Mix of rap and country music, the song Old Town Road by Lil Sin X has just won a record for longevity by being kept ten-seven weeks at number one in sales in the United States, based on the classification of Billboard magazine. The anthem catchy has dethroned the summit of the top titles, One Sweet Day Mariah Carey, released in 1995, and Despacito (2017), of Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee. These two songs had been number one for sixteen weeks.

If Despacito has been a global phenomenon thanks to YouTube, Old Town Road took off with the help of another social platform: the application chinese video-sharing TikTok. After buying 30 dollars of a Dutch artist on a sample found on the Internet, Lil Sin X, rapper 20-year-old native of the State of Georgia, has composed this song before putting it on-line TikTok in December 2018. Objective, that the users of the application take ownership of it. It worked beyond the hopes of the singer. Hundreds of thousands of people are filmed on Old Town Road thanks to a viral challenge, the application of which Tik Tok is the secret, the "Yee Yee Juice Challenge". Created by a user of the platform, he shows how he turns into a cowboy after drinking a magic drink, the "yee yee juice", all under the melody of Old Town Road . "Maybe I should pay TikTok," said Montero Lamar Hill, the real name of Lil Sin X, in an interview at the Time. "They have really boosted the song. [...] I owe them a lot".

The artist has written a title corresponding to the codes of the Internet and social networks. Being very active on Twitter, Lil Nas X knew what pleased the young people: it was for example observed that the cowboy culture, the central theme of the song, spread out on the web. Lil Nas X has developed a real strategy to promote his single on the Internet, before you publish the song on platforms more conventional (like Soundcloud or Spotify. The rapper has finally signed a contract with Columbia Records in march.

The song has also benefited from a strong media coverage because of the debates it has aroused. If Lil Sin X describes Old Town Road like a song "country trap", the magazine Billboard considered that it had not its place in the ranking of country songs because "it did not provide sufficient evidence of this style of music". John Marks, global head of country music at Spotify, has told Rolling Stone not to have "never heard of Lil Nas X up to this history of classification". The decision of the Billboard has created a strong controversy, artists, blacks being less recognized than their white counterparts in the world of the country.

Lil Nas X has quickly found a counter-attack. In April, he recorded a new version of the song in a duet with the icon of the country, Billy Ray Cyrus, father of Miley Cyrus. If this was not enough to change his mind Billboard , the song has gained a new popularity and has established itself at the top of the best sales of all types.

Old Town Road has also been remixed with rapper Young Thug and the young artist, Mason Ramsey. A new version, a duet with RM, a member of the ultra-popular Korean group BTS, has been released this week. To this day, all of the versions of the song amass close to a billion listens on Spotify.