Because of his current flirtation with Nazism and a string of different outrageous conduct, Kanye West isn’t welcome in lots of locations lately. Final 12 months, he publicly complained about being blackballed by US venues, and he’s reportedly confronted related challenges overseas — a music competition in Slovakia just lately canceled his look after hundreds signed a petition demanding his removing. In reality, since 2023, the one international locations the place West has managed to stage dwell occasions are South Korea and China.
On Saturday, he returned to China for what was billed as his first full-length live performance in almost a 12 months. However in response to native media studies, many attendees on the 70,000-capacity Shanghai Stadium have been left confused and annoyed by West’s antics. Per The World Occasions, West took the stage greater than 40 minutes late—a delay that probably didn’t sit effectively with many attendees, as punctuality is very essential in Chinese language tradition and late begins are sometimes considered as an indication of disrespect. The stage design featured minimal manufacturing and lighting, with the rapper performing alone in the course of an enormous oval. It was additionally raining on the time, which impacted the sound high quality on the outside venue.
Because the evening went on, West appeared to expertise points with the DJ, inflicting him to skip and restart a number of songs. He repeatedly walked on and off the stage, finally disappearing altogether close to the top of the present—leaving solely the backing monitor to play in his absence. On the plus facet, he did seem to self-censor his most anti-Semitic lyrics.
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Some followers in attendance — who paid upwards of $400USD for tickets — finally bored with West’s antics and commenced chanting for a refund. The present additionally turned a trending subject on Chinese language social media, with one person saying that they had “by no means seen such a poorly organized live performance.”
Shanghai shoppers DO NOT PLAY.
Huge crowd was shouting REFUND after Ye was late 40 minutes to his live performance. https://t.co/vK75CurL0O pic.twitter.com/7ZFt3ynuv2
— 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐖𝐓𝐘𝐌𝐄 🇨🇳🇺🇸⚜️ (@DetroitShowtyme) July 12, 2025
Ye, Kanye West carried out “Flashing Lights” in Shanghai, China yesterday🔥 pic.twitter.com/IK8gitp9er
— Gregor Estevan (@gregor_estevan) July 13, 2025