$uicideboy$
Thy Kingdom Come
G59
The aftermath of having real chart success for 2024’s New World Depression means that the chains are truly off for New Orleans indie-trap outfit $uicideboy$. Not that the project’s pact-bound cousins Ruby da Cherry and Scrim were ever tied down tight to begin with, as their noisily metallic, emo-hop brand of horrorcore has forever embraced heavy topics such as addiction, depression, and self-harm. On their follow-up record Thy Kingdom Come, however, the overly dramatic duo’s usually dense, trap-imbued soundscapes are open and airier, leaving more room for the $uicidebro$ and their guests (longtime emo-trap collaborators Bones and Night Lovell) to misery-wallow within.
Their self-righteous religiosity is still angrily weighted down and heavy-handed here, with chunks of Thy Kingdom Come pulling from Roman Catholic catechism texts (even Bill Maher can’t get away with the same old anti-church jokes any longer—let it rest, cousins). Luckily, there are still countless surprises to be found amid their non-godly screeds, like the shockingly tender sentiments and the ripened soulful swagger to the likes of “Full of Grace (I Refuse to Tend My Own Grave)” and “Now and at the Hour of Our Death.”
That latter Cypress Hill–esque track features the $-boys huffing and puffing with a mighty mean wind, and yet the topic is more humorous than it is harming: girls, grills, and shopping. Ruby and Scrim even lean into New Orleans parish bounce on the wise-assed “Napoleon,” complete with a sample from local heroine Big Freedia’s “Gin in My System.” Add all that goodness to the fact that on a curt, rude track such as “Count Your Blessings,” Ruby and Scrim finally sound like true hip-hop floacists as opposed to two guys screaming.
