UPDATED 5/20, 10:50 a.m. ET: Mulatto confirmed her name change late Wednesday with a video previewing “The Biggest.”
The Instagram clip shows a search for the word Latto on Google and Merriam Webster, with the result saying, “Short for the lottery. Completely separate from Mulatto, represents a new chapter, good fortune, spiritually & financially. Often referred to as Big Latto, the alter ego.”
In another post showing a conversation in the studio, Latto walked fans through some of her thought process.
“You gotta be strategic with the word choice, ’cause it could come off a way that you don’t mean. That’s how I got in this predicament in the first place, with the damn name. … You gotta think ahead,” she said.
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Mulatto appears to be Mulatto no more, with her Spotify and Apple Music pages renaming her to Latto and a teaser for her upcoming single using the new name at the top.
The Atlanta rapper spoke about changing her handle in December and January, as the moniker has negative historical connotations and is seen as an offensive term to describe people of mixed race. She went on to share during an interview with Hot Freestyle that she didn’t intend to offend anyone, and that after realizing she did, she began working to get things changed.
“You know, you might know your intentions, but these are strangers who don’t know you, never even met you in person,” she said at the time. “So you gotta hear each other out, and if you know those aren’t your intentions and that’s how it’s being perceived, it’s like why not make a change or alter it? For me, it was the name. So now I’m like, ‘OK, my intentions was to never glorify being mulatto.’”
She tweeted “LATTO SEASON” on Monday, possibly alluding to the change.
The artwork for her upcoming Friday single “The Biggest” only uses the name Latto, with no sign of her evidently now-former stage handle:
Just last month, Mulatto was featured in the high-flying music video for Chris Brown’s “Go Crazy” remix alongside Lil Durk and Future, who also delivered verses on the track.
