Westside Gunn Sets Heelmatic for November 13, With a Camel in Cairo and a Sixteen-Track Bill

Westside Gunn has a new album coming, and the title does most of the work: Heelmatic, out November 13 on Griselda Records/Mass Appeal. The Buffalo rapper has spent years building his catalog around wrestling mythology, and this one leans all the way in, from the name down to a tracklist that reads like a card of invented villains: “Grant Heel,” “Blowdysseus,” “Koke Slam,” “Tommy Heelfiger,” “Giant Leather.”

The lead single is “Zilla,” and its video is the selling point. Shot on location in Egypt, it puts Gunn on a camel in Cairo and in front of the Great Pyramid while he raps about Oakleys and Glocks. The clip premiered on Instagram in August and has only now reached YouTube, which says something about how Gunn releases material: on his own schedule, with little interest in the conventional rollout.

He has described the record in his own terms, calling it dusty, soulful and jazz-inspired, and framing it as grimy in the way his best work tends to be. Sixteen tracks, no features listed in the material at hand. It follows a busy 2025 for him, with three mixtapes: 12, Heels Have Eyes 2 and Heels Have Eyes 3.

Release week segues into the Heel the World Tour 2: “Still Healing,” which opens January 30 in Brussels and runs through the UK, Ireland and continental Europe into late February, closing at Copenhagen’s VEGA.