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While Kanye West is no longer romantically linked to Kim Kardashian or Julia Fox, it appears that they have had a lasting impact on his latest album, Donda 2.
The rapper, 44, unveiled his new tracks during a performance experience of the album—a follow-up to August 2021's Donda—at the LoanDepot Park in Miami on Tuesday night.
And at the start of the track "Sci-Fi," his estranged wife Kardashian, who filed for divorce from the musician in February 2021, could be heard in a sample taken from her Saturday Night Live monologue when she guest hosted the show in October 2021.
Kardashian, 41, could be heard saying on the recording, per People: "I married the best rapper of all time. Not only that, he is the richest Black man in America. A talented, legit genius, who gave me four incredible kids."
During her opening monologue at the time, Kardashian addressed her ill-fated marriage to West, when she said: "I've been very blessed in this life, and I'm grateful for everything, honestly, all the ups, all the downs.
"I mean, I married the best rapper of all time. Not only that, he's the richest Black man in America, a talented, legit genius, who gave me four incredible kids.
"So when I divorced him, you have to know it came down to just one thing: his personality. I know it sounds mean, but people keep telling me that comedy comes from truth. And if there's one thing that I always strive to be, it's genuine."
Uncut Gems actress Fox—whose split from West was announced on February 14 after a weeks-long romance—didn't make a vocal appearance on any of the tracks, though it would appear that she influenced one of Donda 2's songs.
During "Security"—which is widely seen as an attack on Kardashian's new boyfriend Pete Davidson—a looped sample can be heard that has been taken from the score of the Taylour Paige and Riley Keough movie Zola.
Though Fox, 32, didn't appear in the black comedy, she revealed in an interview conducted two weeks into her short-lived romance with West that she had introduced him to the movie on their second date.
Speaking with Interview magazine, Fox told how West—who has legally changed his name to Ye—played the movie while they were hanging out with a host of celebrities that included Madonna, Naomi Campbell, Dave Chappelle, Marilyn Manson, Floyd Mayweather, Antonio Brown, and "the guy from the new Batman."
She said of West: "He decided to put on Zola, and I was like, 'There's no way that everyone's going to just stop and watch the movie.' Thirty seconds in, everyone there stopped talking and started watching, yelling commentary, and laughing. Dave Chappelle f****** loved it. It was such a special moment, to include Zola in our narrative."
Explaining why Zola was special to them as a couple, she said: "I think it was a moment that he felt really inspired by something that I had shown him. We watched Zola the second time we hung out."
West's sample of the soundtrack was not lost on Fox, who took to her Instagram Story to play a snippet of the footage from his album event, as "Security" played.
The actress added a trio of ear emojis, indicating that her followers should listen, as she tagged the Instagram accounts of the Zola movie and West.
In a follow-up post, she tagged Zola writer-director Janicza Bravo, writer and Jeremy O. Harris and Aziah "Zola" King, who inspired the movie through her 2015 viral Twitter thread.
Other samples on West's new tracks include one of Vice President Kamala Harris' famous "We did it, Joe" phone call to President Joe Biden, following their election victory back in November 2020.
According to People, West's new album features appearances from such stars as Alicia Keys, The Game, Jack Harlow, Migos, Da Baby, and Playboi Carti, among others. Per the publication, West brought out Marilyn Manson, who appeared on last year's Donda.
During the event, the stadium was pitch-black, save for a burning house surrounded by water in the center of the vacuous space, to symbolize West's childhood home in Chicago.
Among the celebrities seen at the event were Elon Musk, Rick Ross and French Montana.
About the writer
Ryan Smith is a Newsweek Senior Pop Culture and Entertainment Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on ... Read more