Most of the world knows Kid Cudi as, well, Kid Cudi, but if you somehow got a hold of the rapper’s driver’s license, it would show his real name, Scott Mescudi. “Mescudi” isn’t exactly as common a last name as something like “Smith” or “Williams,” so it wouldn’t be surprising to learn that the name has been mispronounced a lot over the years. Well, Cudi was on The Tonight Show yesterday, and while chatting with Jimmy Fallon, he took a minute to teach the world how to say his name.
After discussing the origin of his stage name, Fallon sought clarification about how to pronounce Cudi’s real last name, asking, “Is it… ‘mess-CUD-e,’” pronouncing the last two syllables like how one would say “Cudi.” With a smile, Cudi said, “We’re going to do this right now. I really want everybody to learn how to pronounce my last name. This has been bothering me for 13 years. I know I kind of confuse everybody with my rap name. It’s ‘MESS-cud-e.’”
That lesson was preceded by Cudi telling Fallon that he started his music career with the Lil Wayne-inspired rap name Lil Scott before shifting to Kid Mesc, which ended up causing confusion and people pronouncing it like “Kid Mess.” Eventually, he landed on Kid Cudi, which has clearly stuck.
Elsewhere during the conversation, Cudi spoke about his role in Don’t Look Up and the alter ego he made for himself when he used to work at Applebee’s, so watch the full chat above.