\n\t\tnd just like that, I\u2019m back in high school, parked out front of some kid\u2019s parents\u2019 house, hotboxing in the back seat of an SUV. Except this is Travis Scott<\/a>\u2019s custom Rolls-Royce Cullinan, featuring a bespoke two-tone exterior complete with a candy-green \u201cSpirit of Ecstasy\u201d hood ornament and a custom monogrammed interior. We\u2019re parked in front of a sprawling, 18,000-square-foot brutalist mansion, which belongs to the founder of Oakley Sunglasses and is currently for sale. Scott, an architecture buff, is here to tour the place and, as he slyly suggests, to see if it might become his own. Right now, though, he\u2019s seated next to me in the Rolls, casually making a few well-packed spliffs disappear into plumes of smoke.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tScott is dressed in a vintage T-shirt with the logo of the influential German art school Bauhaus, paired with a Chrome Hearts belt and Balenciaga jeans. As we chat in the car, he explains how \u2014 on the heels of a rec\u00adord-setting world tour during which crowds registered as earthquakes on geological surveys, as well as a Grammy-nominated, chart-topping album in 2023\u2019s Utopia<\/a> \u2014 he\u2019s looking to push things even further. \u201cPutting my whole body and soul into the next [project], for more people to understand,\u201d he says. Who exactly might those people be? \u201cThe person that still don\u2019t understand Trav no matter how long I\u2019ve been in this shit.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tTravis Scott photographed by Daniel Archer in Los Angeles on January 11th, 2026<\/p>\n Sunglasses by Oakley. Shirt by Chrome Hearts. Jewelry is artist\u2019s own.<\/p>\n \n\tHe has, in fact, been in this shit quite some time. Since his debut album in 2015, Scott has brought swarms of young fans into a universe that, through various commercial collaborations, includes shoes, apparel, sunglasses, McDonald\u2019s meals, Fortnite skins, in-game concerts, and cereal. With more than a decade at the center of the rap zeitgeist, Scott is an avatar for 2010s hip-hop. The way we might categorize the \u201cshiny suits\u201d era of the late Nineties with Mase and Puff Daddy\u2019s \u201cMo Money Mo Problems\u201d video \u2014 replete with its Jerry Bruckheimer-style extravagance \u2014 Scott\u2019s sonic and commercial maximalism, his cathartic blast of sounds turned up to max volume, his commitment to the rage, is the defining trait of the past decade of rap.<\/p>\n \t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n \n\tNow, the current generation appears geared for a revival of the 2010s aesthetic that Scott helped define. The year 2016 has become a TikTok fascination, as younger members of Gen Z look back 10 years, to when the current era\u2019s superstars, Scott included, released much of their most influential work. The oozing hedonism and syrupy psychedelia of \u201cMaria I\u2019m Drunk,\u201d from Scott\u2019s debut album, Rodeo, quite clearly presaged Justin Bieber\u2019s latest Swag-era turn. The chorus from \u201cAntidote\u201d \u2014 \u201cDon\u2019t you open up that window\u201d \u2014 might very well soundtrack some future documentary about the 2010s. \u201cSicko Mode\u201d featured one of the most significant beat switches in rap history, a structural gambit that reshaped how mainstream hits could move and fracture. In 2024, after Scott officially released his 2014 mixtape Days Before Rodeo on streaming, the project, already a decade old, nearly blocked Sabrina Carpenter from Number One on the charts. \u201cThat mixtape did a lot for me, and people really dialed into what I was as an artist,\u201d he says. \u201c[It\u2019s gratifying] to see people still fucking with the album years later.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tWatch the video interview below\t<\/p>\n \n\tScott\u2019s generation of rap stars emerged during a particularly optimistic moment in music, when digital distribution platforms, along with the democratizing force of social media, broke down some longstanding barriers in mainstream culture. It became more common for rap, rock, and everything in between to comingle. \u201cI think now it\u2019s limitless. There\u2019s no box,\u201d Scott says. \u201cFor a chorus, you might be feeling like this, for a verse you feeling like this. There\u2019s nothing wrong with them both being together. It\u2019s like a DJ playing fucking \u2018I kissed a girl, and I liked it\u2019 to fucking some Gucci Mane.