Kanye West – DONDA 2 Album

DONDA2 stands as the official sequel to Kanye West’s tenth studio album, Donda, which was released in August 2021. This album marks West’s first independent release, following his self-announced departure from Def Jam.

Speculation about the album’s existence commenced on 3rd January 2022, when Steven Victor reportedly announced that Ye was working on the project.

On 27th January 2022, Kanye officially revealed that the album would be released on 22nd February and that Future would serve as executive producer.

It subsequently emerged on 7th February 2022 that Ye had organised a private album listening gathering in Los Angeles at Nobu, attended by prominent artists such as Drake, Travis Scott, and Yung Lean.

On 12th February 2022, Ye utilised Instagram to exclude Kid Cudi from featuring on the album due to his friendship with Pete Davidson, Kim Kardashian’s boyfriend. Later that day, Ye announced a listening event for the album at LoanDepot Park stadium in Miami.

On 17th February 2022, Ye declared on Instagram that the album would not be available on major streaming platforms, but would instead be exclusively released on the Stem Player platform, a music device Ye had created in partnership with KANO. The deluxe version of Donda was temporarily exclusive to this device before being released on major platforms.

The following day, Ye posted the first official tracklist comprising 22 songs, with a caption quoting his lyrics from 2007’s “Good Life“: “Like we always do at this time.” Subsequently, he posted a second tracklist that included “City of Gods” as the final track.

On 22nd February, Ye hosted the DONDA LIVE EXPERIENCE in Miami. The first half of the show featured most tracks confirmed for the album, with contributions from Jack Harlow, Migos, Soulja Boy, and the late XXXTentacion. However, half the previewed tracks sounded noticeably unfinished with mumbled verses, and some songs from the tracklist weren’t performed.

On 23rd February, only four tracks from the album were released on Ye’s Stem Player: “Security,” “Pablo,” “Broken Road,” and “We Did It Kid.”