Kanye West’s third and final Apple Music livestream listening session for his latest album Donda broke records at the streaming service, totaling 5.9 million viewers on Thursday (Aug 26) evening, a source with knowledge of the situation tells Billboard.
The event, which was held at Soldier Field in West’s hometown of Chicago, came three weeks after the artist’s second listening session at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta broke Apple Music’s livestream record with 5.4 million viewers. For the final event, West constructed a replica of his childhood home in Chicago in the center of Soldier Field, and brought out numerous performers featured on Donda, including Travis Scott, DaBaby, Don Toliver, Westside Gunn, and Shenseea.
Across two listening sessions in Atlanta, West brought out 80,000 people to hear his tenth studio album — and over 30,000 people in Chicago — with tweaks, changes, and new featured artists being added to Donda between the events as West completed the album named after his late mother, who died in 2007.
After numerous delays, Donda was released without warning on Sunday (Aug. 29) and contains well over a dozen features including Jay-Z, The Weeknd, Travis Scott, Baby Keem, and Roddy Ricch.
West’s last album, Jesus Is King, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in October 2019. Apple did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.
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