Ella Langley is now making an impact in the rap game.
As we near the end of the year, it’s becoming increasingly clear that 2026 will go down as the year of Ella Langley. Simply put, it’s hard to argue that she’s not just the hottest star in country music, but in music as a whole.
Launching off the success of her Riley Green collaboration, “you look like you love me” throughout 2024 and 2025, as well as other hits such as “weren’t for the wind,” the Alabama native has become nothing short of a phenomenon thanks to the megahit that is “Choosin’ Texas,” And, in turn, she has captured the hearts of nearly everyone in the country and the world over the past year.
Since its release on October 17th, it is now the longest-running #1 hit by a female artist this century, the only country song by a woman to triple up and go #1 on Billboard’s Hot 100, Hot Country and Country Airplay charts simultaneously. In case that wasn’t enough, thanks to the success of her sophomore album, Dandelion, which debuted at #1 on the all-genre Billboard 200 and sold 169,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in its first week, Langley became just the second woman in history to hold the #1 album and song in the U.S. simultaneously with a country song/album.
Last month, she made U.S. history by officially capturing the longest-running #1 hit in U.S. history with 23 weeks (now 24), passing Mariah Carey’s long-standing record of 22 atop the all-genre Billboard Hot 100.
“Choosin’ Texas,” in particular, has gotten so big that it caught the ear of none other than Drake, who has also had himself quite the year in 2026, notably breaking Wallen’s record for most songs charted on the Billboard Hot 100 in a single week (42) upon the release of his new record, ICEMAN, and its two accompanying projects, MAID OF HONOUR and HABIBTI.
Ironically, the Alabama native was the only reason that the rapper didn’t become the first artist in history to occupy the entirety of the Top 10 on the Hot 100 that week, with “Choosin’ Texas” being the only non-Drake song in the Top 10. Though she blocked him from making history, it’s clear there’s no bad blood between the two. In fact, he’s a big fan. Earlier in the summer, the “Passionfruit” singer went viral for blasting the song in Houston at a nightclub while he was deejaying an event.
Over the past few months, the pair has been at the center of rumors surrounding a potential collab. In case you missed it, let me catch you up to speed.
Back in June, the “Passionfruit” singer went viral for blasting the song in Houston at a nightclub while he was deejaying an event. Flash forward to August, Langley would proceed to give a shoutout of her own to Drake, taking to TikTok to post a video of her lip-syncing the rapper’s legendary collab with Lil Wayne, “HYFR (Hell Ya F*cking Right),” which famously contains the George Strait reference, “All my exes live in Texas like I’m George Strait.” Clearly seeing her earlier TikTok, Drake would take to Langley’s comment section almost immediately, complimenting her songwriting with the simple comment, “Goated Pen.” In turn, she’d simply reply with a shocked emoji.
Just a week later, on August 22nd, he was spotted jamming out to “Choosin’ Texas” next to Langley’s opener, Ernest, during her show in Little Rock, Arkansas, at the Simmons Bank Arena. During her performance, the camera panned to a tent where Drake was having the time of his life, and he was singing along to every word. Of course, the crowd went wild when they saw he was there. A few days after the show, Langley would also upload a photo of herself chatting with the rapper in a photo dump on Instagram.
Drake would then take it a step further at the end of August. In a nightclub in Toronto, Drake hopped on the DJ stand and debuted his brand new remix of “Choosin’ Texas,” which was revealed to be titled “Solar Eclipse.” What made the snippet of the remix notable is the fact that Drake laid down his own vocals.
As Drake geared up for his latest project, an extension of HABIBIT subtitled “Fear of Missing Out,” he’d drop a teaser of the track featuring “Choosin’ Texas.” Originally, the teaser video featured footage of Drake and Langley chatting it up backstage, but the video was eventually taken down when the rapper re-uploaded his mixtape on YouTube in September.
As it turns out, Drake ended up officially releasing “Solar Eclipse” featuring Don Toliver when HABIBIT (FOMO) dropped on streaming on October 2nd. Like the original teaser, the track opens up with Drake interpolating “Choosin’ Texas.” Beginning by dropping the chorus’ iconic opening line “She’s from Texas I can tell”, Drake launches into a raunchy reimagining of the chorus in “Solar Eclipse’s” first verse.
“She’s from Texas, I can tell by the way she grip on my wood grain
She’s down to take a hundred shots with me and talk about my pain
It doesn’t take a crystal ball to see
A cowgirl ends up riding off on me
Drinkin’ yak all by myself
She’s from Texas, I could tell, baby”
Additionally, Toliver repeats the “Choosin’ Texas” lyric in the chorus, once again replacing “Jack” with “yak” (slang for Cognac) like Drake.
“Fort Bend, Texas, Katy, Texas, bae, I can’t make this up (Tell the truth, babe)
Sippin’ yak all by myself (Tell the truth, babe)
She’s from Texas, I can tell (Tell the truth, babe, yeah)”
So far, Drake’s “Choosin’ Texas” shoutout/interpolation has worked wonders. Garnering a hefty 18 million streams on Spotify alone as of writing, it allowed “Solar Eclipse” to debut at #5 on the Hot 100, scoring Drake his record-extending 91st Top 10 hit on the chart. Ironically, it sits just three spots below Langley’s original as the record-breaking hit slid to #2 on the chart following Taylor Swift’s release of “Patient Zero.”
While I can’t say that Drake’s track is great in any way, shape or form, it highlights the growing influence that Langley has had on music and American culture at large over the past year. Though the likes of Morgan Wallen and others have made crossovers into rap and other genres over the years, it’s incredibly rare to see an artist as massive as Drake go out of their way to interpolate and shout out an artist/song that truly has no business crossing genre lines.
Take a listen to the track for yourself below.
“Solar Eclipse” (feat. Don Toliver)
