How Ye’s ‘Vultures Listening Experience’ Moved 70,000 Tickets In China

The artist formerly known as Kanye West has somewhat quietly taken his “Vultures Listening Experience” with Ty Dolla Sign global, as two shows in the Chinese island province of Hainan moved more than 70,000 tickets in a matter of hours. The second show takes place this weekend.

The individual ingredients —  relatively unknown Chinese city, internationally known rap superstar, last-minute bookings — may sound unusual on their own, but everything involved in the “Vultures” project from ¥$, the supergroup formed by Ye and Ty Dolla Sign, is deliberate. 

“He wants to perform in locations that are culturally impactful,” says JJ Cassiere, agent and co-founder of 33 & West agency. 

Cassiere and fellow agent Daniel McCartney began working with West, who performs as Ye, around February and put together listening parties in Salt Lake City, Korea and China. 

“For him, it’s ‘How do I touch a part of the Earth that most artists don’t and also provide a once-in-a-lifetime-feeling show? And that’s what we accomplished in South Korea and China.” Cassiere says the South Korea performance, which took place at Goyang Stadium on Aug 23, sold 39,000 tickets. 

West has professed his love for China before, as he spent part of his childhood there while his mother was a teacher. 

The gigs took place at Wuyuan River Stadium in the city of Haikou. He is the first U.S. artist to perform at the venue and it was his first China show in 16 years. The first show was Sept.15, which will be followed with another show this Saturday. Cassiere says both sold out within five minutes, using a local ticketing platform.  Tickets cost between USD$99 and $300.

While the Vultures performance at Salt Lake City’s Delta Center was booked and took place in the span of four days, organizing something in China is much more complicated, requiring dozens of permits and approvals and local know-how.  Cassiere says his 33 & West was more than up for the task and willing to put in the work to deliver at a high level.

“Basically, when you book someone in China at this level, you have to have government ties, and we had some great people who worked for the government, federally and locally involved with the show,” said McCartney, crediting promoters Richard Beck and local promoter partner Yu Minghe. “They were  just brilliant. It took a serious duo to make that happen and they crushed it on the promoter side.” Management is John Monopoly / David Stromberg.

“There were a lot of hoops to jump through, but we made it happen,” he said. “It’s worth it because it’s so insanely impactful for them, there was $56 million in revenue economically throughout the island just for one day. It’s pretty unbelievable. We had the right people and the right partners and went through the process. The government was supportive of him coming.”

The Sept. 15 show began with the Vultures duo with Ty Dolla Sign and was followed by an unmasked Ye doing a mix of deep cuts and greatest hits as well as appearances from his wife Bianca Censori and his four children,  which Cassiere says got a great response from the crowd.

“To be part of the crowd and able to see people who don’t typically have access to concerts at all, number one, to number two, now have access to seeing Ye, was pretty special,” McCartney said. “You see fans crying and even seeing the security guards watching the show being like, ‘Oh my God.’ That’s when you really know it’s bigger than just a concert.”

Cassiere says earlier this year he and his team met with Ye and his team after getting some referrals from people close to the artist’s camp, who was looking for an agency that was independent, understood hip-hop and was scrappy. “He’s had some great agents over the years, but we were stoked to get the call and got the meeting and were able to sign it,” Cassiere said.

“It’s us being able to navigate a certain way to be able to execute these high profile shows, taking the white-glove approach and super prioritizing his needs,” added McCartney, who previously was a music agent at UTA. “It’s a testimony to us being able to develop young artists from small clubs to handling acclaimed names and doing stadiums. We’re the proof in the pudding that we’re able to do it all.”

With the Vultures 2 project dropping recently, Cassiere says Ye is in cycle and will be taking an internationally focused approach to live performances. 

“Basically, he’s a stadium artist internationally,” Cassiere said. “Especially in Asia, that is a massive market for him. He’s just a global artist that does a lot of tickets, so picking the locations is kind of a mix of somewhere that he wants to play, finding the right promoter, finding the right stadium, that’s a big part of it. There’s a lot of factors into why he ends up in a certain location, but it kind of all starts with something that’s personally relevant to him.”

Whatever comes next, it’s a pretty safe bet the rollout will not be the traditional concert tour launch.  As unorthodox as the project seems, Ye’s model could be adapted for others.

“I think there’s a lot of opportunity for people in China because again, you’re talking about a geographical location where they’re not used to getting big, substantial American artists or any artists outside of China,” McCartney said. “They’re not used to it, so they’re very grateful. There’s a lot of terms and stipulations that come with going to perform there, but with the right promoter and the right artist that has demand there, it’s definitely a really cool market.”

The experience was eye opening on a personal level as well.

“When you’re traveling, you’ll see these cities that you’ve never even heard of and the population will be triple LA’s,” Cassiere said. “It just goes to show you how big the world really is.”