Kanye West is Ye
These music stars also changed their names
Ye, formerly known as Kanye West
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Kanye West is now officially called Ye – but he is far from the first musician to change his name. Other examples and their reasons.
Kanye West becomes Ye (44): The musician has officially changed his name for “personal reasons”. This name, which is certainly not by chance reminiscent of the English pronunciation of Jesus, does not come as a complete surprise. His self-chosen nickname has long consisted of the last two letters of his previous first name, and his eighth studio album was also titled “Ye”.
So far, so clear. But Ye is far from the first musician to have decided to start over by name.
Prince and the unspeakable symbol
The most famous example of this is arguably Prince (1958-2016). He had his breakthrough in the eighties under the name Prince, but changed his name to a symbol after a dispute with his label. Since this could not be spoken or written, he was now called “The Artist Formerly Known As Prince” by the media. After his contract with the label ended, he went back to his old name in 1999.
Snoop and his doggys
A real name chameleon is Snoop Dogg (49). He started his career as Snoop Doggy Dogg, then renamed himself Snoop Dogg, but always had other nicknames such as Bigg Snoop Dogg or Dogg Father. The doggy variations were broken in 2009 when he chose a brand new name as a producer: Niggarachi. Three years later he changed his stage name to Snoop Lion and then, as a sign of a musical reorientation, to Snoopzilla. Nonetheless, he still releases albums as Snoop Dogg, most recently in spring 2021.
When the name is gold
Not all artists give up their names willingly. Santigold (45), for example, an American artist, was known under the name Santogold until 2009 – but lost the dispute with a jeweler and filmmaker named Santo Gold in court. After all, the press release was funny to read: “Change the graffiti on the bathroom wall, get your tattoo touched up, airbrush your T-shirt and change the name on the year-end lists: Santogold is now Santigold.”
FKA always works
FKA Twigs (33), musician, dancer and ex-girlfriend of Robert Pattinson (35), did not expect name competition when she called herself Twigs (“twigs”) because of her cracking joints. When it came out that there was already a band called “The Twigs”, they made the Prince: The “FKA” in FKA Twigs probably stands for “Formerly Know As”.
Not every spelling prevails
JAY-Z (51) tried to make his name change as straightforward as possible. He first came to be known as Jay-Z, but deleted the hyphen from his name in 2013. However, it has been back since 2017, and the rapper, producer and husband of Beyoncé (40) has insisted on capital letters since then. Theoretically. Because that has not really caught on when you see an article or his English Wikipedia entry …
Religious awakening
One might get the idea that only rappers change their names in view of their egos or musicians in view of the likelihood of confusion. But then there is the transformation of the British folk musician Yusuf Islams. Born Steven Demetre Georgiou, the musician began his career in the 1960s as Cat Stevens. After a near-death experience, he converted to Islam in the 1970s, dropped his stage name and changed his real name to Yusuf Islam (73).