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n \n\tSome of that era\u2019s optimism has since waned, as the prevailing conversation in hip-hop these days is a sense that the genre has strayed too far from its roots. Scott is familiar with these types of critiques, too, as they\u2019re similar to what rap purists said about the wave of acts that came in the 2010s. \u201cEven when I was coming in, it was like that,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople wanted to keep [rap] a certain way. I didn\u2019t. And now you got so many other artists that\u2019s on the same type of timing.\u201d Artists in their thirties, like Scott, are keeping a close eye on younger audiences, where they might once have looked up to older gatekeepers. \u201cAs the [new] generations come, those [older] people don\u2019t get pushed out. You see they start bending towards it and shit. Usually it was like the other way around: Generations had to conform up. Generations now conforming down.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tIn conversation, you get the sense that Scott sees the current landscape as decidedly different from when he was coming up \u2014 and at 34, on top of the world, he has the perspective that lets him appreciate how far he\u2019s come. \u201cEverything is now catching up to everything. The art, the fashion \u2014 all of that shit is becoming just as important, if not more important, than the actual music,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m not saying it\u2019s bad or nothing; it\u2019s just a new outlook, I guess. But you got to start \u00adpulling the layers back to the basics at the end of the day. Your core is still going to be music. When I came in, it was about rearranging all this shit.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t Jewelry is artist\u2019s own.<\/p>\n \n\tAS WE TOUR THE MANSION, Scott comments on the clean minimalism of the space. He tells me he\u2019s been looking at architecture programs he might enroll in, casually listing Harvard as a potential option. When Scott suggests he\u2019s possibly considering purchasing the $65 million property, it doesn\u2019t register as a ha-ha kind of joke, but more like something you say to gauge your friends\u2019 reactions before you actually do it. He\u2019d toured the home once before, though at the time it still had all of the owner\u2019s custom furniture. Today, with the plush sofas and cozy decorations installed by the real estate folks tasked with selling the place, the house feels very much like a home. Scott says it reminds him of the house where his children\u2019s mother lives (he shares two kids, ages three and seven, with Kylie Jenner). \u201cI think this is cool because it\u2019s like an open flow,\u201d he says, taking in the indoor theater complete with a world-class projector. He remembers his first visit here differently. \u201cWhen I actually came, I know [the owner] had these chairs. It was black leather chairs. The arms were more like a still structure that was built in his world.\u201d He pauses, recalibrating the room in real time. \u201cBut this feels mad comfortable, which I fuck with.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe owner, Jim Jannard, bought the mansion, located in Trousdale Estates in Beverly Hills, in 2009, not long after selling Oakley, the wildly popular sunglasses and apparel company he grew out of a motocross accessory brand, for approximately $2.1 billion in 2007. Like Scott, the Oakley founder understood how a subcultural aesthetic could scale without losing its edge. Oakley, with whom Scott has a brand partnership, was built on a kind of aggressive anti-fashion, gear designed for punks and ravers rather than runway models, a sensibility that later translated into global ubiquity. Scott\u2019s trajectory followed a similar arc. As his sound and image expanded into stadiums, brand partnerships, and global campaigns, he became an unavoidable symbol of the millennial rapper as brand ambassador and, in turn, an easy target for skepticism. As his presence became more and more dominant, his work was treated less like music and more like a logo or a brand activation. Call it hip-hop\u2019s version of the \u201crockism\u201d discourse that plagued the aughts: the persistent belief that once something resonates too commercially, its artistic ambition must have been compromised.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople wanted to keep [rap] a certain way,\u201d he says of his early days. \u201cI didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \n\t\u201cAs far as musically, they won\u2019t acknowledge a lot of the musical barriers and shit that I try to push with the music,\u201d Scott says of his critics. \u201cThe genre-bending that I try to do with the music, the people I try to bring together, the true understanding of what I\u2019m here to do.\u201d He points to this very publication\u2019s review, which called Utopia an \u201cempty paradise.