On July 18, 2020, Kanye followed up JafaвЂ™s leak by tweeting, then deleting, a track list for the album, with its title changed to Donda, along with a release date for the album set just six days hence, on July 24. News broke of the albumвЂ™s existence a few months later, when cinematographer Arthur Jafa leaked the info during a radio interview. Initial recording for Donda - the follow-up album to 2019вЂ™s Jesus Is King - reportedly commenced in Mexico in March of 2020, at which point Kanye was apparently planning to title the album GodвЂ™s Country. Donda, like its creator, spent most of the last two years in flux With Kanye veering between politics, spirituality, and the music career that made him a legend, Donda has had a long, wild road to creation - and its public and critical reception are proving to be just as unpredictable. Still, it can provide insight into KanyeвЂ™s continued popularity, despite his spending an erratic few years making headlines for everything but his music. With the album, its rollout, and Kanye himself all in such a state of upheaval, Donda may be less an album and more of a seminal pop culture event. Meanwhile, Kanye himself has lashed out at his record label, Universal Music, in an Instagram post claiming the studio put out the album without his permission and even blocked one track, вЂњJail pt 2,вЂќ from the initial release. ThatвЂ™s because Donda seems to be generating more and more buzz as the days pass, as wildly polarized reviews have rolled in from critics, who say the album is disjointed and thematically incoherent, and fans who say itвЂ™s beautiful and a collaborative powerhouse. But even if DrakeвЂ™s Friday release eclipses KanyeвЂ™s, it likely wonвЂ™t top Donda for sheer intrigue. How those two giants wound up going head to head with back-to-back album releases is an additional part of DondaвЂ™s mystique. The album is already on track to score the biggest debut of 2021, although DrakeвЂ™s forthcoming album Certified Lover Boy, due out on September 3, might immediately challenge KanyeвЂ™s sales title. When it was finally released early in the morning on August 29, Donda smashed first-day streaming records and claimed the second-biggest Spotify album debut in history, racking up 94 million and 60 million streams on Spotify and Apple Music respectively. (The listening parties quickly became a form of elite cultural currency, with fans who attended treating each concert like a bougie Met Gala you can reportedly buy air from the concerts if you have $60,000 or so.) A string of pre-release listening parties saw thousands of listeners flocking to stadiums in Atlanta and Chicago for dramatic previews of the album. The release delays after an initial July 23 drop date helped give Donda one of the most drawn-out and lucrative hype cycles for a release in recent memory. Reportedly in production for the last 18 months, Donda has had a rocky road to release, as delay upon delay befell the albumвЂ™s production and Kanye wrestled with a high-profile divorce, mental health battles, and clashes with his album collaborators. These arenвЂ™t the typical questions you associate with an album release, but Kanye West isnвЂ™t a typical artist, and his new 27-track album, Donda (named after KanyeвЂ™s late mother Donda West), isnвЂ™t a typical album. Written By 40, R.So whatвЂ™s the deal with Donda? Did Kanye WestвЂ™s label really release it without his permission? Did Kanye really light himself on fire over it? What about the TikTok panic that he inducted the huge audiences at his listening parties into some dark occult ritual? Recording Engineers: Noah Goldstein, 40, Harley Arsenault, & Noel CadastreДЄssistant Recording Engineer: William Sullivan Produced by 40, Noah Goldstein, & Kanye West Sakiya Sandifer, Gabriel GarzГіn Montano, Noah Goldstein, Carlo Montagnese, Maurice White, 40, Kenza Samir, Majid Al Maskati, Jordan Ullman, Malik Yusef, Drake, & Kanye West Written by Ilsey Juber, Anthony Jeffries, Philip Bailey, J. Written by Jazzfeezy, Steve Samson & Drake Recording Engineers: Carl 'Dennis' Willets, Dirty Saj, & Noel CadastreДЄssistant Recording Engineer: Gregg Moffett Written by Cameron Pasquale, Giggs, & Drake Written by Fred Jerkins III, Jennifer Lopez, Cory Rooney, LaShawn Daniels, Rodney Jerkins, Marvin Thomas, & Drake Recording Engineers: Charles вЂњBricksвЂќ Driggers, Nolan Presley, & Noel Cadastre 2 Chainz & Young ThugДЄdditional Production: Edgar Nabeyin Panford Recording Engineers: Quavo, Travis Scott, & Noel CadastreДЎ2. Recording Engineers: Harley Arsenault & Noel CadastreДЎ1.

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