Lil Nas X Turns 24 with 'Playboy' Inspired Pics

Happy birthday to Lil Nas X, who turned 24 on Easter Sunday with a smoldering photoshoot that riffed on a classic "Playboy" issue and reclaimed an anti-gay slur.

Uproxx detailed that the "photoshoot that saw him embracing his inner femme and reproducing the magazine's January 1986 Cover Girls cover."

"The rest of the photos Nas posted to Instagram see him perusing the pages of his custom issue with a mischievous grin," Uproxx added.

Hot New Hip Hop detailed that the fake magazine cover, while paying tribute to Playboy, reclaimed a homophobic slur common in Jamaica, with the title "Battyboy" splayed above the "Montero" singer, who is seen "in heels, bunny ears, and no clothes, with just the silk sheets of the bed he's laying on (which is strewn with old Playboy magazines) to cover him up."

Added the music news outlet: "Whenever Lil Nas X fights back against bigoted individuals with his statements, he always does his homework."

Nas X frequently displays his wit and humor in social media and playful imagery, as when he heralded the imminent arrival of his first full-length album with an image that showed him sporting a fake pregnant belly.

The video to his global smash single "Montero (Call Me by Your Name)" depicted the singer sliding to Hell and giving Satan a lap dance – an indelible, and cheeky, rebuttal to those who wield religion as a club against LGBTQ+ people.

Still, Hot New Hip Hop noted, his razor-sharp jibes can cut a little too deep and a little too close; the magazine recalled a recent controversy in which Nas X tweeted about wanting to meet men in Africa.

"The reason why people expressed outrage is because he expressed that shortly after Uganda passed sweeping anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation that threatens the community," the outlet explained.