Photo Billboard
Photo Billboard

"Old Town Road" was officially released December, along with a since-deleted music video featuring scenes from the Western video game "Red Dead Redemption 2." From its beginning, "Old Town Road" was intended to go viral, with catchy lyrics and "quotable lines that people want to use as captions," Lil Nas X told Rolling Stone. It didn't take long for "Old Town Road" to go viral, as Lil Nas X wanted. By the start of March, cowboy-related videos were popping up across the popular short-form video app TikTok. Millions have taken part in the "Yee Haw Challenge," where they transform in a matter of seconds from everyday teens into lasso-holding, plaid-wearing, Stetson-sporting cowboys and cowgirls.

The virality of "Old Town Road" boosted the song to the Billboard Hot 100, where it debuted in mid-March at No. 83. Popular music label Columbia Records signed Lil Nas X just a week later.

Photo Film Magic
Photo Film Magic

Full Lyrics:

[Intro]

Yeah, I'm gonna take my horse to the old town road

I'm gonna ride 'til I can't no more

I'm gonna take my horse to the old town road

I'm gonna ride 'til I can't no more

(Kio, Kio)

[Verse 1]

I got the horses in the back

Horse tack is attached

Hat is matte black

Got the boots that's black to match

Ridin' on a horse, ha

You can whip your Porsche

I been in the valley

You ain't been up off that porch, now

[Chorus]

Can't nobody tell me nothin'

You can't tell me nothin'

Can't nobody tell me nothin'

You can't tell me nothin'

[Verse 2]

Ridin' on a tractor

Lean all in my bladder

Cheated on my baby

You can go and ask her

My life is a movie

Bull ridin' and boobies

Cowboy hat from Gucci

Wrangler on my booty

[Chorus]

Can't nobody tell me nothin'

You can't tell me nothin'

Can't nobody tell me nothin'

You can't tell me nothin'

[Outro]

Yeah, I'm gonna take my horse to the old town road

I'm gonna ride 'til I can't no more

I'm gonna take my horse to the old town road

I'm gonna ride 'til I can't no more

I got the hor

"Old Town Road" was embroiled in controversy before the end of March. Besides the Billboard Hot 100 list, the cross-genre song made it to both the Hot Country and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop lists. But Billboard quietly removed the song from its hot country rankings, and claimed that "Old Town Road" should have never made it there in the first place because "it does not embrace enough elements of today’s country music to chart in its current version."

Lil Nas's Fame and Success with 'Old Town Road'

Lil Nas X, 20, was born Montero Hill. He grew up outside of Atlanta in a poor household and, feeling alone, turned to the internet where he found memes and an avid following for a popular Nicki Minaj fan account (though his involvement is widely debated).

Full Lyrics of 'Old Town Road' by Lil Nas X ft Billy Ray Cyrus
Photo Business Insider

At 19, Lil Nas X decided to drop out of college in the summer of 2018 after just a year at a Georgia university. He crashed at his sister's house while he pursued a music career and posted some songs on SoundCloud that got little traction.

Then, right around Halloween 2018, Lil Nas X discovered a beat on YouTube from a then-19-year-old Dutch producer named YoungKio. Lil Nas X bought the track for a mere $30 off of a music-licensing website called BeatStars.

YoungKio's beat inspired Lil Nas X to create "Old Town Road," a song that's part-trap, part-country. He told Rolling Stone the song was "basically what I was going through, but in another lens," and that he chose the title "Old Town Road" simply because of how country it sounded.

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