Ye's Jakarta Show Draws Foreign Fans and Trolling Claims
Ye's concert in Jakarta on 24 October was his first show in Indonesia, and about half of the 60,000-capacity crowd at Gelora Bung Karno Stadium came from outside the country, according to Billboard.
Jakarta's governor, Pramono Anung, said the concert generated about $25 million in US dollars for the city's economy.
The night also started an online argument. A viral clip of the performance of "Heartless" showed Ye stopping and restarting the song. In it, he had the audience sing the chorus a cappella, meaning without any instruments, calling out "Louder!" and restarting the hook three times. The clip's caption accused him of trolling the crowd, reading "at this point bro tryna ragebait." Ragebait is a term for content posted to provoke anger.
Ye answered on X. "Bro this s–t was a vibe," he wrote. He added: "The crowd was very loud It's called rock and roll."
The show ran long. He opened with "King" and performed 39 tracks over two hours. The stage included a giant globe, according to Tempo, an Indonesian news outlet that reported on the show.
"Heartless" is older than most of the people in that stadium. It was released as a single from the album 808s & Heartbreak in 2008 and reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, the weekly chart that ranks songs by airplay, sales and streams.
His newer album, Bully, arrived in March and debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, the weekly chart for albums. Elsewhere, two Kanye West concerts in Russia scheduled for October were cancelled, according to the organiser, Say Agency, as Reuters reported.
Whatever people make of the performance, the crowd is the reason the numbers exist. Half of a stadium travelling in from abroad is a large share of any audience, and it is the part of the story that the governor's figure rests on.