\u201d \u201cI don\u2019t even overhype the things I\u2019m doing onstage, but this is all in the same time that I went out and did a show that had 65,000 people. So, for me, I never gave a fuck about what critics or what people [who] criticize the music think.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThat disconnect, between fan adoration and critical praise, poses a challenge that Scott does seem interested in conquering. Despite his reluctance toward interviews (\u201cI don\u2019t want to continually explain myself,\u201d he says), he\u2019s decidedly friendly and open as we talk. \u201cI can only put my best foot forward and go achieve and knock down barriers, right? But I think since the beginning of my career, that\u2019s always been what it is,\u201d he says. \u201cI think these writers or whoever these people are, they feel like they got to have this tone towards what I\u2019m doing.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tScott is blunt about his frustrations with critics, and about his annoyance at the Grammys. So far, Scott has been nominated for 10, including a Best Rap Album nod for Utopia in 2024, though he\u2019s yet to win one. He\u2019s not shy that he feels he deserves the award. \u201cThere\u2019s always the person that has one that will tell you it don\u2019t matter,\u201d he says. \u201cThey\u2019ll tell you it don\u2019t matter, but when you go in the crib, it\u2019s on the mantel.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tUtopia and its subsequent tour wrap up a distinct period in Scott\u2019s career. The tour \u2014 branded Utopia: Circus Maximus World Tour \u2014\u00a0 was also wildly successful, a sprawling global spectacle that spanned more than 80 concerts across six continents and more than 20 countries. By the time the tour ended late last year, it had sold more than 2 million tickets and grossed more than $250 million worldwide, making it the highest-grossing solo rap tour in history.\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t Outfit by Versace. Pin by Chrome Hearts. Sunglasses by Oakley. Jewelry is artist\u2019s own.<\/p>\n \n\tLike Kanye West before him, Scott had already built a reputation for ambitious live experiences. Early in his career, he was known for raucous, punk-like gigs, full of moshing fans. In 2020, he delivered a performance inside the video game Fortnite,<\/a> which garnered more than 12.3 million unique players and set off a new wave of in-game concerts from the likes of Ariana Grande, Lil Nas X, and Eminem. \u201cEven me doing in-game performances, we went back and forth. I love being in the physical [world], seeing the people. But for some reason, actually, [the in-game performance] was just so turnt.\u201d He notes that the global pandemic may have helped his cause. \u201cIt was a different time, right? Everybody was home. It was one of those moments.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIt was against the backdrop of Covid restrictions lifting that the Astroworld tragedy unfolded in 2021, fundamentally changing how Scott\u2019s performances, and the culture around them, would be understood. In the car, he becomes solemn when the subject comes up. He says he still thinks about the event, in which a crowd crush resulted in the death of 10 concertgoers at Scott\u2019s festival in Houston. One of the hardest parts for him on a personal level is the fact that it happened in his hometown. \u201cWhen I did that festival, I was trying to bring something to where I\u2019m from, and when you look back, it\u2019s like a time that was supposed to be so enjoyable just went wrong,\u201d he says. \u201cI would love to heal that in the city. But I would also want people to be receptive [to it]. I don\u2019t want to force a reception.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI would love to heal that [pain] in [Houston]. But I would also want people to be receptive to it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \n\tMore than four years later, Scott still faces scrutiny for the tragedy. \u201cThrough that experience, I think, there\u2019s a distorted view of who I am and what I care about,\u201d he says. I ask him what he\u2019d say to the commentators who hold him individually responsible. (In 2023, a Houston grand jury declined to bring criminal charges against Scott or other organizers; civil litigation has continued, and many claims have been settled.) \u201cI wouldn\u2019t tell them anything. I would ask them,\u201d he says. \u201cSometimes when I read or even hear about some of the shit that people write, I don\u2019t even know if they believe it. I think there\u2019s always been this distorted view of what I am. And it\u2019s my responsibility just to keep showing what it really is.