Lizzo is leaning fully into her foodie era—and she’s doing it with a flute made out of ribs. The Grammy winner has teamed up with Chili's for a new campaign built around the chain’s famous “Baby Back Ribs” jingle, complete with a disco-style commercial, a reworked version of the song, and a meat-themed instrument performance.
The campaign dropped on Wednesday, May 27, and features Lizzo recreating moments from Chili’s classic 1990s commercials before turning the restaurant kitchen into a full-blown dance floor. At the center of it all is her updated take on the “Baby Back Ribs” theme song, which she said required studying earlier versions recorded by groups like *NSYNC and Boyz II Men.
“The *NSYNC version, I remember being like, ‘Whoa,’” she told Billboard. “How do I turn it into … ‘Oh, you want your baby back? You gonna have to work hard to get that.’”
The partnership marks a notable shift for Lizzo, who spent years publicly embracing a vegan lifestyle before revealing in late 2024 that she had resumed eating animal protein.
She said that the announcement was intentional because she knew future moves like this would raise questions. “I was so nervous that I would hurt people’s feelings or let people down,” she explained. “It would have been super jarring for me to be a vegan in 2021, and then 2026, I’m eating a big old rib and playing a rib flute.”
According to Lizzo, the collaboration may have started with a Halloween joke. Last year, she dressed as one of Chili’s mozzarella sticks, which she now believes caught the restaurant’s attention.
The singer said the campaign reflects the side of her personality that fans may know less about. “If I was not a singer, I’d probably be a mukbanger,” she joked, referencing online creators known for eating-focused videos.
The new ad arrives after months of Lizzo speaking more openly about her relationship with food, weight, and public perception. In a recent essay, she discussed losing weight during a difficult period of depression in 2023 and argued that conversations around body image have become increasingly complicated during the rise of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic.
