Listen to the original demo for Kanye West's 'New Slaves'

Here’s the backstory on the Yeezus highlight.

In the fall of 2012, Kanye West reached out to producers for beats for the album that would become Yeezus. On his list was New York multi-hyphenate Benjamin Bronfman, who first connected with West when his Teachers collective contributed to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy‘s ‘Monster’ in 2010.

“He kept saying, ‘Just make it hot, make it really dope,'” says Bronfman. “He didn’t really get into specifics, which is funny – he’s the type of person who will get really specific in person, but not on the phone.”

Bronfman sent a handful of beats to the rapper, including a skeletal track entitled ‘Cruel Cold Winter’ that would form the basis of ‘New Slaves’.

While slower and less intense, you can certainly hear elements of ‘New Slaves’ in the track. The title and vocals were a riff on Cruel Summer; Kanye was thought to be working on a sequel to the G.O.O.D. Music LP at the time. Stream ‘Cruel Cold Winter’ below via Rolling Stone.

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