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tSCOTT PREPARED FOR A LIFE in music almost from birth. He was born Jacques Webster II and raised between the Houston neighborhoods of Sunnyside and Missouri City. His dad bought him a drum set when he was three years old, and from there he was obsessed. Eventually, he\u2019d teach himself production, developing the eclectic sonic style that would define his career. Chase B, Scott\u2019s longtime DJ, grew up in the same area, and has known Scott since they were kids \u2014 even if Scott got a head start on music. \u201cIt\u2019s like our culture where we grew up,\u201d Chase says. \u201cObviously, he was super involved in the music, [but] I wasn\u2019t at the time. We were just cool. He was just playing me all the shit he was making, and the shit just sounded crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tLater, when Chase would DJ in college at Howard University, Scott would send him his songs to play at parties \u2014 proceeding to blow people\u2019s minds. \u201cHe would send me his music and I would go out to the house parties and I would just be playing it for people, and everybody was fucking with it. It was a whole thing, like, \u2018Who is this?\u2019\u201d Eventually, Scott would come and visit Chase on campus. \u201cWe just ran around to different stores and shit, giving mixtapes out,\u201d Chase recalls. \u201cWe were really doing everything guerrilla-style way before any album deal or artist deal got done or anything like that. We were just stuck in it, just me and him.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIn 2012, Scott, then known as Travi$ Scott, signed with Kanye West\u2019s G.O.O.D. Music after a single of Scott\u2019s, \u201cLights (Love Sick),\u201d caught Ye\u2019s ear. The next year, Scott started gaining wider attention with his mixtape Owl Pharaoh, a project that immediately stood out as a new sound in West\u2019s Yeezus-era orbit. The project drew as much from IDM (so-called intelligent dance music) and electronic styles as it did from Southern rap. Its blown-out synths, fragmented hooks, and dark, immersive atmosphere are a vivid precursor to the sonic distortion of the current era\u2019s underground-rap heavyweights. Listening to the mega-viral young artist esdeeKid, for instance, you can hear hints of mixtape-era Travis Scott.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t\t Shirt by Nike. Sunglasses by Oakley. Belt by Gucci.<\/p>\n \n\tOwl Pharaoh set the stage for Scott\u2019s world-building, a term he\u2019s keen on using. Its songs felt engineered for a highly distinct mood, and his voice, a husky brooding tone that was grizzled by Auto-Tune, functioned more as another instrument in the mix than typical vocals.<\/p>\n \n\tBy the time his Astroworld album arrived in 2018, Scott had fully fused his influences \u2014 Houston rap, electronic and EDM, Kanye-era maximalism, and aughts-vintage trap \u2014 into a blockbuster vision. Named after a now-\u00addefunct Houston theme park, Astroworld was both intimate and engineered for scale, marking the culmination of Scott\u2019s early ascent and establishing him as one of the defining rap \u00adartists of his era. Around this time, Scott launched the Cactus Jack label. Since then, it\u2019s grown into a creative umbrella for his own releases and for artists he\u2019s signed. In 2019, the label released its first Jackboys compilation, featuring artists on the label. \u201cEverybody just got their own thing,\u201d Scott says of his signees, who include Don Toliver, Sheck Wes, and SoFaygo. \u201cDon and Sheck with this raw energy. And Faygo, just melodically. Everybody just got their own energy.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tToliver remembers buying the Rodeo CD from Target: \u201cTravis really stood out. I really was just like, \u2018Wait a minute, this guy is from the H and he going crazy like this?\u2019\u201d It wouldn\u2019t be long before their paths crossed, as Toliver started gaining his own buzz around Houston. \u201cAnd then one day, he just randomly hit me up and was like, \u2018Yo, pull up to Hawaii,\u2019\u201d he recalls. \u201cI literally just threw everything I had in a bag, in a suitcase, and jumped on a plane.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tLast year, Cactus Jack released its second compilation album, Jackboys 2, which debuted at Number One on the charts. Fans\u2019 reaction to the project online, however, was mixed. \u201cI\u2019m hearing that maybe they wanted it to feel like a solo [album],\u201d Scott says. \u201cThis is just an album where you were in a group of different people. And I love that. I think the album is dope as shit.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/wp-content\/themes\/vip\/pmc-rollingstone-2022\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.gif\")
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