Oh when it all, it all falls down. And my “it,” I mean potentially this year’s Coachella lineup featuring headliners Kanye West and Billie Eilish. I’ll explain.
On Thursday, the Donda artist appeared to give an ultimatum regarding his upcoming performance at the popular, California festival. The impetus? A perceived shady move from “bad guy” singer Billie Eilish that many took to be aimed at rapper Travis Scott, one of Kanye’s closest friends. For context, during a concert in Atlanta last week, Eilish stopped performing to make sure a fan who was having trouble breathing received medical attention before she continued on with the show. Per Entertainment Weekly, after she was assured the fan would be OK, she explained: “I wait for people to be okay until I keep going.”
Now, unless you’ve been living under a rock the last handful of months, Eilish’s statement carries a little bit more weight to it in light of the Astroworld tragedy that ensued back in November, which left 10 people dead, including nine-year-old Ezra Blount (remember this name, we’ll circle back to it in a sec.) Scott, who was the mastermind behind the popular concert festival, has been dealing with the fallout for months.
And now, thanks to some news outlets who pushed the narrative that Eilish’s comments were directly about Scott, Yeezy is stepping in and demanding an apology from the “No Time to Die” artist or else he’ll pull out of Coachella come April.
“COME ON BILLIE WE LOVE YOU PLEASE APOLOGIZE TO TRAV AND TO THE FAMILIES OF THE PEOPLE WHO LOST THEIR LIVES,” West captioned in a post to Instagram on Thursday. “NO ONE INTENDED THIS TO HAPPEN TRAV DIDN’T HAVE ANY IDEA OF WHAT WAS HAPPENING WHEN HE WAS ON STAGE AND WAS VERY HURT BY WHAT HAPPENED AND YES TRAV WILL BE WITH ME AT COACHELLA BUT NOW I NEED BILLIE TO APOLOGIZE BEFORE I PERFORM.”
Eilish has since responded, commenting directly under Ye’s post saying: “Literally never said a thing about Travis. Was just helping a fan.”
Additionally, as Rolling Stone notes, the family of Ezra Blount has spoken out against Yeezy following his comments about Eilish, referring to them as “idiotic” and “hurtful.” In a recent interview, Blount’s grandmother Tericia explained:
“I think it’s just crazy, and I hate to use that word, but I think it’s ridiculous. She’s making sure that she is caring for the patrons at her concert, and I just think that’s crazy of Kanye to even let that demand come out of his mouth. I totally commend Billie Eilish for having that decency about her. I think what she did was wonderful, and I would love to tell her myself how brilliant and awesome she is for doing so.”
Added Blount’s grandfather Bernon, “To hear Kanye’s words, that’s hurtful to us. What an idiotic thing to say.”