More than a year after the album was first announced, Kanye West finally released Donda to the world on Sunday morning. The project made its way to DSPs three days after West held a listening session for it at Soldier Field in his hometown of Chicago. It was the third event the rapper held to showcase the album, with the previous two occurring at Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
Donda currently stands at 26 songs with features from a healthy cast of acts that includes Jay-Z, Roddy RIcch, The Weeknd, Lil Baby, Fivio Foreign, Lil Yachty, Ariana Grande, Ty Dolla Sign, and many more.
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One noticeable name that was initially absent from the album was DaBaby, who appeared beside West during the third listening event for Donda. Hours before the project was released, West shared a pair of text message screenshots to Instagram that explained why DaBaby — who was sent to appear on a part two version of “Jail,” with part one featuring Jay-Z — was not present on the album.
“DaBaby manager isn’t clearing ‘Jail.’ So we won’t be able to Upload unless we take him off,” reads a text message from a contact saved as ‘Bu [dove emoji],” who is presumably West’s manager Abou “Bu” Thiam. West asks why DaBaby’s verse on “Jail Pt. 2” isn’t cleared and Bu says he’s unsure, adding that neither DaBaby nor his manager were answering their phones. West, who seems upset about having to leave DaBaby off the album, says, “I’m not taking my brother off,” adding, “He was the only person who said he would vote for me.”
In the second post, West shows a conversation that seemingly takes place between himself and DaBaby. West appears to inform DaBaby that his verse was not cleared for the album, who says “Hell nall I ain’t know . Ima hit em now.” West suggests that his collaborator’s manger is “trying to destroy you” after they “tried to stop you from coming in” to an unknown location. Despite this, the Donda rapper ensures that “God got a bigger plan,” to which DaBaby replies, “A plan that can’t be stopped!!” Luckily for the respective rappers, it seems like their teams were able to work things out as “Jail Pt. 2” was added to the album with an additional contribution from Marilyn Manson by Sunday afternoon.
You can view the text messages exchanges in the video above.
Donda is out now via GOOD Music/Def Jam. Get it here.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
