Halsey Distances Herself From Ye Before Performing ‘Tokyo Narita’ Freestyle: ‘It’s F— Kanye, OK?’
Halsey called out Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, during an eventful first night of her Back to Badlands Tour.
The moment came at the end of a packed setlist at Los Angeles’ Fairbanks Lawn that included many of Halsey’s earliest standouts from her 2015 Badlands debut album, celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. After running through “Hold Me Down,” “Ghost,” “Young God” and more, the singer took a brief pause before diving into “Tokyo Narita” — her 2016 freestyle with Lido that references the rapper by name: “So we laid down on the floor next to our brand-new bed/ Just so we could listen closer to this new Kanye West.”
Related
“Alright, we’re gonna do this one, but it’s f— Kanye, OK?” the singer said before kicking off the song.
Back in 2020, Halsey — who has struggled with bipolar disorder since she was a teen — took to social media to say, “personal opinions aside,” no one should be cracking jokes about Ye’s mental health.
“No jokes right now,” the pop star wrote on X at the time. “I have dedicated my career to offering education and insight about bipolar disorder and I’m so disturbed by what I’m seeing. Personal opinions about someone aside, a manic episode isn’t a joke. If you can’t offer understanding or sympathy, offer your silence. … Taking this opportunity to make offensive remarks and [vilify] people with mental illnesses is really not the way to go. … This is the exact triggering sh– that causes people to keep quiet about it.”
Halsey continued by saying a lot of people who are bipolar remain undiagnosed because of these misunderstandings. “You can hate someone’s actions or opinions without contributing to stigma that damages an entire community of sometimes vulnerable people all for a couple of laughs,” she continued. “If you wanna think someone is an a–hole, go ahead.”
Halsey will perform her third and final night at Fairbanks Lawn on Thursday (Oct. 16) before heading to Mexico City.
Check out a clip of the moment below.
Powered by Billboard.