Every album Kanye West has released since his 2004 debut album The College Dropout has been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). He’s moved millions of units, even billions, including his forgettable 2018 LP ye that got lost in his hefty fashion design, music, political and business workload.
According to music industry sales and streams tracker Chart Data, the Yeezy mogul has eclipsed the one billion mark on Spotify.
.@kanyewest's 'ye' has now surpassed 1 billion streams on Spotify.
— chart data (@chartdata) April 18, 2021
Kanye West’s seven-track ye was his eighth consecutive LP to debut atop of the Billboard 200 album and R&B/Hip Hop Albums charts.
It was included in the sweeping five-part rollout of several albums that had a similar amount on their respective tracklists, which he produced and jointly released on his own G.O.O.D. Music and Def Jam Recordings labels in June 2018. That includes Pusha T’s Daytona, Nas’ Nasir, Kanye and Kid Cudi’s collaborative album Kids See Ghosts and R&B singer Teyana Taylor’s K.T.S.E.
Arguably, the most memorable things about ye was its rushed lo-fi album cover theme of a Wyoming mountain range near his ranch where he produced all five albums. The album cover artwork and its lime green-colored inscription — which read “I hate being bi-polar it’s awesome” — was a passing shot taken on his iPhone during a car ride to his ye album listening party at his ranch’s studio, according to his soon-to-be ex-wife Kim Kardashian West.
Listen to ye below.