Kanye Omari West has filed court documents to change his name to Ye. The judge will need to approve before the rapper can start officially using the new name. Reasons for a name change were listed as “personal”.
No middle name, no last name. Just Ye.
The 44-year old Kanye has been called Ye in his close circle of friends and family for years. In 2018, he unofficially changed his name to Ye, asking people on Twitter to call him only by his nickname. The singer said at the time: “the being formally known as Kanye West. I am Ye”. When explaining his nickname that same year, Kanye said: “I believe ‘ye’ is the most commonly used word in the Bible, and in the Bible it means you. So I’m you, I’m us, it’s us. It went from Kanye, which means the only one, to just Ye – just being a reflection of our good, our bad, our confusion, everything”.
Kanye, or Ye, filled the front pages of tabloids in recent months. First, at the beginning of the year, his wife and reality star Kim Kardashian filed for a divorce. The couple shares four children together – daughter North (born June 15, 2013), son Saint (born December 5, 2015), daughter Chicago (born January 15, 2018), and son Psalm (born May 9, 2019). The couple decided to co-parent their kids until the final agreement is reached.
In the meantime, Kanye was busy with his 10th album called by his late mother “Donda”. The rapper went into a recluse in the Atlanta sports arena while working on new tunes, even making it his living headquarters for the time being. Regardless of the pending divorce proceedings, Kim Kardashian showed up with kids in tow to support her soon-to-be ex-husband. The two appeared to have a good relationship, chatting and smiling backstage.
Like this isn’t already enough on his plate, Kanye went into a tricky exchange of words with Drake. The two have been in a simmering feud for years, subtly picking on each other. This time, Drake was the one who turned up the heat when rapping on Trippie Redd’s newly released song “Betrayal”: “Forty-five, forty-four, let it go / Ye ain’t changin’ shit for me, it’s set in stone”. Kanye responded by posting a string of screenshots on his group chat saying: “You will never recover. I promise you”, and quickly deleted it.
It should have ended there, but Kanye figured that would be appropriate to dox the Canadian rapper. On his Instagram page, Ye published the address of Drake’s mansion in Toronto. Even though the location is publicly known, and the gigantic home was featured in many magazines, fans still found Kanye’s move to be wrong. In a matter of minutes, Drake shared a short video where he is seen laughing.
not even drake can hide the anger towards kanye with that laugh 😭 pic.twitter.com/Gfhw5LqSYQ
— mariano 🦦 (@oscos) August 23, 2021
The beef between the two artists dates back to 2009. It began when Kanye collaborated with Pusha T who already had a history of bickering with Drake. Previous to this, Kanye and Drake were on good terms. However, the Canadian took this as a sign of betrayal from Ye, and the battle was on. The relationship between Drake and Pusha T escalated in 2018 when the American rapper revealed in his song “The Story of Adidon” that Drake has a son. Further, Drake’s associates were attacked by Pusha, and the rapper himself was accused of having a ghostwriter. Considering what we know, Kanye and Drake will never be able to patch up their relationship.
Kim Marks 
Nina Smith