How does a musician know they’ve made it? Maybe they hear their song playing in public, or have an album go platinum. Or, perhaps they land an adidas campaign.
The footwear giant has co-signed its fair share of established acts over the years—the first being Run-D.M.C., after the group released its indelible ode to the brand’s Superstar shoes in 1986—but adidas also anoints music’s ‘next big thing’ with surprising accuracy. Take Olivia Dean, the 2026 Best New Artist Grammy winner, who was tapped for an adidas Originals Superstar campaign last September and dropped her first Originals capsule in 2024. As the record shows, the brand’s ability to identify icons in the making rivals the predictive powers of the charts and top critics.
Its latest prophetic pick: BigXthaPlug, the Dallas rapper who’s been one to watch ever since he burst on the scene in 2023 with his debut album Amar. He took a break from altering the hip-hop landscape to star in the new campaign for the adidas Originals adistar XLG, a shoe as trailblazing and original as the artist himself.
In another lifetime, BigX would’ve still been an athlete. The chart-topping Texas M.C., born Xavier Landum, had football aspirations and the talent to back them up in his school days. A few missteps altered those dreams but, serendipitously, turned him toward songwriting as an emotional outlet. He had a gift for storytelling, he discovered, and became one of the independent rap scene’s brightest stars upon the release of his studio debut and breakout singles like “Mmhmm” and “Texas.”
He was no one-hit wonder. The D-Town native continued his ascension with 2024’s Take Care, which charted at number 8 on the US Billboard 200 chart. This is where things got surreal for the Lone Star pioneer. Beyoncé featured his music in an interlude during her Cowboy Carter Tour. He performed at Coachella in 2025. And in an interview, he hinted that a country project was in the works, and all of Nashville came knocking on his door to work with him.
The result was his collaboration-fueled third album, I Hope You're Happy, which was released in August 2025 to wide acclaim. This time, the Southern rap prodigy erased any doubt that he’s the real deal: a homegrown talent with a hypnotic voice and seamless flow, bolstered by beyond-his-years lyricism that spins raw, gut-punching narratives one after the other. He also caught adidas’s attention, a sign his next era as an artist is about to begin.
Even though he left the field behind years ago, the boundary-pushing rapper’s background in sports gave him a premonition that he’d do a campaign like this one day. “I just always knew that I was going to be representing a brand and it was going to be a big one,” he tells Highsnobiety. “And so for it to be adidas, it’s kind of a crazy moment, because in college, I wore adidas. In high school, it was [always] adidas. So it’s a full circle.”
“This is the type of shit we wear,” he continued. “We care more about comfort, and adidas is that. It’s comfort, it’s style, it’s athletic. It just is us.”
Comfort is the M.O. for the adistar XLG, which also has style on lock with appealing colorways like vibrant solar orange, classic core black, and versatile alumina gray. The sneaker’s Adiprene-cushioned heels serve up ever-important sole support, while the overall silhouette brings Y2K running-shoe flair to the gorpcore era.
If the XLG is the future of footwear, BigXthaPlug is the future of music, and adidas has its crystal ball forecasting bright days for both. Expertly navigating the intersection of sport, style, and music, the brand has forged a strong cultural canon over the decades. Welcoming BigX to the lineage, its tastemaker legacy continues with a powerhouse M.C. that’s ready to meet his moment.
Shop the adidas Originals adistar XLG at adidas.com.
