Twenty-three years ago Pusha T opened Lord Willin’, Clipse’s bone-classic 2002 debut, with this line: “Playas, we ain’t the same, I’m into caine and guns.” That was the thesis statement, and the past few decades have provided the supporting evidence. Ever since then, Pusha has discussed caine and guns in loving, exuberant, writerly detail. When it comes to being into caine and guns (but especially caine) at a consistently high level, Pusha is the greatest of all time. About 20 seconds into Lord Willin’, Pusha gets into his origin story: “Back in ’84, when I saw Crockett and Tubbs as the law, these eyes got big when they televised that raw/ My mama shoulda seen it comin’/ Me runnin’ up and down the down the stairs too quick/ Hummin’ Miami Vice theme music/ Calderone made me colder/ I see the villain’s impact now that I’m older.” It’s a fun little vignette — a little kid seeing a cool coke kingpin on an ’80s cop show and envisioning himself as a cool coke kingpin himself, then spending his life living up to that little-kid image. But there’s another character in that vignette: Pusha’s mother. A few years later, Pusha addressed her directly on “Momma I’m Sorry.” Now, Pusha opens Let God Sort Em Out, Clipse’s long-awaited fourth album, talking about his mother in a very different way.
Mildred Thornton, mother of Clipse members Pusha T and Malice, passed away in November 2021. A few months later, they also lost their father, Gene Elliott Thornton, Sr. Those back-to-back losses are the subject of “The Birds Don’t Sing,” the first song on the first Clipse album in 16 years. On the opening verse, Pusha talks about the last conversation that he had with his mother, and it’s an absolute heart-crusher. To hear Pusha tell it, his mother knew that she didn’t have long left, but she didn’t want to tell him that she knew. So she told him deep, important things about her life and his, and he barely listened. He was busy. He was supposed to go meet up with Kanye West at Elon Musk’s place. He was in transit, scrolling through his phone, business on his mind. When the moment happened, he didn’t recognize it, and now he can only look back on it with regret: “You even told dad y’all wished you never splitted/ See you were checking boxes; I was checking my mentions.”
In the song’s second verse, Gene Elliott Thornton, Jr., better known to most of us as Malice, tells us an even more devastating story, about finding his father’s body. It sends him into a reflective spin. Most of his friends didn’t have fathers in their lives, so his father did dad duty for lots of other kids. He tried to impart wisdom, but his sons still got into caine and guns anyway: “Mine made sure he had every base covered/ So imagine his pain, finding base in the cupboard.” The Thornton brothers came into the game with wicked wit and storytelling precision. You could hear it in the first song on that first album, Pusha talking about what Miami Vice did to his brain. On “The Birds Don’t Sing,” they use those gifts to talk about what must be the darkest, heaviest moments of their lives.
When Clipse first arrived with Lord Willin’, they’d already been through things. They had their experiences with caine and guns, and then they went through the drama of a failed major-label deal and an album that went unreleased after completion. Thanks to their Neptunes association and the slow-burn success of their classic anthem “Grindin’,” they got another shot at stardom, and they didn’t waste it. Lord Willin’ was the sound of everything falling into place, and Clipse kept that momentum up for years, finding ways to get incredible music out into the world even when labels weren’t interested. They’ve been through more things now, and they’ve brought that experience to bear on Let God Sort Em Out. Clipse have never been big on vulnerable, emotional songs like “The Birds Don’t Sing”; it’s just not what they do. So it’s truly striking to hear their reunion album beginning with a song as heavy and cathartic as that one — as if the cold realities of life have forced maturity onto the kid who stared at the TV during Miami Vice. These two brothers are more mature than they were when we last heard from them. But as the rest of Let God Sort Em Out attests, they are still happy to tell us about caine and guns.
Let God Sort Em Out was a long time coming. In 2009, Malice decided that he was done. He’d been talking about caine and guns for long enough, and he didn’t want to live the rap life anymore. Malice went back home to Virginia Beach, changed his name to No Malice, and committed himself to his family and his religious beliefs. His younger brother Pusha kept moving, linking up with Kanye West’s G.O.O.D. Music and continuing his streak. As a solo artist, Pusha had a run. He’s never released a record that was anything less that relentlessly solid, and his most inspired moments rivaled what he once did with his old group. But something was still missing. Malice and Pusha always rapped with similar blasé, cold-blooded efficiency. When I first bought Lord Willin’, it took me a while to learn to tell their voices apart. But Malice’s weary, leathery authority brought extra gravitas. It felt good to hear these two brothers pushing each other, talking the same shit from slightly different perspectives. Now, they’re back together, and the perspectives are way different.
