In the few short years it’s taken Lil Uzi Vert to yah yah yah his way to the front of the emo-rap movement, the 23-year-old has developed a fervent cult following and notched several unexpected mainstream smashes. But a persistent question has followed the “Bad and Boujee”–featured rapper all the way to the upper reaches of fame: Is he serious? His contemporaries, like Lil Yachty and Playboi Carti, have fairly conventional relationships with popular culture. But Uzi is a rapper from North Philly who calls himself a rock star and breaks all the rules of how hip-hop is supposed to sound. He gives meltdown-level, Joaquin Phoenix–performance-art interviews. And he’s as much a walking meme as he is a celebrity, with a gift for Vine-length quips—not to mention 30-foot stage dives—that go viral. How much of Uzi’s character is an inside joke among the Juul generation? I went to Irving, Texas, to find out. Just kidding—I went to Texas to talk to him about the drip.

Few artists achieve such a singular vision for their personal style, not in an era when entourages have expanded to include creative directors and “day stylists.” Uzi dresses instead with a flair reminiscent of Axl Rose, Marilyn Manson, and Prince, if Prince shopped at Dover Street Market and had a standing appointment with Ben Baller (the L.A. jeweler who made Uzi a $200K diamond pendant of Manson’s bust). The only question more unknowable than what Uzi will wear on any given night is whether he’ll even show up.

Lil Uzi is scheduled to take the stage in Irving at 10:00 P.M. for one of a handful of spring shows. It’s 10:30 and his small team is furiously texting. Rappers showing up late is neither unusual nor a crisis, but with Uzi, anything is possible. The previous weekend, he canceled a headlining performance at BUKU fest in New Orleans after missing his flight from Philadelphia, where he grew up and lives when he’s not recording in Atlanta. When the festival organizers got word a few hours before Uzi was to take the stage, they projected a message on the main stage:

LIL UZI IS STILL IN PHILADELPHIA AND DECIDED NOT TO COME AT THE LAST MINUTE. THERE IS NO REASON...SUPPORT ARTISTS WHO SUPPORT THIER [sic] FANS

By 10:40, the only sure thing is that the huge Texas skies are about to unleash a biblical thunderstorm. As the cop manning the loading dock at the Toyota Music Factory stresses about Irving’s 11:00 P.M. sound curfew, Uzi’s black van pulls in and, at the same moment, DJ PForReal drops the beat to an unreleased track inside. Uzi is wearing a patterned camp shirt and plaid Burberry scarf over skinny Rick Owens jeans and white Air Force Ones. He’s tied the scarf over his Joker-green dreads, and his neck is wrapped in several pounds of gold braids and diamond-encrusted pieces, the largest of which says “YSL” in bubble letters. I fire off a few questions as he hops up the stairs: Quick portrait for GQ? He strikes a pose, hands flashing peace signs on either side of the scarf. After about seven frames, he bolts for the entrance. What’s that shirt? Prada? “Um, Burberry,” he says calmly. Damn, bricked it. Less than 20 seconds later, he’s at the edge of the stage. The thousands of Texan high schoolers chanting UZI UZI UZI in the amphitheater are, if anything, even more lit after waiting all night. Someone hands him a mic. Suddenly all 5 feet and 4 inches of pure energy that is Lil Uzi Vert bounds into the spotlight, and the crowd goes absolutely apeshit.