Kanye West comeback concert cancelled
Kanye West’s comeback concert in Italy has been cancelled before it was officially announced.
The US rapper was reportedly set to perform a secret show at the 100,000-cap RCF Arena, aka Campovolo, in Reggio Emilia, near Bologna, tomorrow (27 October), promoted by Milan-based Vivo Concerti.
It was rumoured the gig, which was originally planned for 20 October, would serve as the global premiere of West’s upcoming joint album with Ty Dolla $ign. Local prefect Maria Rita Cocciufa says the event was cancelled for “safety reasons”.
“We had no option but to cancel the event,” says Cocciufa. “These things take a lot of organising: you need to have a health plan, a traffic plan and some idea of how tickets are being sold and the number of people.
“You have to have all these things in place because you have to guarantee the safety and security of the people attending. As a city, we were ready, but we just hadn’t heard anything from the organisers so for safety reasons it had to be cancelled – the concert was due to take place Friday and on Monday we had still heard nothing.”
The Daily Mail reports that a set had been built on the site earlier this month, but was now being dismantled and a convoy of trucks was seen leaving the area.
“We did what we had to do, our part was ready for the 20th – from the parking lots, to the internal staff, to the area itself”
Davide Caiti, partner of arena owner C.Volo, suggests the 46-year-old’s American production team were to blame for the show not going ahead.
“We did what we had to do, our part was ready for the 20th – from the parking lots, to the internal staff, to the area itself,” Caiti tells Il Resto del Carlino.” We were also waiting for the official announcement to continue operations. [West’s team] can say that nothing was ever officially announced, but it’s a bit of hiding behind a finger, because the request had arrived.”
The planned concert had attracted anger from local groups given West’s past antisemitic comments and other controversies, which prompted Creative Artists Agency (CAA) to cut ties with the rapper last year. However, Caiti denies the threat of protests was a factor in the cancellation.
“Faced with an event of that magnitude and a business like that, production would certainly not have stopped due to four local controversies,” he says. “If they [cite] that, it will just be an excuse… Maybe next time, we’ll get some more guarantees.”
West made his first live appearance since the furore in Italy over the summer when he joined Travis Scott on stage at Rome’s 60,000-cap Circus Maximus to perform Scott’s Praise God and Can’t Tell Me Nothing in August.
The arena, which hosted Harry Styles in July, currently has four concerts scheduled for next year, including an already announced Rammstein show.
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