kanye himself is a notable departure from his usual practice.

Yeezy gets the blues due to the widespread media bias that portrays black folks as perpetrators or victims of crime.

Blues could also refer to the Crips in Chi-town. It’s depressing for Kanye to see all the gang warfare occurring in his hometown. This is very similar to a line Kanye spits on “Gorgeous”.

Kanye wonders if black-on-black crime (and society’s complicity in it) can be likened to a genocide, which is technically defined as “the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group”.

The historian Ward Churchill reminds us that genocide, by its legal definition, has existed in America since its first settlement by whites – that is, genocide against the native population. See here for a brief list of historical genocides, including mention of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

Surely the oppression of blacks in America since the 1600s both institutionally, psychologically, and physically (incidental) is a form of genocide.