Music

Kanye West Drops New Song During His Coachella Set; Gets Immediately Memed

Kanye's gonna Kanye.

by Joseph Earp  22 April 2019

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Kanye West has spent the last five years gradually transforming into the most idiosyncratic artist that we have — a popsmith that does whatever he wants whenever he wants, whether that means delaying his new album by six months, or selling plain white t-shirts for $120.

In fact, given his recent career trajectory, the weirdest thing could be for Kanye to stop being weird. Which, if his recent Coachella set is anything to go by, won’t happen any time soon.

The set itself has been mired in the kind of delays that have become the staples of the way West does things. The rapper was initially meant to be one of the festival’s headliners, before organisers balked at his stage demands, and he dropped out. But then, a few weeks later, it was announced that the performer was going to be bringing his super exclusive, invite-only Sunday Service to the festival, an infamous performance series that sees West transform his hits into gospel-inflected ballads.

Better still, the Sunday Service set wasn’t only reserved for those with the cash to fork out Coachella tickets (not to mention an expensive flight to America); it was also streamed live via the festival’s YouTube channel.

Only, there was a catch — turns out the whole set was filmed via what seems to be the world’s smallest fisheye.

Needless to say, the bizarre method of capturing the stream was turned into a meme almost immediately, with many people making the same joke.

Oh well — at least all watching the stream were treated to the rarest gift of them all, a brand new Kanye song. Intrdouced as ‘Water’ the gospel-tinged banger is presumably a cut from the rapper’s forthcoming and oft-delayed Yandhi, although who knows what the hell is going on with that record, to be perfectly honest.

Oh, and if that wasn’t enough, the popsmith also debuted a brand new merch collection at the festival, a line of brown and white, minimalist t-shirts, sweaters and socks being peddled for outrageous prices.

A shirt was setting back deep-pocketed punters USD$225, while a pair of socks branded with ‘Jesus Walks’ cost a massive $50.

What can we say — Kanye gonna Kanye.