The singer-rapper pair’s much anticipated country-trap collaboration is finally here
- Lana Del Rey and Quavo dropped their "Tough" single and music video on Wednesday, July 3
- The singer-rapper pair first performed the collaboration in June at Del Rey's headlining concert at Boston's Fenway Park
- The new song marks Del Rey's first rapper collaboration since 2017's Lust for Life
At last, Lana Del Rey and Quavo’s genre-blending collaboration, “Tough,” is finally here.
After weeks of teasing fans with snippets and a live performance, the “Summertime Sadness” musician, 39, and Migos rapper, 33, released their breezy new track on Wednesday, July 3, along with an intimate countryside visual directed by Wyatt Spain Winfrey.
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Set against a rural backdrop and a picturesque haze, the two artists play an intrepid guitar-loving, shotgun-toting couple as they bond over fearlessly enduring life's trials.
“Tough like the scuff on a pair of old leather boots / Like the blue-collar, red-dirt attitude / Like a .38 made out of brass / Tough like the stuff in your grandpa's glass,” Del Rey sings breathlessly on the song’s chorus.
Wyatt Spain Winfrey
Quavo and Lana Del Rey star in "Tough" music video
The video shows her and Quavo enamored by one another as they share cozy bear hugs in front of their rustic mansion and cuddle beneath the sunshine in a grassy field. One scene even shows the singer-rapper pair teasing almost-kisses, while another features Del Rey sitting lovingly on her collaborator’s lap on their cottage porch, wielding a guitar.
“Tell me how it's hard for you / Like a nickel on strings and your good old Gibson guitar,” the duo trade off on the single’s second verse. “Like the songs that your mama sing to you / And the way that it makes you tell the truth / If you come from where you come, then you were born tough.”
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“Tough,” produced by Andrew Watt and Cirkut and co-written by Clayton Johnson, finds Del Rey and Quavo seamlessly fusing their respective styles over a country-trap beat, harkening back to the hip-hop-influenced sound that decorated the former’s lauded debut album, Born to Die.
The new song marks Del Rey’s first rapper collaboration since 2017’s Lust for Life, which included songs with A$AP Rocky and Playboi Carti. She and Quavo first teased a sneak peek of it in an Instagram teaser on Wednesday, June 19, followed by a debut performance at Del Rey’s headlining show at Boston’s Fenway Park the next day.
Wyatt Spain Winfrey
Quavo and Lana Del Rey star in "Tough" music videoEarlier this year, Del Rey announced plans to release a country album in 2024 titled Lasso, expected to arrive sometime in September. Per Billboard, the hitmaker shared the news of her upcoming 10th studio LP during its Billboard x NMPA Songwriter Awards.
“If you can’t already tell by our award winners and our performers, the music business is going country,” she told the crowd. “We’re going country. It’s happening. That’s why Jack has followed me to Muscle Shoals, Nashville, Mississippi, over the last four years.”
Del Rey teased her country-influenced album again while speaking to NME in May, saying, “Oh geez, what can I say now? When I gave Jack Antonoff his award for best producer of the year [at the 2024 Grammys], I said, ‘Welcome Nashville to Hollywood and Hollywood, welcome to Nashville,’ because the music business has gone, gone country.”
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“And it went silent; 5000 people, dead silent,” she added. “Then the next week, we had three major artists announce big country albums.”
The “A&W” singer remained mum on details, though, after being asked what fans can expect from her new project. “So where’s Lasso going? I really have no idea now!” Del Rey replied.
Quavo, meanwhile, dropped his latest solo studio album, Rocket Power — which featured two songs with his late nephew, Takeoff, last August.
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