Kanye West album goes platinum through streams alone

King Kanye has done it again. His most recent album, The Life of Pablo, just went platinum, thanks to more than 1.5 billion song streams in the United States.

While it is impressive when artists go platinum by selling 1 million albums, it’s not entirely unheard of among popular artists. What makes West’s accomplishment so special is that it happened not through album sales or paid downloads, but entirely through streams Unblocked Games Mills Eagles.

Last year, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) updated their guidelines to include streaming numbers in an artist’s certified status. As TechCrunch explains it, now “150 streams of a song would equal one song download, and 10 song downloads would equal one album download” and due to this, “an artist’s songs would have to be streamed 1,500 times for it to be counted as an album sale.”

Typically, albums don’t have to be streamed 1.5 billion times to make up 1 million in sales, as sales and streams are combined to hit the total. But in the case of Life of Pablo, West never actually made his album available for sale through iTunes or similar platforms, and instead released it on Tidal, before expanding to other streaming services like Spotify.

Physical sales of the album, which he did release on his personal website, were not counted toward the total. (sul/kes)

Here is the cover art for Kanye West's new album, The Life of Pablo

With less than an hour to go before Kanye West unveils his new album, The Life of Pablo at the world's biggest listening party begins, he's finally given the world our first look at the album artwork. Designed (typed?) by the Belgian artist Peter De Potter, the post-modern cover features The Life of Pablo in all caps and featuring a small family photo in the bottom corner. Much will be made about the cover, but regardless of how it looks, the only thing that truly matters about The Life of Pablo is how it sounds. And we'll find that out soon enough.

MSG Concert Page Disappears ... FANS PANIC!

Kanye West fans are going nuts -- the pre-sale ticket page for his "Waves" album release show mysteriously vanished Wednesday morning, but remain calm. It's gonna be okay.
American Express pre-sale tickets were scheduled to go on sale at 10 AM EST for the February 11 show, but Ticketmaster's site is showing a message saying the event no longer exists.
A source close to Kanye tells TMZ the event is still 100% on -- but it's still unclear what the issues are with Ticketmaster and the pre-sale. Tickets are also supposed to be sold at MSG on Thursday and to the general public on Friday ... but we'll see.
We've reached out to Ticketmaster and American Express ... so far, no word back.
Bottom line: Concert's happening ... but ticket sales seem up in the air.

'I am your OG and I will be respected': Kanye West and Wiz Khalifa face off

Rappers trade barbs on Twitter about music, ‘tight jeans’ and Amber Rose after Khalifa accuses West of stealing the title of his forthcoming album Waves

Kanye West: ‘all I want is peace and positive energy’. Photograph: Getty/Rex Features

Twitter, which has brought the public some of its most beloved public arguments – including Taylor Swift v Nicki Minaj and BoB v Neil deGrasse Tyson – has played host to another great face-off: Kanye West and fellow rapper Wiz Khalifa.

When West announced that his upcoming album would be titled Waves rather than Swish, Khalifa claimed he’d stolen the name from Harlem rap artist Max B. “Please don’t take the wave,” he tweeted.

After various tweets about Max B and waves, Khalifa added: “Hit this kk and become yourself.”

West didn’t handle seeing the initials of his wife, Kim Kardashian, in the tweet well. He proceeded to post a plethora of responses lashing out at Khalifa. “Your first single was corny as fuck and most there after,” he tweeted.

Khalifa explained: “KK is weed fool. Reason’s why your not wavy. Go bacc to Swish.”

But West continued. He has since deleted his Twitter rampage.
Photograph: Twitter

He moved on from insulting Khalifa’s music to attacking his family. “You let a stripper trap you,” West tweeted, referring to Khalifa’s ex-wife and West’s ex-girlfriend Amber Rose. He later made reference to Khalifa’s son with Rose: “I know you mad every time you look at your child that this girl got you for 18 years.”

West continued to mix insults and self-praise for a while.
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Photograph: Twitter
Kanye West tweets. Photograph: Twitter

He did throw in the occasional compliment, stating he thought Khalifa dressed cool, adding: “I wish I was skinny and tall.” But West quickly turned his compliment around in his next tweet, with the characteristic thought: “Maybe I couldn’t be skinny and tall but I’ll settle for being the greatest artist of all time as a consolation.”

West ended his Twitter rant with a thank you for the extra promotion for Waves. He explained that he loved the world and “all I want is peace and positive energy”. His final tweet, aimed at Khalifa, apologized for the earlier confusion.

Kanye West changes album name to 'Waves,' will premiere new album with Madison Square Garden performance

m release fit for a self-proclaimed god.
Rapper Kanye West will debut his highly anticipated new album, "Waves," with a live performance at Madison Square Garden on Feb. 11.
The concert event is being billed as the "world premiere of the album" on the Garden's website, and theaters across the globe are set to stream the performance for those who can't make it to the World's Most Famous Arena.

Taylor Hill/FilmMagic

The "Waves" debut concert will also be streamed at theaters around the world.

West is also expected to present his YEEZY SEASON 3 fashion line at the show, which will include an appearance from Italian contemporary artist Vanessa Beecroft as well.
After announcing his Madison Square Garden debut, the rapper made a last-minute change Tuesday night to the album's previous name, "Swish."

