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Kanye West fans in Shanghai chant for refund after erratic gig

July 13, 2025 Culture

Fans at a Kanye West show in Shanghai this weekend started chanting for a refund after he arrived late and gave an erratic performance.

The rapper played his first gig in almost a year at the Shanghai Stadium on Saturday night (July 12) – with his last outing last September also having taken place in China.

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According to The Global Times, Ye took to the stage more than 40 minutes late and during the wait, some of the 70,000 in attendance began chanting for a refund. When he did appear, he reportedly suffered from technical issues, with the DJ having to restart several songs. There was rain during the show, which may have affected the performance.

Ye’s staging was minimal, with little by way of lighting or production design and some in attendance reported that there were sound quality issues. The show began trending on Chinese social media, with one user reportedly saying they had “never seen such a poorly organised concert”.

See some social media reactions here:

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The rapper has found it difficult to secure live bookings in recent years, having only played in China and South Korea since 2023. A scheduled show at a Slovakian festival was recently cancelled after a petition against his appearance received thousands of signatures.

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The petition accused Ye of “repeatedly and openly adhering to symbols and [an] ideology connected with the darkest period of modern global history”, and called the planned appearance “an insult to historic memory, a glorification of wartime violence and debasement of all victims of the Nazi regime”.

Additionally, the petition also called it “unacceptable” for Bratislava to host a performance by West due to “his dangerous public attitudes that are in direct conflict with European memory and historical responsibility”.

The latest of Ye’s controversies occurred on May 8 this year, the 80th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War, when he released a song called ‘Heil Hitler’. Earlier this year, he was also sued for discrimination and accused of texting “Hail Hitler” to Jewish Yeezy employee.

The song led to West being banned from travelling to Australia, with the country’s home affairs minister, Tony Burke, confirming that the rapper’s visa has been revoked earlier this month.

Back in February, the rapper also wiped his Yeezy site clean, leaving only a white t-shirt with a large swastika on the chest available for sale. In previous years, Ye had delivered a series of antisemitic comments during an interview with far-right commentator Gavin McInnes.