In news that should surprise no one: Kanye West finally dropped his long-lost Donda 2 album on streaming platforms Wednesday—and then it was pulled down almost immediately. Because of course it was.
The album originally came out in 2022 (kind of?) but only through Ye’s own weird little gadget, the Stem Player. Fast forward to today, and Donda 2 briefly showed up on Spotify, Tidal, and YouTube Music. Blink and you missed it.
So what happened? Legal drama. Shocker.
According to a post from Ye himself, the album got taken down after DeAndre “Free” Maiden—who manages producers Boogz Da Beast and AllDay—hit him with a takedown threat. Apparently, Ye never paid these guys for their work… going on three years now.
And it’s not like they did one track and dipped—these producers made eight out of the 18 songs on the album. In a screenshot Ye shared, Free flat-out said, “We did not & do not consent to the usage of our work for Donda 2 or ANY Ye project!” and added that lawyers were already handling it. Less than an hour later, poof—album gone.
Kanye’s response? He claimed Free tried to hit him with a $3 million bill for beats from producers Ye says he taught how to make beats in the first place. He wrapped it up with a classic passive-aggressive “Managers 🤷♂️.”
Honestly, between the half-baked release, unpaid collaborators, and Ye’s endless beefs, this whole thing feels exactly like what we’ve come to expect from a Kanye rollout. Chaos, drama, and then… silence.
At this point, Donda 2 is starting to feel more like a cursed artifact than an actual album. Stream it if you can find it—but don’t hold your breath.
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