According to a Kanye interview in W magazine, the song was inspired by a serious diss from a major fashion designer (Hedi Slimane). A few days before Paris Fashion Week in Autumn 2012, West was informed that he’d be invited to a widely anticipated runway show only on the condition that he agree not to attend any other shows. “So the next day I went to the studio with Daft Punk, and I wrote ‘I Am a God,’ ” West says. “Cause it’s like, Yo! Nobody can tell me where I can and can’t go. Man, I’m the No. 1 living and breathing rock star. I am Axl Rose; I am Jim Morrison; I am Jimi Hendrix.”

“You can’t say that you love music and then say that Kanye West can’t come to your show! To even think they could tell me where I could and couldn’t go is just ludicrous. It’s blasphemous—to rock ’n’ roll, and to music.”

First played live at the Met Gala in New York on May 6th, and then again at the Governers Ball on June 9th.

Rick Rubin (Johnny Cash, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Beastie Boys) served as the executive producer of Yeezus. The pair worked on minimalizing some of the album’s excesses, rerecording vocals and sometimes writing entire new verses. Prior to the record’s release, West updated his official website to feature a short video clip of him recording this song while Rubin lays back on a chair and responds to Yeezy’s query as to whether he should be stacking ‘billions’ or ‘millions.’ The fuzzy-bearded producing legend responds “millions”, adding, “To me it’s more relatable. More for the people."West told guests at the album’s playback:

“It was good for me to go to the god, Rick Rubin, and play him my s–t, ask him questions, and allow him to take this project to an entirely new level, and he made a lot of great decisions at the end and pulled it to a whole new level.”