about who she’s dating that’s rare-
ly rooted in fact. During the first week of February,
Megan caught the ire of the internet after G-Eazy
posted an Instagram story featuring him kissing her
on the face. In true Megan fashion, she’d joke a day
later that the Bay Area rapper just liked the taste of
Fenty makeup, while denouncing any rumors.
“These are my immediate girlfriends, and we all
have a lot of guy friends,” she says. “But now, it’s just
a public thing. People think that if I’m hanging out
with anybody, it got to be, ‘Oh, they’re having sex.’
Why can’t I just be turnt up with my friend tonight?”
she asks. “They’re just doing this shit because they
want some attention, and I cannot feed into it. I have
a little anxiety, because I’m still going through the
grief from losing my mother and my grandmother.
Then I have to get on the internet and see these
motherfuckers talking about me? That shit really be
pissing me off sometimes.”
Megan assures the roomthat she’s strong in mind,
confident, and loves herself, but the constant deluge
of Instagramcomments, gossip blogs, and opinions
sometimes take their toll. One of the drawbacks to
becoming a sex symbol is how quickly the public
strips you of your humanity, and relegates your like-
ness to a product. “Because I don’t really clap back
and I don’t show I’m feeling sad on the internet, and
I’mshowing that I’mpissed off,” she says, “they prob-
ably think, ‘Oh, she’s a celebrity, so she’s not going to
care about this.’ ”
Megan is prepping a new album, titledSuga, mod-
eled after a new persona. Typically an alpha on the
MEGAN THEE STALLION[Cont. from 47]
top of the rapper food chain, she wants to show a
side of herself that’s “sensitive” in ways Megan Thee
Stallion has never allowed herself to be perceived. On
lead single “B.I.T.C.H.,” Megan flips Tupac Shakur’s
“Ratha Be Ya N.I.G.G.A.” to open up about a toxic re-
lationship, rapping, “But it’s 2020, I ain’t finna argue
’bout twerkin’.”
“I feel like sometimes guys be trying to be too con-
trolling over me,” Megan says of the line. “I’m like,
‘No. I’m still gon’ shake this ass. I’m gon’ shake this
ass every night at my shows. I’m gon’ shake this ass
with my friends, with my fans.”
It’s the first project she’s putting out into the world
without the guiding hand of her mother. Megan
hopes to dropSuga on a special day in the spring
— “May 2nd is my mom’s birthday.” So far, she has
written or recorded in Cabo, Miami, Los Angeles, and
Texas. SZA, Kehlani, and the Neptunes are confirmed
for the project. Pharrell has dubbed her “Megan
Thee Machine” for her work ethic.
Megan is still in awe of Pharrell after recording
with him in Miami. “I would go in and write a song
and the beat would sound one way, but by the time
he gets done to it, it’s a whole new song,” Megan says.
“I had never worked with a producer before that goes
back in on his own beats and changes a bunch of
stuff, like post-production. ‘Wow, these beats don’t
even be done? That’s crazy.’ ”
In the new year, Megan the student and artist is
looking to change. She’s taking two online classes
this semester and is determined not to repeat the
same mistakes she made in 2019 as a full-time rapper
and part-time student. “I could’ve did better,” she
says with a sigh. “I still passed. This semester I really
want to take my time with sitting down and actuallystudying for my tests, getting my homework out the
way earlier. I’m already off to a pretty good start.
Took my first quiz and exam, and I made A’s on both
of them.”
Similarly, as a musician she has begun to think
about what her younger fans might need to hear
from her. “When I started making music, I was mak-
ing music that I liked,” Megan tells me hours before
she hits the stage. “But I wasn’t thinking about any-
body else in my music. When I’m looking at who’s
in the crowd, and I’m looking at even my god-sisters
— they’re six, seven, eight — and they’re singing my
songs, I’m like, ‘OK, let me give y’all something a
little deeper, because I definitely want to grow with
my music.’ ”
But before Megan can get to any of that, she has
a hometown show to get through. A room full of
Hotties, Houston rap legends (Bun B, Paul Wall, Slim
Thug), and friends (Kelsey and Daren are obviously
waiting in the wings) are all present for a very specif-
ic, very Texas moment in history. The TSU marching
band arrives onstage to perform Megan’s “Big Ole
Freak,” a fitting dedication for a classmate. A few mo-
ments later, fog fills the air, the bass begins to hum
in earnest, and Megan Thee Stallion emerges, riding
a rotating merry-go-round horse. Ginuwine’s “Pony”
rattles the speakers.
Megan performs the songs that made her a star,
and the Hotties scream back every single word. To-
ward the end of the show, she lets them all on her
stage to twerk — probably imperfectly — and looks
on with pride.
“I want to cry a little bit,” Megan told me a few
hours before, as I left her house. “We going to cry,
but we still doing bad-girl shit.”Iconic. Provocative. Infl uential.
ONE YEAR
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