Lil Nas X joins forces with Taco Bell
“(L)ife has come full circle,” Lil Nas X wrote Monday on Twitter. “i officially work at taco bell again.”
The rapper, real name Montero Lamar Hill, is partnering with Taco
Bell to promote his debut album “Montero.” As the company’s inaugural, honorary “chief impact officer,” his role will be merging philanthropy, music and food while working on “menu innovations” and more.
Lil Nas X will make a cameo in Taco Bell’s breakfast campaign as the chain hopes to revive the most important meal of the day at restaurants nationwide. More “fan engagement opportunities” featuring the rapper will be announced later this fall.
The Grammy-winning artist and the restaurant company will be creating “an exclusive experience” around the upcoming album release and rewarding young creatives through the Taco Bell Foundation’s Live Mas Scholarship, according to a release. The album’s release date has yet to be announced.
Lil Nas X formerly worked at a Taco Bell branch in the greater Atlanta metro area in 2017, as referenced in his “Sun Goes Down” music video.
Winfrey picks next book:
One of the year’s most anticipated debut novels, Honoree Fanonne Jeffers’ “The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois,” is now an Oprah Winfrey book club pick. Published Tuesday, Jeffers’ novel traces centuries of Black history through a family in the American South and its contemporary narrator, young Ailey Paul Garfield. “The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois” is named for the canonical Black scholar and activist.
“I was so enraptured by
the story of this modern Black family, and how author Honoree Fanonne Jeffers wove the larger fabric of historical trauma through the family’s silence through generations,” Winfrey said in a statement. “It’s a combination of historical and modern, and it consumed me. I look forward to discussing with our community of readers and speaking with Honoree herself to discuss the themes that run throughout this special novel.”
Winfrey founded her book club in 1996 and has partnered with Apple since 2019. Her interview with Jeffers will air Sept. 24 on Apple TV+.
My Morning Jacket to release album: My Morning Jacket will release its first studio album in nearly six years, a self-titled affair, on Oct. 22. The first single “Regularly Scheduled Programming” is out now,
accompanied by a video directed by frontman Jim James with George Mays. The group kicks off a tour Friday in North Carolina.
“This song really hits home for me after what we’ve gone through with the pandemic,” James says of the single. “But even before then, it felt like so many of us were trading real life for social media, trading our own stories for the storylines on TV, trading our consciousness for drugs. We need to help each other wake up to real love before it’s too late.”
Aug. 25 birthdays: Actor Tom Skerritt is 88. Musician Gene Simmons is 72. Musician Elvis Costello is
67. Director Tim Burton is
63. Singer Billy Ray Cyrus is 60. DJ Terminator X is
55. Singer Jeff Tweedy is
54. Chef Rachael Ray is 53. Model Claudia Schiffer is
51. Actor Kel Mitchell is 43. Actor Rachel Bilson is 40. Actor Blake Lively is 34.