Nicki Minaj Congratulates Lil Nas X On Celebrating His Barb Standom

Long before he was the Billboard Hot 100 record-breaking, Grammy- and VMA-winning megastar maestro in back of "Old Town Road," Lil Nas X was a Barb. Still is, case in point. The variation currently he is a Barb with influence — and on Tuesday night (June 16), he used it to tweet at Nicki Minaj herself to ask if trim appear on a song of his.


This led a fellow Barb to ask, "How come you never claimed her once people asked in case you were a barb?? We all knew who you were." The question digs back inside Lil Nas X's past because the voice beyond a popular Twitter account, one he was able to make use of to help "Old Town Road" go stratospheric. As Intelligencer's Brian Feldman noted in 2019, "By trafficking in memes, viral threads, engagement bait, and Nicki Minaj stanning, Lil Nas X was able to prepare build a six-digit follower base on Twitter, also it was that platform that served as a springboard for 'Old Town Road.'"


However because the song was exploding, Lil Nas X's team denied his involvement with the account, and by association, his Barb standom. It's something the artist addressed in response to his fellow Barb's tweet, writing, "i didn't want people to know I was gay tbh."


Any time another fan clarified that "being a barb don't make you gay," Lil Nas X expanded on his message: "it don't nevertheless people will assume in the event you had an entire fan page serious about nicki u are gay. And the rap/music industry ain't exactly built or accepting of gay males however He added in a follow-up quote-tweet that it "was never anything personal."


In fact, as soon as "Old Town Road" first took off, Lil Nas X had not publicly come out. He waited up until the song was firmly planted at No. 1 last June throughout Pride Month make the announcement on Twitter, pointing to messages in his song "C7osure." "Some of y'all already know, some of y'all don't care, some of y'all not gone fwm no more," he tweeted in June 2019, nevertheless before this month ends I want y'all to listen closely to c7osure. 🌈"


Minaj herself didn't respond directly to Lil Nas X's request to hop on his song. Nevertheless, she did reply to the conversation playing out in her mentions, addressing Lil Nas X by name. "It was a little bit of a sting while you denied being a barb, however I understand," she wrote. "Congratulations on building up your confidence to speak your truth. @LilNasX"


Lil Nas X, in turn, replied to apologize. "The generous queen, I love u. And i'm sorry I did that in a time where u were already getting so much bandwagon hate," he wrote. "I felt so bad, hoping u wouldn't visualize my denial. I was just so afraid of people finding out about me and losing everything before I even got a chance."


Minaj's latest song is "Trollz," a teamwork with Tekashi 6ix9ine. Lil Nas X, meanwhile, tweeted in May that his next album was "82 [percent] DONE." Maybe there's still room in that final 18 percent for a Minaj team-up immediately after all.