Kanye West has mostly stayed away from the spotlight after health problems forced him to scrap his Life of Pablo Tour in late 2016. He was conspicuously absent from his own Yeezy fashion show earlier this year and also passed on attending this month’s Met Gala — an event he never misses. With the exception of a few cameos on Kim Kardashian’s Instagram account, West hasn’t even been photographed since February.

Well, there may be an explanation for Kanye’s reclusive behavior: he’s apparently exiled himself on a Wyoming mountaintop where he’s been writing and recording a new album.



TMZ reports that West’s already spent two weeks at an undisclosed Wyoming retreat, and he recently returned for a second session. All the while, he’s deleted both his Twitter and Instagram profiles. TMZ adds that West is “all about creating music” and his actions have “nothing to do with problems at home or problems with his head.”

The last time West went into exile was following the Taylor Swift-VMAs incident in 2009. After he holed himself up in Hawaii for several months, West eventually returned with what many consider to be his definitive masterpiece, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Would it be unreasonable to expect any different this time around?

Revisit West’s video for “Fade” from his 2016 album, The Life of Pablo: