Background and beginnings In 2006, aspiring artist
Kid Cudi first met rapper-producer
Kanye West in a
Virgin Megastore, as Cudi recounted in a 2009
Spin interview: "I was looking at
CDs, saw the gleam of a
Jesus piece in the right side of my eye, looked up, and it was Kanye West," Cudi said, adding that he introduced himself and offered West some of his music. Cudi would later run into West again, while Cudi was working at the
BAPE store in NYC: "I remember Kanye coming in one time and I was helping him get a couple things," Cudi said. "I forgot to take a sensor off of one of the jackets he bought and I had to run out the store to catch him before he left. Pretty funny me chasing after him in
SoHo." In 2008, Kid Cudi caught the attention of Kanye West's
A&R,
Plain Pat, who had initially met Cudi at a
Def Jam meeting and picked up a copy of his
demo. Plain Pat introduced Cudi's music to West, leading West to sign Cudi to his
GOOD Music imprint later that year. Cudi's assistance included co-writing credits or vocals on "
Heartless," "
Welcome to Heartbreak," "
Paranoid" and "RoboCop." The two continued to work on Cudi's debut album
Man on the Moon: The End of Day (2009), with West serving as an
executive producer. West had also produced two songs, namely "Sky Might Fall" and the
Common-assisted third single "
Make Her Say", which also featured West. By 2018, Cudi had contributed to every West album since 2008, with their 2016 effort "
Father Stretch My Hands" reaching the
Top 40 of the US
Billboard Hot 100 chart. After a brief fallout, the two reconnected in late 2016, around the dissolution of West's
Saint Pablo Tour, which ended in him being hospitalized. West abruptly canceled his Saint Pablo Tour and sought hospitalization for exhaustion in November 2016. At that time, West's only two live appearances since had both been with Cudi, who also sought
mental health treatment in the fall of 2016, for performances of "Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1" in November 2017 and February.
Formation and debut listening party in
Southern California in 2018, backed by a bonfire. On April 19, 2018, West announced via
Twitter that a collaborative album with Kid Cudi would be released in June. He followed the
tweet revealing the name of the group, which also serves as title of their debut album,
Kids See Ghosts. On April 22, again via Twitter, West unveiled the album artwork, which was composed by Tokyo-based artist
Takashi Murakami. The duo were originally photographed with Murakami in July 2017. On April 25, West revealed the album would be accompanied by a
short film, directed by Dexter Navy, a music video director notable for his collaborations with
the Neighbourhood and
ASAP Rocky. On June 8, their first album
Kids See Ghosts was released following a live listening party in
Santa Clarita, California.
Kids See Ghosts debuted at number two on the US
Billboard 200 chart with 142,000
album-equivalent units, of which 79,000 were pure album sales. It serves as West's tenth top-five album and Cudi's sixth top-five album in the United States. The track "Reborn" managed to chart in the
Top 40 of the US Hot 100, at number 39. "There are some songs that we didn't use that I'm hopeful we can put out later," Cudi explained in an interview with
Billboard. "But the plan is to do more Kids See Ghosts albums... We just have this chemistry that's undeniable, especially when we have to fight for it with each other." The duo made their live debut under the moniker at
Tyler, the Creator's
Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival on November 11, 2018. They performed their album in entirety as well as the Cudi-featured West songs "Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1", "Welcome to Heartbreak", "Paranoid", and "Ghost Town", and Cudi's single "Pursuit of Happiness." At Cudi's 2019
Coachella set, West joined him onstage for performances of "Feel the Love", "Reborn", "Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1", "Ghost Town", and "Ghost Town Pt. 2".
070 Shake and
Ty Dolla Sign, frequent collaborators of the duo, came onstage for their features on the latter two songs.
Unreleased projects Kids See Ghosts 2 In a September 2019 interview with
Complex, Kid Cudi assured fans that more material from him and Kanye West would be coming. "There will be more Kids See Ghosts albums. Kanye already told me he wants to start working on the second one," he said. "With the first album, I didn't know how serious he was about making a collab album with me," he continued. "He had mentioned it, but I thought it was just a good idea he had in the moment. But then he kept bringing it up and kept having me come to his house, listen to music, and work on beats, so I was like, 'Wow, he's really into this.' We had a discussion where he said he wanted to make a spiritual album and I told him, 'Great. That's what I do. I would love to do that, something I can sink my teeth into.' So there will definitely be more."
Animated series On June 26, 2020, a
computer-animated series directed by artist
Takashi Murakami was announced via social media. The series chronicles the adventures of the
Dropout Bear, the character portrayed on West's first three album covers, and Kid Fox, a character created exclusively for the show, both of whom acting as cartoon personae for the artists. The show currently has no scheduled release date and is unlikely to air due to the group's split.
Dissolution of creative partnership On April 19, 2022, exactly four years after the announcement of the group, Kid Cudi announced that "Rock n Roll", on Pusha T's fourth album ''
It's Almost Dry'', would be his final collaboration with West due to the latter artist's recent behaviour, therefore dissolving the duo's partnership. Cudi stated on Twitter that "I did this song a year ago when I was still cool [with] Kanye. I am not cool [with] that man. He's not my friend and I only cleared the song for Pusha cuz thats my guy. This is the last song [you] will hear me on [with] Kanye." In December 2023, the two temporarily reconciled, with Cudi appearing at a listening session for West's
Vultures 1 and later appearing on the track "Gun to My Head" from West's
Vultures 2. Cudi stated in a January 2024 interview that he forgave West because "he apologized to me and it was sincere" and "Kanye does not apologize to anybody and say sorry to anyone." However, in an August 2025 interview, Cudi stated "[West] said some things that there's just no coming back from [...] the comments that he's had about
Virgil Abloh are just some of the most evil, vile, disturbing, fucked-up things I've heard [...] There's no coming back from that, man. I'm done with you[,]" effectively concluding his association with West. On April 28, 2026, Kid Cudi dedicated a performance of "Reborn" to West during his Rebel Ragers Tour. Amid the performance, he instructed his fans, saying, “We gotta sing this loud so Ye can hear you." ==Discography==