Chance the Rapper premiered a brand-new, still-untitled track on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert last night. The song was a collaboration with Canadian singer-songwriter Daniel Caesar, who joined Chance on backing vocals and electric guitar. The song is mostly percussionless, but builds to a gospel-esque climax featuring a full band and a trio of backing singers.
Chance also sat down for an interview with Colbert, who introduced Chance as his “collaborator and friend.” The two discussed the fact that Chance is not actually planning on running for mayor of Chicago (“I don’t like politics”) and his charitable work with the Chicago Public Schools. He discussed church, faith, and his favorite hymn (“This is the Day”), and revealed that the song he was performing was written very quickly for the show. Chance said that he intended to do his song “Grown Ass Kid” for the show but couldn’t (“for reasons I don’t really want to talk about,” Chance said), and also mentioned that he’d been working in the studio lately.
Chance recently worked with Colbert on a rap for his opening song for the Emmy Awards. This is the second time Chance has unveiled material on Colbert’s show; in 2015, the rapper performed Coloring Book‘s “Angels” on the show for the first time to announce the release of the single.