It’s been in the works for a while. Pusha continued to make great records as a part of Kanye West’s camp, doing his best to save a sinking ship. Even in mid-spiral, West saved some of his coldest production for Pusha. West went through his own temporary religious awakening, making the gospel album Jesus Is King in 2019. Pusha and No Malice remained close even as they found themselves moving in different directions, and Jesus Is King was a good excuse for them to get back together — on “Use This Gospel,” a song that naturally also featured Kenny G. They made a few more songs together. Pusha became a father; No Malice was already a grandfather. The Thornton brothers’ parents died, and I can only imagine the kinds of conversations they had after that. Finally, the brothers decided that it was time. Pharrell Williams, the brothers’ childhood friend and longtime collaborator, put them onstage together at his Something In The Water festival and invited them to make another album with him. No Malice once again became Malice, and the Clipse are the Clipse again.
Pharrell is the sole producer of Let God Sort Em Out, and Clipse recorded it in Paris, at Louis Vuitton headquarters, where Pharrell is men’s creative director. In a recent New York Times interview, Pusha said, “While we recorded ‘Birds Don’t Sing,’ everybody in the office — sewing, drawing, sketching — was crying.” That must’ve been a hard day at work for everyone. The album might not click if other producers besides Pharrell were involved; it’s depressing to even imagine Malice and Pusha going through 808 Mafia beat packs and trying to find some sense of inspiration. Let God Sort Em Out is not an album that exists in conversation with the rest of today’s rap, even if some current A-list rappers make guest appearances and others get stern warnings. The record is a reclamation of legacy, a grown-man rap statement of the highest order. Pusha T is now 48 years old. Malice is 52. They’re not trying to play catch-up with anyone, or even to evoke their old glories. They’re saying the things that they need to say, and a lot of what they need to say is: Fuck you, we’re the best.
You probably already know about the Kendrick Lamar thing. Let God Sort Em Out was supposed to come out on Def Jam, but Pusha told GQ that the label blanched at the idea of including Kendrick’s ferocious guest-verse on “Chains & Whips.” Usually, a label would want to put out a record with the biggest rapper of the moment, but Def Jam’s parent company Universal didn’t want the optics of a record with Drake’s two most prominent opponents getting together in the midst of Drake’s high-profile lawsuit against them. As a result, Pusha found a way to buy both himself and his group out of their deal, and former Def Jam president Jay-Z is releasing the LP through his Roc Nation company. You probably know about the Travis Scott thing, too. Pusha has said plainly that he takes direct shots at Scott on the early single “So Be It.” Pusha doesn’t have some ancient blood feud against Scott, but he didn’t like the way that Scott conducted himself with respect to a certain Drake guest verse, and he just thinks the guy is corny. So: “Fuckin’ with P, get something immediate/ Your soul don’t like your body, we help you free it.” What’s Travis Scott going to say to that?
A few other unnamed rappers get some cold words on Let God Sort Em Out. On the album, “The Birds Don’t Sing” leads directly into “Chains & Whips” and to Pusha informing someone that you know he knows where you’re delicate, a gorgeous little bit of tonal whiplash. If Let God Sort Em Out was a Pusha T solo album, it might be the best one. Pharrell’s beats don’t have the berserk bump of Lord Willin’ anymore, and it’s a shame that the Clipse and the Neptunes couldn’t get on the same page at the same time. (Pharrell and his Neptunes partner Chad Hugo are on the outs these days.) But Pusha has been clear that Pharrell was also the only producer on 2006’s Hell Hath No Fury, arguably Clipse’s best album, and the new record has some of that one’s minimal, stabbing intensity.
Pharrell’s beats are full of empty space and ferocity. At times, he throws in allusions to gospel, and we get moments like Pusha’s fellow G.O.O.D. Music survivor John Legend singing the hook on “The Birds Don’t Sing,” but he never overdoes that aspect. We get a few muted rock guitar riffs, too, but they never overshadow the central bump. Pharrell sings all over the album, and Clipse once again bring out his cold, ghostly swagger. His production is both sweeping and threatening, but it never draws attention away from Pusha and Malice. Pharrell and Pusha still have the same wizened mind-meld that they showed on Pharrell’s half of Pusha’s last album, 2022’s It’s Almost Dry. Pusha sounds grand and imperious all through Let God Sort Em Out, and he’s somehow finding new ways to inform us that he’s “the Bezos of the nasals, that’s case closed.” He’s lively and engaged, and he attacks Pharrell’s beats from multiple directions, changing up cadences and taking audible joy in his own frozen tone.
