Saturday, a Lincoln, NE record store First Day Viral went viral for posting a video destroying a shipment of records of Bully by Ye (FKA Kanye West). Claiming they were delivered to the store without their permission for Record Store Day, the employees decided to make their dissatisfaction known by filming a short, comedic video breaking the gamma.-distributed records in comedic ways. Yesterday, after receiving almost a week's worth of backlash, the store deleted the video and responded to critics.
"If it pains you to see records from an actual n*zi being destroyed maybe don’t out yourself in the comments — FDV team,” read the original caption.
Watch the original video, reposted by XXL, below:
"I was mad at a company (label? idk) called 'Gamma' for sending us unsolicited copies of Kanye's new album Bully, falsely associating themselves with Record Store Day," wrote one of the employees on the store's official Instagram account. "We were expected to treat this like a gift and either sell or distribute it to customers, and that really pissed me off."
Gamma (stylized as "gamma."), an alternative digital distribution company founded by former Apple executive Larry Jackson and record exec Ike Youssef, partnered with Kanye West earlier this year for the distribution of Bully. The two parties made creative ties soon after Ye's one-page apology ad in the Wall Street Journal, where he apologized "to those I've hurt" for his recent behavior, especially his violent antisemitic outbursts and pro-Hitler rhetoric. The media company still agreed to sign him for a low-to-mid seven-figure deal, per Wall Street Journal, citing that they believed his new record was going to commit to positive change.
gamma. and Ye's green vinyl version of Bully, however, were not listed as one of the labels/distribution companies partnered with Record Store Day, a yearly event that encourages music fans to shop local by pressing and selling limited edition and special cuts of many beloved artists' music.
The distribution company attempted to mislead stores anyway, placing official letters in their boxes that claimed these green vinyl variants were "Record Store Day exclusives." One California record store posted an unboxing video to their Instagram Reels on April 16, thanking gamma. for the surprise delivery. Watch it below:
One can clearly read gamma.'s letter, which reads:
"Dear Record Store:
We wanted to take a moment to express our sincere gratitude for the vital role that independent record retail plays in music culture. You are the front line — the people who connect music to communities in a way no algorithm ever will.
Enclosed please find 10 copies of our latest release, Bully by Ye, on an exclusive vinyl color variant available only through select independent retailers this Record Store Day. Consider this our gesture of appreciation for everything you do.
This is a limited pressing that your customers won't find anywhere else. We hope it gives you something special to offer the people who walk through your door this Saturday.
Thank you for keeping the culture alive.
With respect and gratitude,
gamma."
Other posts online, including Kanye West fan pages, circulated the letter, confirming it's from gamma.
"I resented having copies shipped to my store without my permission. If someone at gamma. had just reached out to ask if we wanted it, we would have declined, and that would have been the end of it," the First Day Vinyl employee said in his Instagram statement.
More stores across the US complained about receiving unsolicited copies of Bully for the April 18 Record Store Day Event. On April 16, Pinwheel Records in Chicago, IL posted a video to their Facebook expressing disappointment with gamma. for trying to get them to distribute "an artist we no longer carry" without a deal beforehand. Though they intentionally leave out Ye's and gamma.'s names from their eight-minute-long video statement, they clearly describe the green vinyl, the "problematic" behavior that began in 2016, and the fact that other stores have received it. "I think we all have people in our lives...who you love or loved, and...you find yourself rooting for this person for a long, long, long time until they start to become harmful to themselves and the people around them in a really problematic way," one of the employees in the video explained. "Because of that," she continued, "we are not going to take any money from these albums. We're not going to destroy them." By the end, the two decided just not to sell it at all, but they'd be willing to give them to clients for a $100 donation to Thresholds, a Chicago-based mental health non-profit organization.
Watch their video below:
The First Day Vinyl employee's message yesterday reiterated similar points, though much more directly. "Kanye's had an eventful couple of years starting with proclaiming himself a Nazi and selling swastika t-shirts on his website in early 2025," the employee continued. "In May 2025 he released a track called 'Heil Hitler' and praised Hitler on various social media platforms and in interviews. As Kanye fans, we've tolerated a lot of bullshit from him over the years, but this was an immediate line in the sand for me." While the record store employee recognized Ye eventually apologized and was vulnerable and open about his ongoing struggles with Bipolar I Disorder, he still decided "First Day was never going to carry the new record."
He eventually took the video down after Kanye fans began spamming him online, accusing him of racism, insensitivity to the rapper's mental health struggles, and alienating Kanye fans who don't identify as Nazis. "The way the video came across rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, and that's my fault," he wrote. He continued:
"You can miss me with the claims of racism, none of that bullshit is based in reality. The criticisms that I'm willing to engage with though: that I didn't address Kanye's apology and mental health and that I'm choosing to stock albums by other problematic artists but not Kanye."
After acknowledging Ye's formal apology and considering its sincerity, the First Day Vinyl employee said he used to be more vigilant about "problematic" artists being carried in the store, all before deciding the client should have the freedom to judge and decide who to support. Apologizing for casting strong judgement on Ye's fanbase and destroying the Bully vinyl, he wrote: "I'll try to be more thoughtful about stuff we post going forward."
gamma. has yet to respond for sending rare edition copies of Ye's Bully to multiple stores in attempts to profit off Record Store Day.
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