Changes: Drake, Kanye, Rob Zombie, King Diamond

Drake is blaming Saturday’s last minute postponement on “an unexpected technical issue.”

Fans waiting at Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Arena weren’t told until 8:30 p.m. that the show that was supposed to begin at 7 p.m. wasn’t going to happen, according to NBC 10 Philadelphia.
The Oct. 19 gig, which would have marked the second stop of Drake’s North American headline tour, has been pushed back until December.

A statement from the venue says, “Due to the elaborate nature of tonight’s show and an unexpected technical issue, Drake’s ‘Would You Like A Tour’ concert at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia has been postponed until Wednesday, December 18. Drake, the Wells Fargo Center, Live Nation, and the entire team behind tonight’s show want to ensure fans will experience an unforgettable live music event and have decided to move the concert to a new date. All tickets and original parking receipts from tonight’s show will be honored at the Wednesday, December 18 date.”

Rolling Stone points out that support act Miguel tweeted at 8:35 p.m. that he had just heard the news, saying, “Man, just found out, unfortunately tonight’s show in Philly is cancelled.” Miguel made the best of the situation by playing a free surprise show in the city at a secret location.

As for Kanye West, he’s offering even less of an explanation for why he couldn’t take the stage Sunday at Vancouver’s Rogers Arena.

An announcement from the venue, which was posted to Twitter Sunday afternoon, says the Oct. 20 gig was rescheduled “due to unforeseen circumstances.”

Kanye and support act Kendrick Lamar are now set to play Vancouver Oct. 31. Fans are told to hold onto their tickets for the new date.

King Diamond, on the other hand, had a lot to say about why his Oct. 20 performance at Loud Park Festival in Saitama, Japan, was canceled.

The Danish heavy metal musician posted nearly 1,000 words on his website on the subject along with a poster for the Loud Park festival that were covered with a red box declaring in all caps “Cancelled By Promoter.”

“The Japanese promoters at Loud Park  … posted a false and deceitful cancellation announcement, which they are going to have to correct to what really happened. First of all: We did not cancel the show. The promoters did,” King Diamond wrote.

The musician explained that problems arose because of a six-day delay getting his theatrical production, including instruments and special effects, to Japan in time for the show. A new plan was worked out to get the gear to Japan and even “the Danish embassy and the Japanese embassy in China became involved in trying to solve this dilemma.” And, of course, money then became an issue.

King Diamond said the promoters tried to force him to agree to two free shows next year in case the cargo didn’t make it in time to the festival, but the idea was nixed because “we couldn’t guarantee that it would fit in our future schedule, plus that we would have huge losses doing that, and last but not least we do not play without our theatrical production anymore.”

He ended the post with an apology for missing the show and added that the promoters weren’t to blame either.

“Both parties tried to go above and beyond to make this happen, but in the end it ended up being out of our hands and up to the Chinese customs authorities.”

After all of those postponements and cancellations, let’s talk about an act actually adding another show. Due to overwhelming demand, Rob Zombie will now play two headline nights at his Great American Nightmare event.

In addition to closing out the Southern California festival Nov. 2, Rob Zombie will take the stage Nov. 1.

Featuring haunted house attractions and a series of concerts at the FEARPlex in Pomona, Calif., the Great American Nightmare began earlier this month and runs every Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday through Nov. 2.

Along with Zombie’s performance, the Nov. 1 lineup includes a late night EDM after-party with Destroid – the live dubstep band featuring Excision, Downlink and KJ Sawka – as well as Dirtyphonics.

The festival closes out Nov. 2 with Rob Zombie, Eagles Of Death Metal, Powerman 5000 and 45 Grave.

Tickets are available now.