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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 106
MIGOSO≠set has had time to meditate on this
subject, the long arc of success. The uncom-
fortably high likelihood of failure for people
who do what Migos do. For a while, the group
couldn’t get out of their own way. They’d have
a hit, like 2012’s “Bando” or 2013’s “Versace,”
and get hot, and then O≠set would disappear:
“I went to jail twice”—once in 2013, when he
did nine months for a probation violation
relating to a burglary charge, and then in 2015,
when he served eight months on a subsequent
parole violation. “I came out bigger the second
time,” O≠set says. “People don’t do that. That
shit will wash your ass out.”
In 2015, Migos put out their debut album,
Yung Rich Nation. It sold a disappointing
15,000 copies the week of its release. Even
before that, they’d had the uncanny experi-
ence of watching things they’d popularized,
like the dab, speed through pop culture with-
out them. If you’ve noticed that rap music has
leaned heavily on a triplet rhythm these past
few years (that rising cadence, the one that
sounds like the artist is going up a three-step
escalator) or made hooks out of the same word
(Versace Versace Versace) repeated several
times: Migos. But the history of pop music is
full of organ donors. For a while it seemed like
Migos would be another one. “It’s been a lot
of times that I’ve been frustrated, just asking,
‘Why?’ ” Takeo≠ says.
O≠set spent much of that time watching
Migos songs become hits while he sat in a cell.
Then he came home famous. “I ain’t get the
opportunity to get coached until being a star,”
O≠set says now. “I came straight into this shit.
The whole ‘Versace’ shit, I wasn’t in the video.
I missed out on all that. I came home as a star.
I had a lot of money. I was wilding, I was being
young, I was just living and experiencing life,
though. So I ain’t got no regrets. You got to
grow up and mature when you see you’ve got
something going for real.”
Something you could jeopardize.
“Yeah, it’s a career! My momma proud of
me. I failed some obstacles. Just being serious.
Thank God I’m out of that.”
Here is an example of an obstacle, though
I won’t pretend to know all the details.
Yesterday, outside a streetwear convention at
the Sands Expo, they got involved in a confron-
tation with another artist, Sean Kingston. I’d
been with them just minutes before this but
had left through the front door. They went out
the back, where a guy with Kingston appar-
ently fired a gun in the air and was arrested.No one was injured. Today, Migos are not par-
ticularly inclined to disclose more than that.
“You was there, man,” Takeo≠ says. (I was
not.) “It wasn’t nothing crazy. Then they go to
putting the boost on it, just because I guess
we got the name or whatever. Nothing actually
happened. We actually came through and did
what we had to do and left.”
“I don’t know nothing about no fight,”
Quavo says of a TMZ report claiming that an
altercation preceded the shot. But then he
adds, almost as if to himself: “Now we know.
We new to this, so we don’t know. We up under
this microscope now.”- ••
TYSON, IN A LUXURIOUSLY pink leather
jacket that he has clearly put on for this occa-
sion, greets Migos at the door of his home,
all Spanish tile and McMansion arches. He’s
maybe slightly shorter than you’d expect. He
leads us through the house and out back, past
the swimming pool and the palm trees, to
where the pigeons are, in a coop that smells of
freshly cut wood. Inside, you can hear the birds
softly breathing. Tyson takes Migos through
his collection—the males and the females, the
rolling pigeons who do somersaults in the air.
“And they come back?!” asks Quavo, incred-
ulous. “They always come back?”
Mike says they do. It’s quiet for a moment.
The Migos look at the pigeons, and the pigeons
look back. Someone asks if any of these birds
have names. “No,” Mike says sadly—a virus rav-
aged the guys back here, and ever since he can’t
bring himself to individuate the pigeons more
than he has to. “It’s real cool you guys came
around, though,” he says.
Back inside, he shows them his trophy case.
It’s in the corner of a big empty living room
with giant ceilings, white leather couches, and
a piano in the corner. On the mantel, above
the fireplace, is a woodcut of Tyson punching
another man. The Migos rummage around
inside the trophy case and come away hoist-
ing Mike’s belts.
Quavo regards the one he’s holding. “Who
you knocked out for that one?”
“I don’t know,” Mike answers gently. “Just
a guy.”
He shows Migos photos on his phone of cars
he used to own. “That’s how we were living,
baby.” He says he sold the cars a long time ago.
College tuition, he says. It takes a toll. “I’m old
greatness,” he says. “You’re new greatness.”
Mike’s 8-year-old daughter comes into the
room. She sits down at the piano. She has
curly hair, pink headphones, and pink sneak-
ers. A silence falls as she begins to play—she
later says the piece is Spanish; she can’t pro-
nounce the name. Whatever it is, it’s beauti-
ful. Mike and the Migos stand in a reverent
semicircle, like four proud dads. “They’re all
here watching you!” Mike says. She does not
seem bothered by this fact. Minutes stretch on,
night setting in above the house. Quavo and
Takeo≠ and O≠set look respectfully into the
middle distance as she works her way through
the piece. When she’s finished, Mike looks at
her fondly. “That was very nice,” he says. The
Migos enthusiastically agree. They take turns,
kneeling to give Mike Tyson’s daughter a hug.
And then they leave, to go see some more
magic.zach baron is gq’s sta≠ writer.Page 78.From left: courtesy of Herman Miller;
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SELF-ADDRESSED STAMPED ENVELOPE.MAY 2017 GQ.COM 137Above the fireplace is
a woodcut of Mike Tyson
punching another man.
The Migos rummage
around inside the trophy
case and come away
hoisting Mike’s belts.