Kanye’s Donda Should Be Apple’s ‘One More Thing’ This Fall

Artists have all the time needed to hype their work. Actors, administrators, musicians, authors—everybody goes on press junkets to hawk their newest challenge. Some artists have perfected media stunts to drum up buzz in such an suave method that it nearly eclipses the work itself. (See: Lil Nas X’s complete profession, however particularly his knock-off demon Nikes.) And then there may be Kanye West.

I’m not right here to defend Kanye West. I do know full nicely that by remaining a Kanye fan, I’ve consented to his unending rollercoaster of trolling and tomfoolery. I’ve agreed to color my face with clown make-up as we now enter the fourth week since he blew previous the July 23, 2021 launch date for his tenth album Donda. (Which is definitely nearly a 12 months after his preliminary July 24, 2020 launch date.) And but, his Donda shenanigans illustrate the pitfalls of content material launches within the streaming period.

The album was first teased in March 2020, when Pusha T hinted a brand new Kanye album was within the works. Another trace got here in a Wall Street Journal function. That was adopted by extra breadcrumbs, culminating in a supposed July 2020 launch date. July got here and went, although Kanye continued to drop snippets of songs, tracklists, and even album art work. And then, you understand, he ran for president.

Rumors began up once more in March this 12 months, with the primary shock listening social gathering occurring on July 18. Then Kanye introduced Apple into the entire rattling factor, with a live-streamed listening social gathering from the Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Apple Music for July 22. The reside stream was chaos, with a silent Kanye showing in an Akira-inspired outfit, two hours late. Needless to say, an album didn’t materialize on Apple Music. Then on August 5, Apple dropped a second Beats by Dre industrial starring Sha’Carri Richardson that featured a snippet of a supposed Donda track for an August 6 launch date. It additionally listed a second Apple Music reside stream, this time from Kanye’s bunker within the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. (You see, he’d by no means left the stadium after the primary listening social gathering.) Again, the album didn’t seem. And now, Kanye has introduced one more listening social gathering in Chicago on August 26. If you google what the discharge date is now, it’s a cryptic August 2021. Sure.

This isn’t the primary time Kanye’s delayed an album. But is it a coincidence that these kind of hijinks have solely worsened within the streaming period? Probably not.

With streaming has come unprecedented entry. All you must do is pay a subscription and you’ll hearken to hundreds of thousands of songs ad-free. There’s no extra searching within the discount bin of Tower Records, burning CDs, or debating which CDs are value truly paying retail worth. For higher or worse, you don’t even must curate a set anymore. You can simply seek for it. But whereas streaming has been massively handy for the plenty, artists have lengthy argued it’s a nasty deal. One of essentially the most well-known examples is when Taylor Swift penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal opposing free music companies, and adopted it up a couple of months later by pulling her entire catalog from Spotify.

It was a pleasant attempt, however in the end meaningless. We’re all on streaming companies now, there’s no getting round it. Swift returned to Spotify in 2018, after Spotify CEO Daniel Ek mentioned he traveled to Nashville “many, many times” to persuade Swift “why streaming mattered.” He received. But that additionally means artists have needed to get inventive to remain related in an period the place you could possibly hearken to something you need at any time. Hence—the dumb shit. Kanye’s Donda launch is likely to be essentially the most ridiculous, nevertheless it’s not as if he’s alone right here. The previous decade has been plagued by stunt-y album launches, starting from Beyonce’s self-titled album in 2013 to Frank Ocean’s Blonde. I imply, Lorde is promoting Solar Power as a discless box, which is successfully a obtain code and a few fairly postcards.

You’d suppose Apple could be pissed about Kanye however truly, the longer he delays, the higher it’s for them. Apple will get folks flocking to its reside streams. It blocks you from taking screenshots, so you must go discover mirrors on YouTube or scour Twitter for reside updates if you wish to be a part of the second. You can ignore it and keep a shred of sanity—or you’ll be able to crack Don Cheadle jokes with the remainder of us. You can’t watch it later as a result of then, you would possibly miss out on the modifications from one listening social gathering to the following. You would possibly simply decide to subscribe to keep away from the trouble of all of it. Every time Kanye doesn’t ship, it’s simply one other unique win for Apple Music.

The most monetizable ending to that is for Kanye to drop Donda because the ‘one more thing’ shock throughout September’s iPhone 13 occasion. Apple trotted out Lana del Rey, one other problematic singer, for its 2018 event to debut her extremely OK track “How to Disappear.” Considering the Beats by Dre advertising and Apple Music unique reside streams, certainly that is the one logical conclusion to essentially the most ridiculous of Kanye launches in latest reminiscence. And then, when Tim Cook indicators off, perhaps we’ll all look on our iPhones to search out Donda’s already been downloaded, very similar to that one U2 album that no one asked for.

Donda is simply the most recent in our collective habit to seemingly unique moments that dissolve into the ether—solely to later be cobbled collectively right into a patchwork web historical past of comparable occasions all of us overlook about two days later. By the time Donda arrives, the music won’t even be essentially the most memorable factor about it. If all you need is to hearken to the music, the pageantry is annoying, puerile, and infuriating. And but, right here I’m, always refreshing Apple Music, ready for Donda to drop.