Kanye West compares self to Hitler, Michael Jordan

Some people collect stamps. Some people collect, I don't know, coins or small bits of rock or candles or whatever. Me, though, I collect crazy Kanye West quotes. And I've got a gem for my collection: at the Big Chill music festival in England Saturday night, 'Ye compared himself to Hitler and Michael Jordan, though woefully not in the same sentence.

"I walk through the hotel and I walk down the street and people look at me like I'm [expletive] insane, like I'm Hitler... One day the light will shine through and one day people will understand everything I ever did."

So West is feeling a bit persecuted, I guess. But outsize historical comparisons, aside, what of his contributions to music?

"Michael Jordan changed so much in basketball, he took his power to make a difference. It's so much [expletive] going on in music right now and somebody has to make a [expletive] difference."

Look, I'm neither Kanye's biggest fan nor his most outspoken hater. I think his beats are great, his rhymes are okay, and his singing, Auto-Tuned to hell and back or not, is terrible. But I think he's a fascinating case of celebrity pathos — here's someone that, despite having a fair share of detractors, has succeeded at nearly everything he's set out to do, which is astounding, considering the breadth of his aspirations.

Yet, for some reason, he still feels like Hitler. And Michael Jordan. All at once.  If that's not worth some heavy psychoanalyzing, I don't know what is.