“Old Town Road” singer Lil Nas X is looking for an off-ramp from his recent legal trouble.
The Grammy winner, born Montero Hill, appeared in court Thursday as his lawyer asked a judge for a short delay so she could file a motion seeking to transfer his felony police battery case into an unspecified diversion program. She did not elaborate on the type of program but said she was waiting on an “expert report” to support the request. Diversion programs generally lead to charges being dismissed if defendants complete treatment or rehabilitation.
The Los Angeles County judge ordered the case back on April 6. Outside the courthouse in Van Nuys, Calif., Hill agreed to make a brief statement to reporters. His lawyer, Christy O’Connor, said he wouldn’t be able to take any questions amid the pending legal matter.
“All I wanted to say is to my fans, I really love, and I miss you, and I appreciate your support so much, and I can’t wait to be back hugging you guys,” Hill said before blowing a kiss. “You guys, have a good day.”
As he walked away, Hill stopped and asked for a song when he passed a busker with a guitar, smoking a cigarette outside. Jensen Pawley, 39, unpacked his instrument and played Radiohead’s “Lucky” as Hill tapped his foot. Hill handed him $100, leaving Pawley gobsmacked.
“It was a great moment,” Pawley tells Rolling Stone. “[He’s] a nice guy.”
Hill was arrested Aug. 21, 2025, after he was captured on video walking in traffic in the predawn hours, wearing only his underwear. Prosecutors say Hill, 26, was “strolling naked” along Ventura Boulevard in Studio City around 5:40 a.m. when police arrived.
They allege Hill assaulted responding officers who tried to take him into custody, injuring three of them. He was later charged with three counts of battery with injury on a police officer and one count of resisting an executive officer. Hill has pleaded not guilty and faces up to five years in state prison if convicted as charged.
After he spent the weekend in jail following his arrest, Hill called the incident “terrifying” in a social media post. “Your girl is gonna be OK, y’all,” the artist said in an Instagram video. “That was fucking terrifying. That was terrifying. That was a terrifying last four days. But your girl is gonna be all right.”At a hearing in mid-September, Hill’s lawyers said he was “in treatment” at an out-of-state facility. Judge Shellie Samuels sealed the details of the care he was receiving.
“You heard the ‘treatment’ word. We’re doing what is best for Montero from a personal standpoint and a professional standpoint, but most importantly, for his well-being,” Hill’s lawyer, Drew Findling, said after the September hearing. “He is surrounded by an amazing family, an amazing team of people that care about him and love him. And we’re just addressing those issues. It’s really as simple as that. He’s had a great life, and he’ll continue to have a great life. This is a bump that he’s going to get over.”
Before his arrest, Hill had shared unreleased music and mirror selfies on Instagram that sparked concern among fans. Police initially transported him to a nearby hospital for a possible overdose before taking him to jail.
Hill’s father, Robert Stafford, rushed to Los Angeles to support the rapper and later told London’s The Times that Hill had been dealing with “pressure” he placed on himself as an artist and as the “breadwinner” for multiple people.
“We all have breakdowns every now and then, but the difference is, yours get played out in the public eye when you’re a celebrity,” Stafford said. “Hopefully, this is a turning point in his mental stability.”
Did ‘The Life of a Showgirl’ Need an Encore? And Where Is Taylor Swift Going Next?
Taylor Swift has always loved a story. It’s what has set her songwriting apart for 20 years now — and what she has used to maintain her almighty superstar status. Both in her work and in the presentation of it, Swift has woven strong narratives of heartbreak, success, redemption, torture, and glory where all of the pieces fall into place and it’s easy to root for her.
With her latest album, The Life of the Showgirl, Swift presented a sequined tale of triumph. Finally, finally, the girl who spent her whole life trying to put the feeling of love into words had changed the prophecy by getting engaged (and now married) to Travis Kelce. Professionally, Swift was at her peak, too. She’d just bought back her masters with the earnings from her historic Eras Tour, an all-encompassing career feat that inspired the project.
But there’s no debating that the musician’s 12th album was her most polarizing yet (yes, even more than the 2017 LP, Reputation). Some critics and fans alike didn’t appreciate the execution of the “showgirl” idea sonically or thematically. But hate it or love it, Showgirl was the perfect way for Swift to revel in her success — and set the stage for her next show-stopping move.
That’s why it’s so confusing that the expert storyteller decided the show wasn’t over when she released The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore with four bonus tracks. One of the strongest elements of the original album was that Swift delivered a tight 12, and only 12, songs. “There’s not a 13th, there’s not other ones coming,” she said last year. “Every single song is on this album for hundreds of reasons, you know, and you couldn’t take one out and it’d be the same album. You couldn’t add one. It’s just right.”
Now, there is suddenly more to the story with the addition of “Patient Zero,” “Cleveland!” “Pink Clouding,” and “Babylon.” Unfortunately, as many fans have pointed out, none of the songs add to the narrative set forth in Showgirl.
Swift said she wrote the bonus tracks last year following the success of the album. “We just wanted to reflect and take in how grateful we were for the moment we were in,” she said, referring to the project’s collaborators, Max Martin and Shellback. That moment found Swift newly engaged, yet her lead single back, “Patient Zero,” looks back at a past relationship. “Pink Clouding” also reflects on a former flame, but without the regretful yearning that made “Ruin the Friendship” a standout. Meanwhile, “Cleveland!” takes the gushing over-the-heels joy from “Honey” and “Wood” and adds an almost spiteful twist. And then there is the new curtain-closer, “Babylon” where Swift hands out more pearls of wisdom over an acoustic cut that would fit better on Folklore or Evermore. In fact, all four songs sound like they were plucked from previous albums like Midnights or The Tortured Poets Department. With these four tracks, she has not only confused the story of Showgirl, she’s also muddled that of Taylor Swift™.
Swift is a known mastermind, who has planned her next career move years in advance, and she’s been celebrated for her expert marketing power moves. But where does the showgirl go from here? The Encore has unleashed more questions about Swift’s next chapter rather than offer a clear path forward.
On Sunday, Swift premiered the cinematic music video for “Patient Zero” at the 2026 MTV VMAs. It’s a chilling thriller, and one of her most impressive visuals to date. Was that the point of it all, to highlight her full-throttle pivot to film? We know that the musician has a directorial debut on the way with Searchlight Pictures. Maybe she finally found the time to finish it, and that’s why she worked on the Toy Story 5 soundtrack.
The Encore could also just be a way for Swift to get her 12th album back into the conversation, just in time for the first round of voting for the 2027 Grammys. One would expect the singer-songwriter to submit the project for all of the major categories, including the coveted Album of the Year and Song of the Year. It’s unclear whether Swift will submit both “The Fate of Ophelia,” which became Swift’s longest-running Number One song atop the Billboard Hot and her new shining single “I Knew It, I Knew You” for Song of the Year — the songwriting-focused Grammy she has yet to win.
Swift has spent the last six months riding on the high of “I Knew It, I Knew You.” The song dominated on country radio — and led the musician to drop a ton of Easter eggs hinting at her big return to the genre. She could honor her songwriting legacy with a country music return timed to the 20th anniversary of her debut in October. Now that would be a great story.