What led to Kid Cudi’s heartbreaking rift with Kanye West? Reasons explored as The Prayer rapper says ‘no coming back’

Kid Cudi recently opened up about the reasons for his rift with Kanye West, where he revealed that their relationship had reached the point of no return. The rapper effectively poured cold water over fans' hopes of getting a possible reunion, as he shed light on the circumstances that brought about an end to their creative brotherhood.

Kid Cudi appeared on CBS Mornings today, where he was quoted as saying:

"It’s a sad thing. The freedom we experienced when we were creating, it will just never happen again, and that’s just the heartbreaking side of things ... [Ye’s] said some things that there’s no coming back from."

He then went on to elaborate on the comments that disturbed him:

"The comments that he’s had about [late] Virgil Abloh are just some of the most evil, vile, disturbing, f*cked-up things I’ve heard. Every time he took a dig at Virgil, it just made me super angry. Virgil was an angel to everyone. There’s no coming back from that, man. I’m done with you. And it breaks my heart because I loved Kanye. I really loved him. He was part of my life changing and at some point, he was a really good friend, but the man that he has become … I just don’t know that guy anymore, I don’t know him. I don’t know that version of him, and it’s really heartbreaking."

Kanye West and Kid Cudi - a brief history

Kid Cudi and Kanye West's professional relationship started when the latter was signed by West's record label. Their creative partnership gave rise to some hip-hop tracks over the years, with West also co-executive producing Cudi’s debut album.

The first major change in their relationship dynamics was witnessed in 2013 when Kid Cudi opted to go his own way. When Cudi parted ways with Kanye's record label, both artists initially described the separation as amicable. However, the tensions between them have come to light in the wake of their disassociation and Kanye's increasingly controversial remarks.

While they were sporadically seen making music together even after Cudi departed from West's label, tensions escalated dramatically in 2016 when Cudi took to Twitter to criticize both Kanye and Drake. While appearing for an interview with Esquire, the rapper downplayed the significance of West's influence in his career and argued that he was a self-made man.

"I just want to clear that up for anybody that feels like Kanye made my career or made me who I am. He brought me on to do 808s. I thought that was really f**king awesome. I wanted to be a part of a family and saw G.O.O.D. Music as that opportunity. So I finally said yeah. Kanye West did not come and pluck me out of Applebee’s or the Bape store."

The post-2013 years produced many controversies, as there were episodes of conflict followed by reconciliation. The friendship between Kanye and Cudi was irreparably damaged in 2022 when Kanye publicly declared that Cudi would not participate in his album Donda 2 because Cudi was friends with Pete Davidson at that time.

Kanye West's latest public outbursts, including his comments about the late Virgil Abloh, have not been taken favorably by Kid Cudi. There were a lot of expectations that their differences were just a temporary hindrance, as they had made up many times in the past. The statements made by Cudi recently contain an air of finality that was lacking in the earlier conflicts that they had.

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