“Black Beatles” is a celebration of wealth and fame, but Mike WiLL’s spaced-out strumming gives it a complexity that intrigues on its first, tenth and fiftieth listen. On another Rae Sremmurd song, for instance, Swae’s line “New day, new money to be made” would likely sound completely different here, he sings it with a tinge of sadness before puffing out his chest and rattling off his credentials as a new-school legend. The ebullient chants of Rae Sremmurd’s signature hits - “No flex! Zone!,” “Unlock! The swag!” - here melt into a wistful collection of observations from Swae Lee, who follows the melody on the hook and shrugs off lyrics like “Young bull living like an old geezer / Quick release the cash, watch it fall slowly.” The hint of incompletion in the chorus, with Swae ending each line on a down note and echoing his own words in singsong falsetto, is its most fascinating feature, and balances out the meme nods and money talk of the verses. Listen closely, and you’ll find that “Black Beatles” is closer to the Stranger Things theme than anything released this year from Drake, Future or Kanye West. Compared to more muscular 2016 trap hits, the “Black Beatles” beat glides, with a ticking rhythm and synths that sound evil but somehow inviting. Yet “Black Beatles” finds a way to sound even more outlandish: it pairs the duo’s main appeal, euphoric adolescence, with a psychedelic haze that’s surreal even for their standards. Mike WiLL has concocted some downright peculiar beats for Rae Sremmurd’s Swae Lee and Slim Jxmmi outside to “Black Beatles.” The sinister bleep-bloop of “Unlock The Swag” and sparse, groaning “No Type” beat helped make the duo’s 2015 debut SremmLife so compelling, while this year’s SremmLife 2 is highlighted by bizarre piano hooks (“By Chance”) and zonked-out synths (“Do Yoga”).

Rae Sremmurd, Gucci Mane and producer Mike WiLL Made-It cooked up one of the most inspired singles of 2016, by adhering to their weirdest instincts in a fall full of pop formula, we desperately needed “Black Beatles” disrupting the Top 10. But the novelty of this “Harlem Shake”-esque explosion also shouldn’t overshadow the sonic risk of “Black Beatles”: this song is brash and unabashedly strange, an idiosyncratic hip-hop summit that was swiftly conquering the Hot 100 long before the first #MannequinChallenge dropped two weeks ago. That’s nothing to be ashamed of, and the Sremmlets and Gucci are clearly having a blast leaning into the online trend as the song continues rising on the charts. So, yes, the biggest hit of both Rae Sremmurd and Gucci Mane’s careers is now (and likely forever) linked to the spiritual sequel of the Ice Bucket Challenge.

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Rae sremmurd - black beatles cover art