Kanye West took to his twitter today to riff on the news that his proposed album art for his forthcoming My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy has been banned. "Banned in the USA!!!", West wrote. "They don't want me chilling on the couch with my phoenix!"

The image of a reclining, demon-faced West, holding a booze bottle and apparently having sex with a winged female, evokes the dark emotions West has been vocal about battling since his infamous and very public fall from grace at the 2009 VMA Awards. It's not quite clear who "they" is in the piece here, but in a series of related tweets he does mention Wal-Mart at one point. And as you can see from the banned art posted by West, it quite clearly does show the rapper chilling on the couch with his phoenix.



West followed up the post with a series of related tweets on the banning, saying that he still wants to sell albums but not at the expense of his "true creativity":

In the 70s album covers had actual nudity... It's so funny that people forget that... Everything has been so commercialized now. I know that cover just blew yall minds ... I wish yall could see how hard I'm smiling right now!!! In all honesty ... I really don't be thinking about Wal-Mart when I make my music or album covers #Kanyeshrug! I wanna sell albums but not at the expense of my true creativity.

And: So Nirvana can have a naked human being on they cover but I can't have a PAINTING of a monster with no arms and a polka dot tail and wings

This isn't the first contested image from the rapper in the past week. West was copping heat over the weekend regarding the nude-ish cover for his most recent Good Friday MP3 download 'Take One For The Team'. The cover, which shows a female nude on a bed toting a gun, moved some of his twitter followers to respond accordingly. "That album cover is disgusting" wrote one. "Let the man chill with his phoenix", replied the internet.



West's highly anticipated album is due before the end of the year.