It's the third name change from West, who in March initially dubbed the album "So Help Me God."
Presale tickets will be available on Ticketmaster on Wednesday at 10 a.m. ET. They go on sale to the general public on Friday at 10 a.m. ET.
Fans have long been clamoring for the release of "Waves" — which will serve as the follow-up to West's critically acclaimed 2013 album, "Yeezus."
The 38-year-old rapper announced on Monday that he had finally finished the then-titled "Swish" after working on it for more than a year — and he also shared a first look at its official 10-song track listing.
Also on Tuesday night, the rapper shared an image of a notepad, which listed an additional track titled "Ultra Light Beams."

"So happy to be finished with the best album of all time," he shamelessly tweeted Monday.
He continued the high praise on Tuesday when he said the album should be considered much more than the best album of 2016.
"This is not album of the year," he wrote. "This is album of the life."
The new album features several songs already released by West, including "Wolves," "Real Friends," and his head-bobbing compilation with Kendrick Lamar, "No More Parties in L.A."

Somewhat surprisingly, however, neither of his recent collaborations with Beatles icon Paul McCartney were included on the album, nor was his mega-popular 2015 hit, "All Day."
It's possible several more tracks will surface before the long-awaited release of "Waves,” as his wife Kim Kardashian teased earlier this month that he'd put out a new song from the album every Friday until the premiere.

Bruce Bennett/Getty Images

Tickets for West’s concert event at Madison Square Garden (above) go on sale to the general public on Friday.

He held true to the promise on Jan. 8 when he released "Real Friends," but was three days late in dropping "No More Parties in L.A." and hasn't released another song since.
"Waves" will be West's seventh solo studio album.
In response to West's latest announcement, the rock band Wavves teased they would name their next album "Kanye."

Kanye West announces 2020 run for US president at VMAs

Kanye West said that he is running for president in 2020 during his acceptance speech for the MTV Music Video Award’s lifetime achievement honor.

West made the announcement at the end of a 10-minute speech where he discussed visiting the grocery store with his daughter and admitted that he does not understand awards shows.

“And yes, as you probably could’ve guessed in this moment, I’ve decided in 2020 to run for president,” West said, before walking off stage.

West famously stormed the stage at the 2009 awards to protest Taylor Swift’s win for best female video. Swift presented the Video Vanguard award to West on Sunday night and stood next to his wife Kim Kardashian during the speech.

After accepting the award on stage, West stood silently for several minutes under a spotlight while the crowd cheered for him. “Bro, bro, listen to the kids,” West began.

In his speech, West rehashed the controversy in 2009, when he took Swift’s award. He said that it is something he thinks about in the grocery store with his daughter and when a crowd of 60,000 people boo him at a baseball game.

“I think if I had to do it all again, what would I have done?” Kanye said. “Would I have worn a leather shirt? Would I have drank a half a bottle of Hennessy and given the rest to the crowd?”

He then asked if he would do it if he had had a daughter at the time, as he does now, would he have taken the award from Swift. At no point in the speech did he give a clear answer to those four questions.

Six years later, West said it does not make sense to him why “five artists” are given the opportunity to attend awards ceremonies where they can lose. “I still don’t understand awards shows,” West said.

West also acknowledged that his comments might make the audience wonder about whether he was intoxicated.

“‘Did you smoke something before coming out here?’” West said. “The answer is yes, I rolled up a little something to knock the edge off.”

Shortly after, he announced his run for president.

Kanye West Labeled Captain Planet by CyHi Da Prynce

Speaking to the Mixtape Daily, the up-and-coming MC said that Kanye West is their ‘Captain Planet’ as he possesses all the individual qualities that are the specialties of his protégés.

You all know Captain Planet and his band of merry tree huggers out to save the planet from pollution. Prynce described himself as heart, Big Sean as water, Teyana Taylor as Wind, Pusha T as fire, and saved the best character for their leader and mentor Kanye, who he thinks is a combination of special talents.

Does this means that Mr. Hudson is Earth? Captain Planet had five elements, last time we checked.

Anyways, credit should be given where it’s due and there is little doubt that Yeezy has done a wonderful job in promoting his minions to the mainstream media.

The “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” singer is fresh out of making the crowd crazy with his music at the Texas-held South by Southwest music festival, where most of his crew supported him on stage including, Pusha T and Prynce, in addition to the other big of the music industry, Jay-Z.

Following the show, Prynce commented that the best thing about Kanye is his friendliness and the straight up honesty, something which makes him different from all the major music personalities nowadays.

CyHi said that he wishes the media and the masses would see that side of Kanye and know him better, as it is about time that the misconceptions regarding Kanye are removed.

He compared the situation to people saying things behind someone’s back and then becoming very careful with what they say to the person. CyHi thinks that this element of the society, of passing inaccurate judgment about one another, is wrong and needs to be stopped.

Instead, Prynce thinks that people should make a better use of honesty, as its absence lets matters get out of control and reach a point where everything gets crazy.

He reiterated that the much-maligned West is as honest as they come these days, and that is what he admires about him.

When the quality of his work in the studios is not as high as usual, Prynce said that instead of sugar-coating his comments to soften the blow, Kanye would let him know straight up, so that he can gauge himself, make improvements and come back strongly, with more quality.

He said that in return, he always takes Kanye’s criticism as positive, considering the level of success and experience that Kanye has.