Chords for How Lil Nas X Took ‘Old Town Road’ From TikTok Meme to No. 1 | Diary of a Song

_ _ [C] _ _ [Db] _ [B] Hey, what's [Eb] going on?
Everything's going on.
[E] Everything is [Ab] going on.
Mr.
Cyrus, how are you?
I'm doing good, Joe.
How you doing?
Yo, what's up?
I like your robe.
_ Thanks, yeah, I always make beats in this.
Play the number one [Eb] song in the world.
Okay, [B] let's hear Old Town Road.
_ _ I [Ab] got the horses in the back, [B] horseback is attached.
[Gb] Addie's mad at Black, got the hooses [Ab] black to match.
_ _ _ _ [B] _ _
So [N] you were just like throwing stuff up on SoundCloud that you recorded in your bedroom?
Either in the closet of my bedroom or the closet in my grandma's house, like making studios out of those.
_ Well, I'm from the Netherlands.
I live in a small town next to Amsterdam.
This is where I make my beats. _ _
_ It's just like a desk with two monitors, and I'm just selling my beats online.
I can make quality beats really fast, so I can like pump like 10 a day, you know.
[Ab] _ _ _ _ [B] _ _ _
[Ebm] _ _ _ _ [Abm] _ _ _ _
The banjos, you know, it really just hits me.
That's why [B] I made the track.
Who [G] wrote the sample?
It was Nine Inch Nails, _ _ _ [Gm] _ _ [Bb] _
_ _ [F] but I had never heard of Nine Inch [Eb] Nails before.
But AF, [G] they make some really good music, [Bb] you know.
[Ab] I would always get my beats like from YouTube.
I would just go through like 100 beats.
It's really just luck that people just find your [Abm] stuff, you know.
It's really luck.
I found the beat on like Halloween [G] night.
The beat was just speaking to me, [Ab] you know.
I was like, these songs are going to be [B] great.
Did you conceive of [Gb] the song as [Ab] a country rap song?
Country trap.
But like if I had to choose which one is more leaning towards, it would definitely be country.
I got the horses in the back.
Horse [B] tack is attached.
[Gb] Hat is mighty black.
[B] Got the boots is [F] black to match.
[Ab] I knew Old Town Road had to have some kind of funny lyrics just to keep people entertained.
Cowboy hat from Gucci.
Wrangler on my booty.
Did you have a [E] job at the time?
Were you working?
No, I was not working.
Like I was pushing my music [Db] through the internet like full time. _
From the very [Eb] night I released Old Town Road on Twitter, the [B] song was already like moving.
I'm [Ab] going to take my horse.
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Ab] Got the horses in the back.
I ran and we [Bm] found it on Twitter.
Somebody put his [Gb] song over a video that I already did.
And then I was [Abm] like, hold on, this song is _ kind of hard.
I [Ab] got the horses in the back.
It put the [B] black yeehaw agenda [Gb] and the song _ [Ab] _ together and it just shot off.
_ A lot of people like to say, [B] you know, it was like a [Gb] kid accidentally got it.
It's like, no, [E] this is no [Ab] accident.
Like I've been [B] I've been pushing this hard.
_ [Gb] _ _ The internet is basically like my parents in a way.
I was [B] raised picking up on stuff.
I learned [Gb] how to use it, you know, in my own way.
I saw _ [Ab] you made that post on [B] Reddit where you were like, what's that song [Ebm] that goes?
I'm going to take [Gb] my horse to Old Town Road.
Because I knew that's what [Ab] people want to search.
_ So, yeah, _ that's embarrassing.
I [G] didn't really know the song existed.
I think it was a girl who sent me a meme.
[E] She was like, I knew your producer thing.
Kia, Kia.
[Bm] So you'd never met Nas X [Ab] before.
You didn't know who he was.
I didn't [B] know who he was.
[Gb] Nothing.
I feel like it was meant to be, you know, me [Abm] finding him right on _ time.
[Ab] _ _ _ _
_ [B] _ _ It's 15 second videos.
I have a hard time explaining it [Eb] to anyone.
That's [Ab] like, so you make money how?
I'm like, I [B] dance on camera.
_ _ [Gb] _ _
Are you the first [Ebm] person to post Old Town Road on TikTok?
Yeah, it went crazy.
I [Ab] got the horses in the back.
Everyone was dressed like a cowboy for like three [Dbm] weeks.
I got the boosters like the max.
Riding on a horse.
[Gb] Once they hit TikTok and it was going viral, I was like, OK, we [Eb] _ won.
[Ab] We passed the biggest songs out and [Gb] we just passed it like it's nothing.
_ _ [Ab] It's nothing. _
[Ab] Ain't nobody tell me nothing.
You hear that?
That's Old Town Road, Lil Nas X, big hit.
And it was tearing up the country chart [Db] until Billboard pulled [B] it off for not [Ab] being country enough.
Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Now you got too much dip on your chill.
_ Do [A] you think there's a racial element to Old Town Road being removed from the [Gb] country chart?
I [Ab] see it as more of like a we let certain things slide, but maybe this one is too [Gb] different.
If we allow this, [Ab] who knows?
I was really [B] mad because [B] if it didn't go [Gm] off the charts, it would be like number one. _ _ _ _ _
_ [G] _ Billy Ray, tell me when you first heard Old Town Road.
I heard the song on March the 16th.
Who played it for you?
_ _ Tish.
That's your wife?
Yeah.
And we were having our morning coffee and she got a call, I think, from Ron Perry at the record label.
He said, hey, we've got this thing.
Would love for your husband to hear it.
And I actually stood up out of my chair.
I stood up and go, God, I love that.
That dude is original.
If you go to my past tweets, like two days after I put on Twitter, please help me get Billy Ray on there.
Because I was like, Billy [Ab] Ray Cyrus would be perfect for this.
_ Hat down, cross [Db] town, living like a rock star, spend a lot of [Ab] money on my.
Billy Ray, where's Old Town Road on the charts right now?
Which chart?
[Eb] The main chart, the Billboard Hot 100.
Oh, Old Town [Abm] Road is at number one.
I'm going to take my horse to the Old Town Road.
I'm going to ride till I can't no more.
I got it.
It's my beat, you know, I just made it here in my in my bedroom.
[Ab] And now the whole entire planet is listening to it.
I _ _ [B] can't go down the street without [Gb] hearing this song at all.
_ And from the [Ab] Internet, which is amazing.
_ _ _ Every now and then a song like that comes around and and I count my blessings that they reached out to me [B] and just let me be a part of this moment.
Are you ready to play it a million times for the rest of your life?
Yes, I'm going to play this [Abm] song.
This is my life song at this point.
[Ebm] _ _ _ _ [Db] _ _ _
[Ab] _ Do you have plans to [B] come to the US?
Yeah, yeah, [Gb] of course.
But I like college, you know, so [Abm]
I can just drop everything and just go [B] there. _
_ [Gb] _ _ Have you [Ab] ever ridden a horse?
Not yet.
That's crazy.
It's the craziest part.
Maybe in the music video.
_ [Db] _ Oh, of course.
[Dbm] _ _ _ _ _ [N] _ _ [N] _ _ _ _