But Let God Sort Em Out is not a Pusha T solo album, and that’s crucial. Malice and Pusha never seemed to be in competition with one another, but once upon a time, I would’ve given Malice the slight edge. His threats were never showy, and I always appreciated how he could be mean and matter-of-fact at the same time. He always came off as a patient man who could clinically explain to you all the ways he’d get to clappin’ and have your body parts mix and matchin’, fella. Today, Malice isn’t quite the rapper that he once was. His patterns are a little simpler and more repetitive, and there are a few lines here and there, like the two Lion King references on the single “Ace Trumpets,” that he can’t quite sell. He’s happy to let Pusha play the lead most of the time. What do you want? He’s a 52-year-old grandfather who’s been making Christian rap records for a decade and a half. But with all that said, Malice sounds incredible. He has come back harder and more locked-in than anyone could’ve possibly expected, and his presence still has the gravitational force of a black hole.
Let God Sort Em Out would not be a Clipse record without Malice, and in Malice’s performances, I hear the exhilaration of an old master rediscovering his voice. Throughout the album, Malice references his time away from secular rap, usually in little sidelong ways: “I was the only one to walk away and really be free,” “I done been both Mason Bethas.” He brings hard-earned wisdom to some of his reflections, as on “By The Grace Of God,” where he considers how often he put himself at risk of life in prison: “Co-defendant gave in, and lawyers couldn’t save him/ All for the love of 580s and a mixed bitch having your baby/ I done dodged strays crazy/ Man, I think about the shit daily.” Despite all the years he spent literally preaching, Malice never comes off preachy, and the virulent joy that he brings to the delivery of certain lines — “You’re gasping for air now, it’s beautiful” — is its own kind of perverse thrill.
The on-record chemistry is crazy. Consider “F.I.C.O.,” with its hesitation gut-splat beat and Griselda affiliate Stove God Cooks crooning gutturally on the hook. Malice and Pusha come in with tricky, intricate flows, and they both tell absorbing, economical stories about the lives that they’ve left behind. Pusha: “Heard your man was in there singin’ for his life, they was callin’ him maestro/ ‘Cause time that heavy can crush/ When you pay a n***a back like it’s layaway, whisperin’, ‘Die slow’/ Them last words you hear in the trunk.” Malice: “Hit the turnpike with the running lights that be on in the daytime ’cause K-9s sniff out a crumb/ Hands three and nine on the wheel as I’m crossin’ the state lines, dum diddy dum diddy dum.” Or consider the rush when longtime Clipse affiliate Ab-Liva, who’s spent the past decade-plus ghostwriting many of Kanye West’s best lines, resurfaces on “Inglorious Bastards.” It just feels good to hear these guys syncing back up again.
In another reality, Clipse’s reunion album might be a very good rap-elder return, a dependable nostalgia play. But that’s not the world that we live in. Instead, Let God Sort Em Out feels like a real-deal event, a hyped-up album that delivers on every level. Plenty of factors go into that: Pharrell’s involvement, Malice’s long absence, Pusha’s continued goodwill, the masterful press tour where the brothers haven’t shied away from talking shit when shit needs to be talked. Rap has no real center right now, no dominant figure or narrative. Kendrick Lamar is killing shit, but he’s too thorny and particular to feel representative of a larger movement. Other than perhaps Kendrick, it’s been a long time since we’ve heard anyone bring the level of focus and control that Clipse show on Let God Sort Em Out. The streaming-bait system doesn’t incentivize big-statement records, and Let God Sort Em Out is a big statement merely by existing. You can sense the energy on the album. The guests — Kendrick, Nas, Tyler — know that they’re participating in something monumental, and they respond accordingly. The radio-focused A&R people that once tormented the Clipse have faded into the mists of history, allowing the brothers to indulge their purism. As their former peers have drifted off or lost vitality, they waited for the right moment to pounce, and that moment is now.
The kids who watched Miami Vice together are all grown up. They are now the elders. Malice and Pusha have things that they’ve been wanting to say — to themselves, to each other, to the world. They know that life is finite, that the clock is always ticking, that every day on this plane of existence might be their last. Clipse always moved with half an eye on their legacy, connecting regions and eras from ghetto to ghetto to back yard to yard. Now, they’ve built another monument together. I hope that the Clipse reunion goes on for years, for decades. But if this is all we get, then it’s enough.
Let God Sort Em Out is out 7/11 via Roc Nation.
