“In life, we hide the parts of ourselves we don’t want the world to see,” Lil Nas X says as the video for his long-awaited new single “MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)” begins. “We lock them away, we tell them no, we banish them. But here… we don’t.” And he certainly wasn’t lying. Here we find the 21-year-old Georgia musician embracing his true self. Packed full of warped biblical references, Nas is depicted happily strumming his guitar in the garden of Eden before he’s tempted by a snake and condemned to death. A CGI Nas promptly slides down an almost endless stripper pole (with moves that’d impress even FKA twigs) straight to the pits of hell where he straddles a leather daddy devil before snapping his neck, stealing his horny crown and promptly growing wings like the multifaceted force for good he is. Phew!
Lil Nas X, whose real name is Montero, wrote an accompanying letter to his 14-year-old self. In it, he says: “I wrote a song with our name in it. It’s about a guy I met last summer. I know we promised to never come out publicly. I know we promised to never be ‘that’ type of gay person. I know we promised to die with the secret. But this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist. You see, this is very scary for me, people will be angry, they will say I’m pushing an agenda. But the truth is, I am. The agenda to make people stay the fuck out of other people’s live and stop dictating who they should be.” Not all heroes wear capes. Some wear blood red braids and thigh high PVC boots.
Also in the playlist you’ll find BROCKHAMPTON’s “BUZZCUT” in collaboration with Danny Brown. The track, which is the band’s first official release since 2019’s GINGER, comes with a seriously trippy 90s-inspired visual directed by Kevin Abstract and Dan Streit in which Joba births Danny Brown from his mouth. It’s fun and brilliant and we want more. There’s also banging new stuff from Princess Nokia, Yaw Tog (a whole album, TIME, which you should hear in its entirety), beabadoobee (more from her on i-D very soon!), AYA GLOOMY, Deijuvhs, COBRAH, Art School Girlfriend and so much more.