Will Butler, a longtime member of Arcade Fire, has announced his departure from the band.

“Hi friends — I’ve left Arcade Fire,” Butler — who’s the younger brother of frontman Win Butler and has been a part of Arcade Fire since the group’s debut full-length album, Funeral — announced in a tweet on Saturday (March 19).

“I left at the end of last year, after the new record was complete,” the multi-instrumentalist and songwriter clarified. “There was no acute reason beyond that I’ve changed — and the band has changed — over the last almost 20 years. Time for new things.”

His update continued, “I’m working on a new record; booking some shows this summer. I’m working on music for a David Adjmi play (which is so good). A few other projects percolating.”

“Thank you to anyone who’s come out to AF shows, or bought a record, or loves our music. It’s meaningful to be part of your lives. Thank you to the crew, staff, management, label people, bands, artists, and friends who have helped bring our vision to life for so many years. The band are still my friends and family,” he said.

Butler also noted a reading from a memorial service for Paul Farmer in his tweet, saying that the words “remain at the front of my mind.” He said that he plans to continue work with organizations including PLUS1 and Partners in Health “to give people material help; to build better systems of health, justice, and government; to try to live up in some way to Paul’s example.”

Arcade Fire just announced a May 6 release date for new album WE, which features new song “The Lightning I, II.” The band has seen three albums (2010’s The Suburbs, 2013’s Reflektor and 2017’s Everything Now) peak at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, and a fourth (2007’s Neon Bible) reach No. 2.

See Will Butler’s tweets below.

I left at the end of last year, after the new record was complete. There was no acute reason beyond that I’ve changed—and the band has changed—over the last almost 20 years. Time for new things.

— Will Butler (@butlerwills) March 19, 2022

I was at Paul Farmer’s memorial service last weekend. The words from the ceremony, and the challenge of his life, remain at the front of my mind: pic.twitter.com/32K4Svwbsp

— Will Butler (@butlerwills) March 19, 2022

Thank you to anyone who’s come out to AF shows, or bought a record, or loves our music. It’s meaningful to be part of your lives. Thank you to the crew, staff, management, label people, bands, artists, and friends who have helped bring our vision to life for so many years

— Will Butler (@butlerwills) March 19, 2022

I’ll be around! See you around!

—Will

— Will Butler (@butlerwills) March 19, 2022

Cuban rapper Yotuel Romero and his superstar singer/songwriter wife, Beatriz Luengo, wrote the first verses of “Patria y Vida” in 2020 to “report the constant violations of human rights in Cuba and the repression of freedoms of expression for the artistic community,” said Luengo during a panel on March 17 at SXSW.

Today, even after “Patria y Vida” — which was also co-written with Gente de Zona, Descemer Bueno, Maykel Osorbo and El Funky — inspired Cuba’s current anti-government uprising and won the Latin Grammy for song of the year, change has been slow to come. But Romero and Luengo hope an upcoming documentary of the making of the song will take its message even further.

“People have the power,” stressed the rapper, who attended the first live edition of SXSW since the pandemic to talk about the upcoming documentary that he and Luengo are in the process of making to show how “Patria y Vida” was conceived and how they hope to continue to use the song to transform his home country. The message of “Patria y Vida” is particularly poignant now.

“That song means you have power,” he says. “We need to react to what’s happening. We’ve seen people in Ukraine fighting for their freedom. Of course, no one wants a war, but when I see people standing in front of tanks, those examples show me humanity is not lost.”

But, the rapper says, Cubans can’t do it alone, which is why he, along with Luengo and his fellow Cuban artists, took a stand.

“Cuba is an abused woman, who first and foremost needs to identify and isolate her abuser,” said Romero. “If you have a dictatorship that controls everything, and whose only dialogue is homeland and death, it’s impossible to start a dialogue.”

A clear example of the regime’s iron rule is Osorbo, who is still jail in Cuba for his role in protests and in the song.

“We’re trying everything [to get him released], but what can you expect from a country that supports Russia?” said Romero bluntly. “Cuba learned from Russia how to treat people, how to punish people for speaking out.”

Romero and Luengo also denounced ongoing human rights abuse in Cuba, from gay rights to children imprisoned for speaking out against the government. And Romero, who is Black, spoke out — as he often has — about Black oppression in Cuba.

“Blacks in Cuba live in the worst conditions. Fidel Castro lied to Black people when he said, when I have the power, Black people will have the same power as whites. Bulls—. The six singers in ‘Patria y Vida’ are Black. I think this is one of the things that the dictator Castro hates. But rap was created for that: to protest abuses.”

And that’s what Romero plans to keep on doing.

“We didn’t write this song; someone higher up murmured those words,” says Romero. “For 62 years, Cuba’s slogan has been ‘Homeland or Death.’ It is the slogan of the revolution. It means if you want to stay in my country, it has to be my way. There are no options. They don’t admit differences.”

For “Patria y Vida,” adds Luengo, “We changed ‘death’ for ‘life,’ and we changed the word ‘or’ for an ‘A.’ Because ‘or’ is a terrible way to have a slogan. There’s just one option. It’s Patria or nothing. My way or nothing. Patria y Vida is homeland and life. And that is so important.”

Kanye “Ye” West’s rep says that an unannounced performance at the 2022 Grammy Awards has been pulled due to “concerning online behavior.”

A representative for the rapper confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter details in a report, published on Friday by The Blast, which alleges West received a call Friday evening notifying him that he was scrapped from this year’s Grammys performer line-up. While West is up for five nominations this year, he was not among the first round of artists announced to perform by the Recording Academy ahead of the April 3 ceremony.

A rep for West, whose legal name is Ye, declined to confirm whether he was still attending or invited to the show taking place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. THR has reached out to the Recording Academy for comment but has yet to hear back.

The news follows Ye’s temporary suspension from Instagram on Wednesday, March 16, after he published a post featuring a slur that targeted The Daily Show host Trevor Noah. During the 24-hour suspension, the Grammy-winning musician was unable to post, comment or send DMs.

In Ye’s post, which has since been deleted by Instagram, lyrics to “Kumbaya” were replaced with a variation of a racial epithet based on a minstrel character. West used the slur in response to a Tuesday segment of The Daily Show, in which Noah addressed the rapper’s online fixation on and harassment of both his ex-wife Kim Kardashian and her current boyfriend, SNL cast member Pete Davidson, calling it “terrifying to watch.”

Before West’s post was removed, Noah — who is hosting the 2022 Grammys show — responded, telling the rapper that his behavior “broke” the host’s heart and that Ye should “know the difference between that and fighting your family.”

“If you’re just joking about it all and I’m an idiot for caring, then so be it. But I’d rather be the idiot who spoke up,” Noah concluded his comment.

West’s public response to Noah is just the latest chapter in his ongoing public response to his divorce from Kardashian, who was declared legally single on March 2. Kardashian filed for divorce from West in February 2021 after six years of marriage, and during court proceedings claimed he was causing her “emotional distress” with his social media posts.

Since then, West has made numerous public comments across social media about their split. Ye apologized in February for at least some of those posts, specifically those that involved him publishing private texts with Kardashian on his public account.

Addressing his escalating social media responses to their divorce, he wrote that “I know sharing screen shots was jarring and came off as harassing Kim. I take accountability.” He went on to say that he’s “still learning in real time” and that he could “benefit from a team of creative professionals, organizers, mobilizers and community leaders.”

But following the public apology, Ye went on to, among other things, depict decapitating a claymation version of Davidson in his video for “Eazy,” a track that features the lyrics, “God saved me from that crash / Just so I can beat Pete Davidson’s ass.”

This article originally appeared on The Hollywood Reporter.