CONTEXT

• Lil Nas X's real name is Montero Hill
• Lil Nas X's debut musical single (OTR) became an unexpected hit with meme culture on Tik Tok less than a year after he left school.
• A young Dutch record producer Young Kio composed the instrumental version of the song and made it available for purchase online in 2018. It features a musical sample of the song " 34 Ghosts IV by the American industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails. The sample was placed behind a combination of drums and bass
• Montero used his home computer to create waves of videos and memes eg images that put a funny spin on the song and posted them to social media from his family home therefore promoting the track itself without traditional record label intervention. 
• Old Town Road was uploaded to SoundCloud in December, but it really found its footing on TikTok, the popular video app that allows users to make short music videos with goofy edits and effects.  Tik Tok is especially popular with teenagers because teenagers like Memes.
•  Social Media and sharing memes helped propel it into the national music charts. It was spread on social media including support from big music stars like Justin Bieber who told his 106 million Instagram followers about his love of the song.
• This was a significant cultural moment in that artists no longer needed big label backing to achieve chart success. Lil Nas X has since signed to the giant Columbia Records. 
• The song has since been streamed nearly a billion times on Spotify with a further billion views on YouTube. It is the longest running US No 1 of all time with more than 12 weeks at the top.
• Lil Nas X defined the song in a Time Magazine interview as country trap – a fusion country music and rap. He also said it should have appeared on both the country and rap charts. 
• CONTROVERSY 

  Controversy started when the US chart organisers Billboard stepped in saying ''the song wasn't country enough''. They claimed that Old Town Road did not embrace enough elements of country music. They followed this by removing the song from the Country top 20 singles chart. 
• MUSIC GENRE BARRIERS

  This controversy of removing OTR from country billboard charts caused outrage starting a cultural conversation about the rigid borders between musical genres and who exactly can cross those borders in modern Post Trump America. 
• RACISM IN COUNTRY & WESTERN CHARTS

  When the American Billboard chart excluded Old Town Road from the country charts the move was widely regarded as racially motivated igniting a row in American pop culture over the types of music black artists are allowed to create as they were being shut out of traditionally white cultural spaces pigeonholed into Rap and R&B instead.
• Country music in America has been whitewashed, with African American country artists traditionally existing on the margins of the genre with very little exposure or recognition.
• The situation of African American country artists has not improved in a post-Trump America, where Black Lives Matter is still a necessary voice for African Americans as a result of the murder of George Floyd.
• African Americans are disproportionately shot by the police and incarcerated within the American prison system, a situation covered in Ava Du Vernay's 13th Documentary.
• BILLY RAY CYRUS

  Famous white country artists like Billy Ray Cyrus came out in support of Montero Hill and the song. This inspired  Montero Hill to respond to the ban by re-releasing the track with a guest verse from Billy Ray Cyrus himself.
• HYBRID MUSIC VIDEO

  The video for the song also became a talking point crossing Sci Fi and Western film genres with a narrative reminiscent of the time travel western film Back To The Future Part 3 which is an obvious intertextual reference. 
• INTERTEXTUALITY

  Other intertextual references  in the video to Western Genre include:-

  Back To The Future Part 3

  (time travel back to the old west)

  The Good The Bad & The Ugly

  (with title text next to the characters) 

  and Django Unchained & Blazing Saddles

  (Stylish black cowboy)

  The video featured time travel and the old West using western codes and conventions in the first part of the  video. 
• After Lil Nas X wins the street race against the rapper Vince Staples, he spends the money on a spectacular new colourful outfit. In his research of Russian folk tales, Vladimir Propp Propp noted the heroes were often given new clothes to recognise their triumph over evil and their new status in society. The theorist called this the transfiguration. The change in dress codes, from the traditional dull cloth and leather to more contemporary fabrics and designs in “Old Town Road”, connotes the musician’s transformation.
• Lil Nas X is portrayed as the hero character type in the story arc.
• The story arc positions Lil Nas X as an outsider, epitomised by the reaction of the locals playing bingo in the community hall.
• Classical western genre narratives then focus on the conflict between the hero and villain. You could argue the villain in “Old Town Road” is racism in the bingo hall and therefore the country charts – Lil Nas X defeats the evil, and “society accepts the hero”.
• So the filmmaker and the music artist Lil Nas X are using Media language to incorporate their own ideas, viewpoints and beliefs into the music video to convey a message to the viewer which is ideological in that it highlights and questions the racism in the American music charts as well as racism in America as a whole.
• HIDDEN MEANINGS

  There is a sequence in the video where Lil Nas X conveys a message and ideology about racism. He says "Last time i was here they weren't too welcome to outsiders" This relates to how he was not accepted in the American country & Western charts

   Billy Ray replies:-

  'you are with me this time'(eg Billy is now on the remix of the song)

  and also says

  'everything is going to be alright'

  (eg the remix with Billy Ray now becomes a worldwide hit). 
• There is also a sequence where Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus break into what appears to be a country and western gathering of older white people wearing western cowboy outfits playing bingo. They stop and stare at Lil Nas X which can relate to the song itself not initially being accepted in the country and western charts.
• After breaking into the bingo hall, the white people who stop and stare then appear to respond positively when Billy Ray Cyrus and a group of white musicians join Lil Nas X on stage as he performs the song. This could be a reference to how the song was not accepted and not a big hit until white country artist Billy Ray Cyrus got involved. At the end of the video the older white lady seems to accept and like Little Nas X. 
• Other hidden meanings include Lil Nas X being shot at by the white home owners in the old west which could be a direct reference to the disproportionate number of unarmed African Americans shot at by police or a particular example in 2020 when a innocent black man was shot for trespassing(Ahmaud Arbery). 
• Montero Hill has broken down further barriers this time in the traditionally homophobic black hip hop community by openly admitting to be gay and being hailed as an LGBTQ hero and fashion icon. Hill was quoted as saying that “since I came out in 2019,people have been coming up to me saying ‘you’re making a way for us’ he says proudly.  This has also affected the way in which the music video has been understood
• Lil Nas X presents a positive representation of a black man who subverts the stereotype of black men just having sporting prowess, physical strength and being straight but rather depicts a representation of a black man who is musically talented but also stylish in his dress sense and not ashamed to be openly gay.

  The music video reflects aspects of society and contemporary cultural issues in its discourse on race, gender and musical categorisation.