With this month’s Donda listening event in Atlanta, Kanye West sold out the Mercedes-Benz Stadium and broke an Apple Music streaming record. Now, as has been whispered about for days now, a new report offers a bit more insight into a possible second edition of the listening event.
As fans already know thanks to meticulous photographic updates and Mike Dean-focused memes about productivity, West has essentially not left the stadium since the original Donda event. Of course, he’s been hard at work on finalizing the new album while—at least according to a new report from TMZ—simultaneously crafting ways to make the reported second event stand on its own.
Per the report, West and his team have locked down the date of Aug. 5 (the eve of Donda’s expected release) and are currently “brainstorming” on how to change up the aesthetic for attendees. The report also cited sources as claiming that both CAA and Live Nation had put “pressure” on West and his production company to “make the second Donda event different” to ensure another sellout.
As more involved fans will note, though a second Donda listening event in Atlanta has not yet been formally announced, there have been a number of developments pointing to exactly that in the days since round one.
Complex has reached out to reps for West and the Mercedes-Benz Stadium for comment.
While Donda was briefly considered to boast at least a small chance of arriving shortly after the first listening event, a new release date of Aug. 6 was later floated by friends and collaborators before ultimately being confirmed.
Among the takeaways from the original stripped-back listening event, which functioned as a piece of performance art in which a face-obscured West was on display for a crowd of tens of thousands as he invited them to witness a work in progress, was a Jay-Z collaboration that’s currently being referred to by fans as “Jail.”
Ahead of official word on the reported Donda event sequel, fans noticed on Friday that West had set his official Instagram account to private, which may or may not mean anything at all.
