In anticipation for his 10th album, and just days before DONDA released, Kanye West dropped the “DONDA stem player,” a $200 device, preloaded with the DONDA album that allowed the user to isolate certain instruments, or “stems”, from any song. Customers have begun to receive their devices and have noticed the devices come with a few extra songs, including an unreleased fan favorite “Life Of The Party” featuring Andre 3000.
According to HipHopDX, aside from the album itself, the DONDA Stem Player contains the unreleased Jesus Is King-era track “Up From the Ashes,” the Andre 3000 assisted track”Life Of The Party,” “Never Abandon Your Family,” a song that was played at the first listening event but did not make the album, and a early version of the “Remote” with Kid Cud’s verse restored.
For a refresher, “Life Of The Party” was leaked by Drake shortly after the release of Drake’s sixth studio album, Certified Lover Boy. The Andre 3000 assisted track showed Kanye dissing Drake, Virgil Abloh, and longtime collaborator CyHi The Prynce. However, things quickly backfired when the song was praised instead of ridiculed as Drizzy had intended.
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Andre 3000 later released a statement after the song was released, saying that the track he recorded over did not have Ye’s diss on it and he had hoped to make a more focused track for Ye’s album. He added that “It’s unfortunate that it was released in this way and two artists that I love are going back and forth.”
Check out the clips below of the bonus songs featured on the DONDA stem player. As for now, the stem player is still available on Kanye’s website.
