Niccijade Reeves-Alhark
Staff Reporter
Lil Nas X, born as Montero Lamar Hill, has recently, and rightfully, become the talk of the town since the release of his new song.
Hill was born on April 9th of 1999 in Lithia Springs, Georgia. According to an interview he did with TIME Magazine, his parents divorced when he was 6 years old and his family was poor as he grew up. As a teenager, he turned to the Internet for comfort, creating memes and posting on a Nicki Minaj stan account by the name of ‘nasmaraj’. There, he gained a large following that he hoped would help him in his real life, where Hill was dropping out of college, and when he and his parents were not getting along.
December 3rd, 2018 is when he released Old Town Road on Spotify. It was not until 2019 when the single became popular with the rise of the Yeehaw Agenda, a trend that pulled from cowboy culture of slang, fashion, etc. Within the first 3 months of 2019, Old Town Road hit the top of the Billboard Hot 100 and stayed there for a full 19 weeks. As the song grew in popularity, Hill released remixes of it featuring other artists, including Billy Ray Cyrus, Diplo, and RM of BTS.
A few months later, he released his first EP titled 7. The EP has 8 tracks, including Old Town Road and the Billy Ray Cyrus remix of it. After listening to it a few times, it feels more like an experimental collage of Hill trying to find his sound and flow. He seemingly finds this when he released HOLIDAY during the trying times of 2020.
This year he released his self-titled single, Montero (Call Me By Your Name), Montero for short. He also announced that there will be an album coming out this summer through a tweet.
When the music video for Montero was released, it instantly gained popularity throughout social media, with people condemning it while others praised him for his creativity. In my utmost honest opinion, I love this song and the music video with all of my soul.
Montero is my top favorite song because of its lyrics and sound. The majority of the melodies are string-based and the claps add this Latin vibe to the song while the lyrics delve deeper into desperation. The Latin beat adds to the lyrics by creating another layer of passion and movement. In Montero, Hill sings, “Call me by your name,” this is a reference to the queer film Call Me By Your Name (based on the book by André Aciman). Call Me By Your Name tells a similar story of passion and secrecy as the lyrics of Montero do, and that connection just amplifies the meaning even more. The catchphrase for the movie and book is “Call me by your name and I’ll call you by mine.”, this phrase is said between the two main characters as a way of saying, “You are me and I am you.” That closeness described in Call Me By Your Name is something so pure and rare to find, yet everyone wants it, whether it is real or not, hence the lyric “Call me by your name, I do not care if you[’re] lyin’.”
As someone who loves all forms of art and interpreting it, this was the most iconic move I have seen in a while. Lil Nas X has definitely broken down a barrier in the music industry with this one and I hope he breaks down more with his new album coming out this summer.
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