A beaming Kanye West was spotted attending a listening party for his much delayed new album Bully in Los Angeles on Thursday evening.
The controversial rapper, 48, officially dropped the record after a reported eight postponements as well as his own cancellation following numerous antisemitic rants.
But the tides could now be turning for the star who apologised for his vile worlds earlier his year and in November sold out his show in Mexico City.
Kanye detailed how his bipolar disorder caused him to lose ‘touch with reality’ in a page-long advertisement published in the Wall Street Journal.
Now after sharing news of the listening parties around the US to his Instagram Stories, the rapper was clad in black leather as he attended one in LA.
The musician wore a leather jacket with matching trousers which he teamed with a grey hoodie as he was seen making a low-key exit.
A beaming Kanye West’s was spotted attending a listening party for his much delayed new album Bully in Los Angeles on Thursday evening
The controversial rapper, 48, officially dropped the record after a reported eight postponements and cancellation following numerous antisemitic rants
But the tides could now be turning for the star who apologised for his vile worlds earlier his year and in November sold out his show in Mexico City (New album Bully pictured)
Kanye’s ninth studio album was at the time pushed back by two months with the hitmaker telling how he planned to finish it in Africa.
However, after being pushed back a number of times, it was indefinitely postponed and eventually abandoned, with Kanye instead going on to release Jesus Is King.
In his apology Kanye attributed his antisemitism to the effects of his health battle, one which he says was caused by a 2002 car accident.
In a statement appearing in the January 26 print edition of the WSJ, he alleged he sustained a brain injury during the accident that went ‘unnoticed’ at the time – with the ‘medical oversight’ sparking his bipolar disorder.
Kanye said the illness made him ‘detached from my true self’ and caused him to be drawn ‘toward the most destructive symbol I could find, the swastika‘.
The advertisement, which was paid for by Yeezy and authored by West, was headlined ‘To Those I Hurt’ and described how, after ‘hitting rock bottom’ several months ago, he decided to seek help at the encouragement of his wife, Bianca Censori.
It all began in 2022 when he tweeted he was going ‘death con 3 on Jewish people’ – which got him promptly dropped by his agency CAA, production company MRC, Adidas, Gap, and Balenciaga.
The Yeezy designer – who’s worn swastika and ‘White Lives Matter’ T-shirts – has repeatedly spoken about his disdain for Jewish people and his adoration of Nazi Germany dictator Adolf Hitler.
Now after sharing news of the listening parties around the US to his Instagram Stories, the rapper was clad in black leather as he attended one in LA.
The singer has been keeping fans up to date with where they can hear his new album
But in 2023, he claimed watching Jonah Hill in his 2012 action comedy 21 Jump Street made him ‘like Jewish people again’ in a bizarre Instagram post.
‘No one should take anger against one or two individuals and transform that into hatred towards millions of innocent people,’ the hip-hop star wrote at the time.
It comes after his wife Bianca arrived to testify shortly after plaintiff Tony Saxon was seen entering the Los Angeles Superior Court.
It has since been revealed that Kanye and his team are taking a victory lap after a jury awarded a contractor suing him $140,000 – ‘a small fraction’ of the $1.7 million he had been seeking with the litigation.
His spokesman, Milo Yiannopoulos, told the Daily Mail that the contractor, Saxon, recovered ‘only a small fraction of what his lawyers demanded’ with the $140,000 – after asking the jury for ‘approximately $1.7 million.’
Yiannopoulos said the jury rejected almost all of [Saxon’s] claims in the case, which saw both Kanye and Bianca take the stand to testify.
‘Although the jury found that Saxon qualified as an employee for certain purposes,’ he said, ‘they awarded no damages for lost wages, overtime, waiting-time penalties, retaliation, punitive damages, or any other statutory penalties.
‘The only damages awarded were $140,000 related to Saxon’s claim that he was injured while working on the property.’
West Coast Trial Lawyers attorney Neama Rahmani told the Daily Mail that his client Saxon was ‘relieved’ and ‘vindicated’ as the case drew to a close.
The verdict handed down to Kanye on Wednesday was split into $100,000 for Saxon’s medical expenses, past and present, and $40,000 for past pain and suffering, Rolling Stone reported after reviewing the court ruling.
Saxon did not recover any damages for future pain and suffering or punitive damages, according to legal documents reviewed by the outlet.
Kanye had not been acting in ‘malice, oppression, or fraud’ in firing Saxon from the construction project, which the jury ruled was not a wrongful termination, according to legal docs.
‘It took a lot of discussion to get to $140,000,’ a juror in the case told the outlet. ‘Some people wanted to go higher. We thought [Saxon] was injured, but there were too many other nebulous things to consider.’
Rahmani said of the ruling, ‘Admittedly, we won some claims, we lost some claims – it was a mixed verdict – I’m not gonna say that it was a clean sweep by any stretch, but the fact that the jury found merit in our claims, found that [Saxon] was an employee, found that [Saxon] was injured on the job … they gave him damages for his medical expenses – this is the law.’
Rahmani told the Daily Mail that the case involving Saxon marked the first time the rapper ‘had ever testified in court,’ adding, ‘We have no problem litigating against Ye – we’re the first law firm to push a case against Ye all the way to trial.’
