Girl Singing "Humble" In Car

Submission 94

Part of a series on Viral Videos. [View Related Entries]

About

Girl Singing "Humble" In Car or Rory Lee Singing "Humble" In Car is a viral video of a girl named Rory Lee singing Kendrick Lamar's "Humble" in a car in the style of Ariana Grande singing the same song during a "Musical Genre Challenge" on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. The video was posted to YouTube in 2018 and went viral over the following years, inspiring memes and reactions, with many torn on whether or not her vocal performance was good or not.

Origin

On May 2nd, 2018, The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon YouTube^[1] channel uploaded a segment from the show in which Ariana Grande takes part in the "Musical Genre Challenge" as she's tasked with singing a given song in an atypical genre. At the 01:25 mark, Grande is tasked with singing Kendrick Lamar's "Humble" in a goth rock genre (shown below).

On May 26th, YouTuber^[2] Dana's Spam Channel uploaded a video titled "Humble funny cover in car by Rory Lee" in which a girl wearing a pink shirt, Rory Lee, sings the same song in the same style, garnering over 95,000 views in six years (shown below). This is purportedly a reupload, with the original being uploaded by Lee herself to her now-deleted Instagram page, @rory.comm. On May 27th, the same video was uploaded by YouTuber^[3] noodlesandrice, garnering over 2 million views in the same span of time.

Spread

The video gained viral spread over the following years, becoming the subject of memes, reactions and discourse, with some finding her voice somehow both good and bad. On October 31st, 2021, TikToker^[4] @dawndivinee posted a parody of the video that gained over 46,000 views in three years (shown below, left). On December 17th, TikToker^[5] @gavinisnotfunny posted a parody that gained over 25,000 views in the same span of time (shown below, right).

On August 26th, 2022, X^[6] user @undressssd posted the video in response to a now-deleted, unarchived tweet, garnering over 49,000 likes and 7,600 reposts in two years.

On February 3rd, 2023, TikToker^[7] @popculturememories posted the video, captioned, "this cover of 'Humble' by Kendrick Lamar still has me cackling," garnering over 230,000 views in a year.

On June 19th, 2024, X^[8] user @KindaHagi posted, "kendrick lamar bring out the girl who sang humble in the car!!" garnering over 2,500 likes in two days. The post references Lamar's Juneteenth concert. On June 20th, after Lamar's concert, X^[9] user @offbeatorbit posted the video in response to the post by @KindaHagi, writing, "Needed her there 😔," garnering over 108,000 likes in a day (shown below).