STEWART COPELAND

I know many here will be shedding a tear over this news:

http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/i ... -canceled/

Just two weeks after Kanye West and Lady Gaga announced their full slate of “Fame Kills” dates, the tour has been canceled. No official reason has been given for the cancellation, but ticket refunds will be available.

After the backlash surrounding Kanye’s outburst during Taylor Swift’s VMAs acceptance speech, the tour was rumored to be embattled. Now official confirmation of the cancellation comes from concert promoters Live Nation.

But Gaga isn’t letting this slow down her collaborations with rappers. Just yesterday, she hinted at the possibility of recording with Dr. Dre.

Oh boo hoo. NOT.
Was too busy enjoying U2 coverage in RS to notice this, thanks!

Kanye, I a let you finish, 'cept it looks like you're pretty much finished already.

NO!!!! Say it isn't so, I was so looking forward to that tour.































NOT!!!

[quote="luddite lady"]Kanye, I a let you finish, 'cept it looks like you're pretty much finished already.[/quote]



Love ya, LLady.

Follow-up story by Rolling Stone:

Speculation as to why Lady Gaga and Kanye West’s “Fame Kills” tour was killed has begun, and TMZ has already shot out a few theories that start with sluggish early numbers. Ticket sales “sucked,” to point where ” ’sucked’ happens to be a nicer version of the word,” TMZ writes, adding Gaga’s and West’s people were allegedly “at each others throats like their last names were Gosselin” and that Gaga reportedly wanted to bring The Fame Monster and her steady rotation of outrageous outfits to smaller venues than the hockey arenas the tour planned on playing. The official word from Lady Gaga, though, is it was a “mutual decision,” Billboard reports. Gaga said West is going to take time off, and she’ll be embarking on a solo jaunt in several weeks.

Considering Kanye’s “Glow in the Dark” tour was sold out and Gaga’s star is on the rise, it’s hard to believe ticket sales were that poor. However, in the case of the “Fame Kills” stop at New York’s Nassau Coliseum, plenty of general admission tickets were still available hours after they went on presale. In fact, Ticketmaster’s listing for the Nassau Coliseum show is still active, and GA tickets are widely available.

Of course, there’s a fairly obvious reason for slow ticket sales: the wave of anti-Kanye sentiment that washed across the country when West stole the spotlight from Taylor Swift at MTV’s Video Music Awards on September 13th. When Rolling Stone initially revealed the Fame Kills tour dates, the presale date listed on some of the concerts was just two days after the Swift incident.

All the negative press surrounding Kanye delayed the presale date, and Live Nation information started to disappear from the Web as many questioned if the tour was off. Then came that strange, NSFW promo clip and assurances that Fame Kills wasn’t dead and ticket did go on sale.

Following the Swift debacle and its fallout, West went on The Jay Leno Show to apologize and say he wanted to take some time off, only to officially announce the “Fame Kills” tour days later. Whether West’s desire to take a hiatus played a role in snuffing the “Fame Kills” tour is unclear. Gaga was also reportedly disappointed in West following his display at the VMAs, but there’s no evidence at this point whether that put the brakes on “Fame Kills.” So far, West has not supplied any all-caps explanations over at his official blog.

According to Making the Band star Laurie Ann Gibson, who says she was doing Lady Gaga’s choreography for the tour, “Fame Kills” was canceled over “creative differences,” she wrote on her Twitter. Gibson also insinuates that Gaga still had a rehearsal yesterday, despite the tour’s cancellation, and that our Hot Diva might be planning her own trek. When word of the tour first broke, West had insisted the two would be collaborating onstage (“She’s talented and so incredible that she’s not an opening act. We’re doing it together, with no opening act”), so it’s possible the pair did run into problems as ideas developed. Gaga is still hard at work, though: earlier this week, she told Rolling Stone about the new tracks she was working up for the tour, and Dr. Dre hinted the two could be collaborating on a song soon.

While “creative differences” are being cited, our own comment section also blames the high price of tickets for the “Fame Kills” tour as a potential reason why the ticket sales “sucked.” After surcharges, tickets for general admission were about $150, and VIP tickets were $500.