Note: This article contains descriptions of alleged domestic abuse.
Part 1: Atlanta
Ken Carson is resting his back on a pillow of money, two fat-ass stacks of dollar bills. At a sprawling recording studio in Buckhead, Atlanta, Ken—24 years old and riding the high off his 2023 collection of gothic headbangers A Great Chaos—grabs the TV remote, and flips through the channels looking for a horror movie to throw on. With every station he pauses on, he dishes out commentary. First up is Ghostbusters: Afterlife. “Shit, ain’t nobody scared of no ghosts in 2024,” he says, slamming on the remote. “Why they keep making them? They need to leave that shit alone! It’s all fake!”
Managers, assistants, and friends are circulating in and out of the room. They’re all getting their ducks in a row because, in a few hours, Ken will take the stage at the Coca-Cola Roxy for one of his homecoming stops on his A Great Chaos tour, the first major headlining tour of his career. At the beginning of next year, he will release his highly anticipated fourth album, More Chaos, which is still in the works. He’s wearing camo shorts, Balenciaga boots the size of a pair of Shih Tzus, and a black T-shirt that reads, “Dead on the inside but I’m still happy.” He puts his blonde-streaked locs into two pigtails. “On show days I only have to be performing for one hour so the other 23 hours I be chillin’,” he says, as his barber gives him a shape-up.
“What woke me up is Rob Zombie’s Halloween,” he says.
Do you like John Carpenter’s Halloween?
“Hell no! Ain’t no female battling Michael Myers,” he responds. “Jamie Lee ass would’ve been died in a Rob Zombie movie!” (Fact check: Laurie, the character played by Jamie Lee Curtis in the originals, survives her battle with Michael Myers in Rob Zombie’s remake.)
Because what Ken was doing at first was really all vibes: the all-black dress code, the grungy photography, the cryptic social media presence. His shows are hyper-masculine live spectacles where guys still waiting for their beards to connect bump shirtless chests and supposedly impress girls by smoking a fuck-ton of weed. But then came last year’s A Great Chaos—a loud, boneheaded, maximalist recalibration of Whole Lotta Red’s male angst, which, as of September is certified Gold—that grounded Ken in an historic Atlanta lineage. Here was an album that made you want to dig deeper into who the hell this guy is and believe everything that Ken was trying to convince you of—that he is a new-generation antihero and not just another young rap villain getting rich off mimicry and misogyny.
Together, the group does a lot of daydreaming. Isaac wants to take his clothing brand to the next level. JBans is building a studio in Miami. On Ken’s mind is getting to that final tour date, a performance at Rolling Loud in Thailand the night before Thanksgiving. “I know they gon’ save me a plate,” he says to Vision, rubbing his hands together, as he visualizes making it home for an Atlanta holiday season.
Sometimes Ken is petulant and bossy. Sometimes Ken dissociates, covering his face with his locs, as he endlessly scrolls or stares at graphic, violent internet videos. (He has an obsession with gore; throughout my time there he can’t wait to see Terrifier 3.) Sometimes Ken is crudely funny, with hypotheticals for days: “If I was a junkie I’d be walking around naked, going, ‘Oh you weren’t worried about me before, now it’s your problem too.’” His friends seem unbothered by the mood swings, possibly understanding that they form a protective bubble around him, so he has nothing to worry about other than being Ken Carson.
If you or someone you know has been affected by domestic abuse, we encourage you to reach out:
The National Domestic Violence Hotline
https://thehotline.org
1-800-799-SAFE (7233)
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English (US) ·