Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus took their remix of the viral hit ‘Old Town Road’ to the BET Awards 2019 last night (June 23). Watch their performance below.
The duo made a grand entrance – on horses. Nas X and Billy Ray trotted to the award show’s entrance at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, California, before taking to the stage, which was dressed up to look like a saloon from the Wild West, complete with a bar, tables and patrons who doubled as backing dancers.
The audience received the performance with rousing singalongs, with some celebrities in the crowd – like Cardi B – even mouthing the lyrics.
Last Friday (June 21), Lil Nas X released his debut EP, ‘7’. Besides the original and remix versions of ‘Old Town Road’, it features new songs like the Nirvana-interpolating track ‘Panini’ and ‘Rodeo’, which features a verse from Bardi.
Cyrus’ remix of ‘Old Town Road’ has been number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for 11 weeks now. The song – sans Cyrus’ contribution – first went viral on social network TikTok, and became the subject of controversy earlier this year when Billboard decided to remove it from its Hot Country Songs chart when it entered the Top 20, because “it [did] not embrace enough elements of today’s country music to chart in its current version”, Billboard told Rolling Stone.