THANKS TO BILLY RAY, LIL NAS X IS MOS DEF COUNTRY (UPDATE)

We have an intriguing developing situation here, cowboys and cowgirls. The Billy Ray Cyrus remix of Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” (Columbia) is #1 at iTunes, five slots above the original track, while the two versions are #1 and #2 Spotify U.S. and Apple Music and #2 and #3 at Spotify Global. Meanwhile, Billy Ray is a top trending topic at Twitter, as the remix boosts the track into meme overdrive.

Can we call the damn thing a country track already? It's appeared on several of the key Spotify country playlists and has been detected at 30+ Country stations in addition to big spins at Pop (where it debuted at #28) and Rhythm (#21). It's also going in the U.K., where it appears headed for the Top 5 on the Official Singles chart. Ron Perry is now being fitted for a Nike-branded Stetson.

There was much chatter among biz folk in Vegas over the weekend that not putting Lil Nas on the ACMs was a huge missed opportunity.

Oh, and Will Smith is in, people.

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