Lil Nas X, has written a heartfelt note to his 14-year-old self to mark the release of his music video “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)”.
Lil Nas X whose real name is Montero Lamar Hill, released the video for the song on Friday (26 March), which sees him travelling through a fictional land, kissing an alien and giving the devil a lapdance.
“In life we hide the parts of ourselves we don’t want the world to see,” the voiceover at the top of the video says.
“We lock them away, we tell them ‘no’, we banish them. But here, we don’t. Welcome to Montero.”
Celebrating the video’s release, Lil Nas X shared a letter to his teenage self on Instagram, addressing his decision to come out as gay in 2019 while “Old Town Road” was the No 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100.
“Dear 14-year-old Montero,” he said. “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.”
Adding that releasing that video was “very scary” for him, as people would accuse him of “pushing an agenda”, the 21-year-old continued: “But the truth is, I am. The agenda to make people stay the f*** out of other people’s lives and stop dictating who they should be.”