Grimes Reveals the Meaning of Her and Elon Musk’s Son X AE A-12’s Name

After Elon Musk confused the world when he announced that his and Grimes‘ newborn son is named X Æ A-12, Grimes took to social media to clear a few things up. She indeed confirmed the unusual name, and gave an explanation as to how she and the SpaceX CEO arrived at the unique moniker.

“X, the unknown variable,” the new mom tweeted Tuesday night. “Æ, my elven spelling of Ai (love &/or Artificial intelligence),” she continued, before sharing that a part of her son’s name is a nod to the CIA’s Lockheed A-12 reconnaissance plane. “A-12 = precursor to SR-17 (our favorite aircraft). No weapons, no defenses, just speed. Great in battle, but non-violent.” She added that the “A” in the name also represents “Archangel” — which she said is her “favorite song” — while the number 12 stood for the Chinese zodiac sign of the rat. (According to the Chinese zodiac, 2020 is the Year of the Metal Rat.)

The baby is the first for 32-year-old Grimes, whose real name is Claire Boucher. Musk, 48, has five sons from a previous marriage. His first son, Nevada, died of SIDS at 10 weeks old in 2002. Musk shared photos of the newborn on social media earlier this week, marking the arrival of their first child together. He even added a funny photo filter that placed face tattoos around the baby boy’s eyes. “Mom & baby all good,” Musk wrote on Twitter four hours after writing, “A few hours away!”

Fans were greatly confused by the name Musk and Grimes chose for their child, taking to social media throughout the day on Tuesday to theorize on the name’s meaning and pronunciation. Fans still appeared equally as confused after Grimes attempted to explain the name Tuesday night. “you realize this is a human child and not an EP right,” one Twitter user quipped. “oh dear we were all praying this was a joke,” another said.

The “Oblivion” singer confirmed she was expecting back in January, sharing the news on Instagram weeks after sparking pregnancy speculation with a baby bump photo. In March, she confirmed to Rolling Stone that Musk was the father. The two were first romantically linked in May 2018, and have stayed mostly private about their relationship. Grimes opened up a bit about it to Rolling Stone, saying that she did not grasp the extent to which their romance would come to define her image, especially with fans who did not know her music.

“No one believes me about this, but I just did not understand what I was getting into at all,” she said at the time. “Not that I’m mad about it. I just didn’t think it would be a thing. The s— that’s happened with my boyfriend this year has overwritten so much of my life’s work. He’s just very good at talking me out of my bulls—,” she explained. “I’ve learned a lot of about controlling my state of mind.”