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Kanye West spends weekend controversially promoting new album, forgets to release album

By | Published on Monday 1 October 2018

Kanye West

Kanye West spent the weekend doing whatever it is Kanye West is trying to do at the moment. And he did it a lot. He didn’t release his new album though, which is what all this random nonsense stuff was supposed to be promoting.

Here are some things that happened: He wore a ‘Make America Great Again’ hat a lot; he announced that he was changing his name to just Ye; he turned up at The Fader’s offices and went on and on and on about stuff; he appeared on ‘Saturday Night Live’; and he said that America should amend the Thirteenth Amendment in order to end slavery – the Thirteenth Amendment of the US Constitution being the one that abolished slavery.

It was the ‘SNL’ appearance that drew the most interest. West was apparently drafted in at the last minute as the musical guest for the first episode of the new series, after Ariana Grande was forced to pull out.

He took to the stage with that ‘MAGA’ hat again, although he did take it off for a performance of ‘I Love It’, in which he and Lil Pump bounced around the stage dressed as bottles of water:

At the end of the show, as the cast collected on stage for their final bow, West embarked on a pro-Trump rant, which continued after the programme had gone off air. He said that he had been “bullied” about wearing his ‘MAGA’ hat backstage, and that the liberal media stifles freedom of speech and expression. There were boos from members of the cast and the audience, although some sporadic clapping as well.

The rant drew praise from Donald Trump himself, who tweeted: “Like many, I don’t watch ‘Saturday Night Live’ (even though I past hosted it) – no longer funny, no talent or charm. It is just a political ad for the Dems. Word is that Kanye West, who put on a ‘MAGA’ hat after the show (despite being told ‘no’), was great. He’s leading the charge!”

Conversely, West drew criticism from Lana Del Rey, who responded to an Instagram post from the rapper. In that post he showed his hat and wrote: “This represents good and America becoming whole again. We will no longer outsource to other countries. We build factories here in America and create jobs. We will provide jobs for all who are free from prisons as we abolish the Thirteenth Amendment”.

In response, Del Rey wrote: “I can only assume you relate to [Trump’s] personality on some level. Delusions of grandeur, extreme issues with narcissism – none of which would be a talking point if we weren’t speaking about the man leading our country. If you think it’s alright to support someone who believes it’s OK to grab a woman by the pussy just because he’s famous, then you need an intervention as much as he does – something so many narcissists will never get because there just isn’t enough help for the issue”.

So that was all a thing. But at least we get a new Kanye West album out of all this. Except we haven’t yet. Because despite announcing earlier this month that he would release new album, ‘Yandhi’, on Saturday, and then confirming it again last week, no such record has been released. I guess when you have a really busy weekend, it’s easy to forget one or two details. That does seem like quite a big one to forget though.

Unless, of course, West is subverting the album format and his actions over the weekend are the new album. I mean, it sounds nonsensical, but it also sounds like something Kanye West would definitely do.



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