Travis Scott “always” thinks about the Astroworld tragedy.
The 32-year-old rapper was headlining the festival in his hometown of Houston in November 2021 when a mass crowd crush claimed the lives of 10 people near the front of the stage, and he’s admitted those who lost their lives and their families are always on his mind.
“I always think about it. Those fans were like my family. You know, I love my fans to the utmost… It has its moments where it gets rough and … yeah. You just feel for those people. And their families,” he told GQ magazine in an interview for the December /January issue.
The “Goosebumps” actor was “overly devastated” by what happened and found it “therapeutic” being able to channel his emotions into his new album “Utopia.”
“Making music, you think about things that go on in life and things that happen in your life, and you dial in on things. That moment for families, for the city, you know, it was devastating. And when it came to making, like even finishing the album … I got back into it probably like, I don’t know, months and months and months after. And the idea of just even getting back into music, working on music and just even getting into that, was therapeutic of being able to channel some of the energy into production and sounds and finishing it … I mean I was just overly devastated, you know?” he said.
On his Utopia album, a song titled “My Eyes” references what happened and features the lines: “I replay them nights, and right by my side, all I see is a sea of people that ride wit’ me. /If they just knew what Scotty would do to jump off the stage and save him a child.”
“[It’s about] the things I deal with on a day-to-day basis and the fact of how it could be misunderstood and the struggles of life and all aspects of life. The constant weight that’s put on. That you carry, you know. And just a vision through my eyes … It just came out when I was writing. Like I said, it was a real moment. The song is emotional to me. It’s one of my favorite songs on the album. And that verse means a lot to me. [I want people] to know I have pain too. I have concerns, things that I think about, and the things I see on a day-to-day basis I think about them. And every day I want to find change in the things, to make things better, make myself better. It’s just like: I go through things like everyone else. And even recently through something like I never could imagine,” Scott reflected.
