“I just want to tell y’all, we just broke the record.”
Just weeks ago, Kanye West was facing fresh cancellations, blocked performances and growing opposition across parts of Europe.
On Saturday night, he stood before a crowd of 118,000 people in Istanbul.
The contrast could hardly have been sharper.
The rapper, now known as Ye, performed for more than two hours at Istanbul’s Atatürk Olympic Stadium, drawing one of the largest crowds of his career and what organizers described as one of the biggest music events held in Turkey this year. Fans travelled from Britain, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Russia and several Middle Eastern countries to attend the show.
“I just want to tell y’all, we just broke the record, 118,000,” Ye told the crowd during the performance.
Hours before the concert began, roads around the stadium were packed with fans arriving from across the city. Long queues formed outside the venue as thousands waited to enter.
Inside, the atmosphere felt closer to a festival than a standard concert.
Ye performed many of his biggest hits, including “Power,” “Runaway,” “Heartless,” “Homecoming” and “Stronger,” while standing atop a massive spherical stage illuminated by projections, lights and smoke effects. Thousands of fans lit up the stadium with their phone flashlights as chants echoed around the venue.
One fan who travelled from Germany described the atmosphere as unlike anything he had experienced before.
“The stadium was already full long before he came out. People were singing before the show even started.”
The performance comes at a complicated moment in Ye’s career.
Over the past several years, he has faced intense criticism for a series of antisemitic remarks, statements praising Adolf Hitler and the release of content containing Nazi imagery. The controversy led to widespread condemnation, damaged business relationships and triggered opposition to several planned performances.
In April, British authorities denied Ye entry into the United Kingdom, resulting in the cancellation of a planned appearance at London’s Wireless Festival. Concerts in France and Poland were also cancelled or postponed amid political and public pressure.
That is partly why Saturday’s turnout surprised many observers.
Despite years of controversy, Ye continues to attract enormous crowds, particularly outside the United States.
Social media quickly filled with videos from inside the stadium showing fans singing along to nearly every song. Some clips showed spectators standing on seats and waving phone lights as the crowd stretched across nearly every section of the venue.
Earlier this year, Ye publicly apologized for some of his past behavior.
In a full page advertisement published in The Wall Street Journal, he renounced his previous admiration for Hitler and said his actions had been influenced by an undiagnosed brain injury and untreated bipolar disorder.
Whether that apology has changed public opinion remains unclear.
His critics argue the damage from his earlier statements cannot easily be undone. His supporters point to the apology and continue to separate the artist from the controversies surrounding him.
For now, both realities appear to exist at the same time.
In some countries, Ye remains unwelcome.
In Istanbul, however, 118,000 people showed up to watch him perform.
And judging by the noise inside the stadium, many of them were not thinking about politics at all. They were there for the music.
