Travis Scott chose to honor Pop Smoke's legacy after the rapper was killed at just 20 years old during a home invasion robbery in the Hollywood Hills earlier Wednesday morning (Feb. 19) by playing a snippet of one of the Brooklyn drill rapper's unreleased songs.
The two collaborated on "Gatti" late last year on Scott's No. 1 Billboard 200 project Jackboys with his Cactus Jack labelmates Sheck Wes and Don Toliver. Pop Smoke, whose real name is Bashar Barakah Jackson, joined Scott and the rest of the gang for "Gatti," which peaked at No. 69 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the week dated Jan. 11 and made for the young rapper's career-first Hot 100 entry.
The Houston rapper shared a short video of himself cruising around while listening to the unreleased Pop Smoke song on his Instagram story earlier Wednesday. Listeners can make out the word "Dior" being repeated toward the end of the 15-second video, which name-drops the title of his bonus track and remix featuring Gunna on the top 10 Billboard 200 mixtape Meet the Woo, V.2 (chart dated Feb. 22).
The "Welcome to the Party" breakout star disclosed to Rolling Stone in an interview posted just last week that he felt starstruck meeting the "Stargazing" artist. "The first time I ever met Travis was at his f—ing Astroworld] Festival. He invited me to his festival in Houston, that was crazy too," he recalled. "He gave me a whole bottle, mad merch…. Real one, for sure."
Listen to the Pop Smoke snippet below.
Travis Scott played a new Pop Smoke snippet on IG —- pic.twitter.com/Y6NaH82nww
— — (@RodeoTheAlbum) February 19, 2020
