The beef between Drake and Kendrick Lamar may be over, but its aftershocks continue to reverberate. The most peculiar example might involve the reunion album by Virginia rap duo Clipse, AKA Pusha T and Malice. It was scheduled to be released by a subsidiary of Universal, home to both Lamar and Drake. But the label apparently demanded that the track Chains and Whips, featuring Lamar, be removed – despite the fact that, dazzling and pugilistic though his verse is (“I don’t,” he avers, “fuck with the kumbaya shit”), neither it nor the rest of the track seems to reference Drake. Years before the Drake/Lamar beef erupted, Pusha T released The Story of Adidon, a Drake diss track so brutal that one critic compared it to “bringing a gun to a knife fight”. Pusha T alleged that Universal’s “lyrics committee” deemed the very presence of Lamar on a track also featuring him was an act of provocation. As a result, Clipse wound up buying out their Universal contract: Let God Sort Em Out instead appears on Jay-Z’s Roc Nation label, with Chains and Whips present and correct.
It’s an intriguing twist in a broader story – Drake is, after all, currently suing Universal for defamation over Lamar’s 2024 hit Not Like Us (Universal has called that case “utterly without merit”, and has not commented on the Clipse situation). And, if nothing else, the alleged existence of a shadowy committee fearful of Clipse’s lyrical power is useful publicity for the duo’s return.
It’s 15 years since Pusha T’s elder brother Malice quit the duo, a conversion to Christianity sitting uncomfortably with their trademark descriptions of life in the cocaine trade: he subsequently changed his name to No Malice. “Came back for the money, that’s the devil in me,” he shrugs on POV, but whatever the reason, the No has gone and he’s rapping about his time as “the Bezos of the nasals” again, replete with an impressive array of euphemisms for his chief commodity: at one juncture, he refers to it as Lady Gaga.
Still, Clipse’s return hardly needs a publicity boost. Their first two albums, in 2002 and 2006, spawned a rabid cult following that, as Pusha T once rhymed, “put the hipsters with felons and thugs”. As one half of production duo the Neptunes, Pharrell Williams helped propel Clipse to stardom, and is back on board. If Drake doesn’t warrant a mention, notice is nevertheless served that getting on the wrong side of Pusha T remains best avoided: on So Be It Pt II, rapper Travis Scott is eviscerated in no uncertain terms.
It would be a shame if this headline-grabbing stuff overshadowed Let God Sort Em Out, as strong a restatement of Clipse’s skills and power as you could wish for. Said skills might be even more striking in 2025, because their stock in trade – vivid storytelling, technical brilliance made to seem effortless – has, aside from the occasional figure such as Lamar or Doechii, little purchase in current mainstream hip-hop, dominated as it is by vibe creators such as Playboi Carti or Future rather than genuine wordsmiths. Listening to the chemistry sparked by Clipse’s contrasting approaches – Pusha T’s relentlessness alongside Malice’s more measured style, his sense of reflection amplified by his time away – is a salutary reminder of what you’ve been missing. “You rappers all beneath me,” snaps Pusha T on Ace Trumpets. His brother concurs: “All of you imposter, simply just Ferrari window shoppers.”
Great lines abound, from the chilling to the laugh-out-loud, while the feeling that guests including Nas and Tyler, the Creator feel obliged to step up – without ever quite stealing the show – is unavoidable. Something similar is true of the music. From the eerie minimalism of 2002’s Grindin’ to the metallic clatter of 2006’s Wamp Wamp, Clipse always seemed to bring out the best in the Neptunes, and likewise, Williams flying solo here. His focus these days may be on fashion – the album was part recorded in the Paris HQ of Louis Vuitton, where he’s creative director of menswear – but that feels like a shame given how inspired these beats are. The rhythm that underpins Ebitda sounds like an introductory fill that’s about to resolve into something more straightforward, but it never settles down, obstinately driving the track on. The horn riff of Inglorious Bastards is warped into a daring atonality; the gospel samples on So Far Ahead jar thrillingly with the dragging beat and low-rent synthesiser buzz; the Indian vocals and strings behind So Be It Pt II are enough even to distract attention from Pusha T’s forthright views on Travis Scott.
The album’s one sonic misstep is opener The Birds Don’t Sing, its big John Legend-sung chorus venturing into a poppy commerciality that sits awkwardly with Clipse’s USP, but the track is redeemed by its lyrics, a depiction of the near-simultaneous deaths of the brothers’ parents that rains one emotional blow after another on the listener: “The way you missed mama, I guess I should have known / Chivalry ain’t dead, you ain’t let her go alone.” It’s new emotional territory for Clipse, who up to now didn’t really do vulnerable, and proof that Let God Sort Em Out offers far more than nostalgia: familiar but fresh, it’s one of the albums of the year.
This week Alexis listened to
Durand Jones and the Indications – Lovers’ Holiday
Not a cover of Change’s disco classic, rather a standout from recent album Flowers that floats gently but gorgeously along, as welcome as a cool breeze on a hot afternoon.
