In the wake of the ominous alignment of President Trump’s inauguration and Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I sat down with Denzel Curry, the self-declared King of the Mischievous South. “We’ve been through this shit before,” says the multifaceted rapper of Trump’s then-impending second term, Zoom-calling me from his home. Defiant in tone, he’s optimistic the country can get through the next four years and come out the other side, whole.
His energy is hopeful, as he hones his focus not on the dystopian pageantry of the January 20 inauguration but on the community he is a part of in Los Angeles, where he currently resides. Curry was vocal and present in leading community fundraisers for those affected by the devastation of the LA wildfires – an unsurprising disposition, seeing as community is a tenet of his artistry and daily life.
“I’m from Dade County, Miami. I’m gonna rep that to the day I die. But for the past eight years I’ve been living in Los Angeles. So, instead of fleeing – because I did have to evacuate at one point – it made me want to step up to the plate and use my platform for a sense of good for the community.”
from left: cardigan by STUSSY, shirt by HERMES, trousers by KIKO KOSTADINOV, shoes by SALOMON, gloves by STONE ISLAND, sunglasses by BOTTEGA VENETA and jumper by STONE ISLAND, hat by ERL
He’s done that in more ways than one. Releasing his mixtape King of the Mischievous South Vol. 2 last July, Curry, 30, revisited the motif and title from his 2012 breakout tape with a more mature mindset and a host of guest appearances that honour his Southern roots and peers. “When you look at the collaborations on this tape – some of them were in person, some of them weren’t in person – but they pretty much understood the full concept, and a lot of them made major contributions to Southern culture and Southern music,” he says. So of course, bringing them all together for this tape, and having the people that influenced me in the first place, is like a full-circle moment.” We talk about how, in the early days of his career, Curry would use the beats of the rappers he looked up to, and now he has them as features, notably Memphis legend Kingpin Skinny Pimp, who narrates the album. It’s something surreal, but characteristically organic, and for those of us who have followed his career, completely unsurprising.
The Miami Gardens rapper has been a sabre cutting through the noise since 2012, evolving with each mixtape and album like a Pokémon. “I’m always changing with every project,” he says. It’s hard to strike a balance between socially conscious hip hop, horrorcore, martial arts, the manga series One-Punch Man and Death Note, trap and metal influences, and a playful demeanour – but Curry has always done that. Whether it’s the sombre introspective exploration of his mental health and grief on 2022’s Melt My Eyez See Your Future or the more experimental album Unlocked (2020), which was produced by Kenny Beats and has an accompanying 24-minute short film, each project is a chance for Curry to introduce fans to even more dimensions and influences. “Every era of Denzel Curry and every album that I make, I want you to remember something specific about that era of my music.” And our take-home for this era? “Just how free it felt,” he says.
from left: jacket by STONE ISLAND, jumper by KIKO KOSTADINOV, sunglasses by MOSCOT and jacket and shirt by HERMES, shorts by WALES BONNER, tie by PRADA
I was 16 when KOTMS Vol.1 came out back in the glory days of downloading mixtapes off DatPiff, listening to them while reading reviews on Big Ghost Chronicles, showing off your new favourite song as your status on BBM. It’s hard to imagine in a world where streaming services are so ubiquitous – with algorithms that swallow underground artists then just spit out the predictable mainstream – that the internet was a cornucopia of the new, the bold, the exciting. KOTMS Vol. 1 was new, bold and exciting. Even at 17, Curry had found a way to take what he had grown up with and turn it into something singular and distinct. Something in conversation with the legacy before him and the legacy he seeks to leave behind. “Just be happy that this was an era you could remember,” he says. It’s a testament that, in 2025, on the precipice of an upcoming tour that includes a slot high up the bill at Bludfest in Milton Keynes in June, we’re still finding new ways to talk about a concept he started building in 2012. “That shit was just a fire-ass name I came up with as a teenager,” he tells me on the origins of his King of the Mischievous South title, which draws inspiration from the long names of the old-school mixtapes. “Every mixtape name back in the ’90s from Memphis were long- ass-titled names,” he says. “I was like, let me just come up with this one – King of the Mischievous South Vol. 1 (Underground Tape 1996)!”
Creative projects just seem to come together naturally for Curry, even outside music. He jokes about fashion being a learning curve earlier in his career. “I remember [my stylist] would try to get me to wear certain things and I’d be like, fuck that, I know how to dress. And then I look back now and I’m like, oh, I did not know how to dress.” Though since finding a fashion hero in the late Japanese actor Yusaku Matsuda, Curry feels his personal style is now “just another way for me to express myself. I feel like, if you step outside, you gotta put that shit on. And to be honest with you, none of this shit was planned,” he says of his music videos for this era. “A lot of these videos [were] just about having fun and being in the moment.” We specifically get into the video for his single Still in the Paint, featuring Lazer Dim 700 and Bktherula, and a standout cameo from Waka Flocka Flame, whose 2008 track Hard in da Paint is sampled. “With Waka Flocka and BK and Lazer, all of them come from Atlanta. So it was like a camaraderie there. And me and Flocka, that was the full-circle moment too.
from left: jumper by ZEGNA, trousers by FILA, shoes by PARABOOT, hat by HAPPY99, sunglasses by MOSCOT and top by C.P. COMPANY, trousers by LEVI’S, sunglasses by BOTTEGA VENETA
“When Threatz blew up back in the day [on his 2013 debut album] when I was in [the collective] Raider Klan, Flocka was on my MTV on RapFix Live. He was the guest that had to judge my song.” This was an unsuspecting canon event that somehow, perhaps cosmically, led to producer Charlie Heat playing the track that would become Still in the Paint to Curry in a studio session, with a sample that would go on to facilitate Flocka and Curry appearing in the same music video. Now, he gets to be the artist who pays it forward for younger underground rappers. “Rap is competition, but at the same time it’s still a community. The hip-hop community. And whatever the case may be, I’m doing what I can for the hip-hop community.”
He’s very intentional and sincere about giving props to the up-and-coming artists he loves: “Lazer just keeps working. I like what he got going on. And I love BK. I absolutely adore her. She’s great. I love her work.” All of which is a nice callback to earlier in our conversation when we discuss his approach to collaborations. “That’s why I had everybody on this tape. From old and new. I wanted to put people that you wouldn’t normally see on a track together because you got the new guys coming up and then you got me and got somebody like 2 Chainz, you know what I’m saying?” It’s not just about working with recognisable names or abandoning the community he’s a part of – it’s about working with people he respects and introducing fans to a rich tapestry of artists they may never have experienced outside the Denzel Curry universe. In this digital age, regional rap can sometimes feel like an ant being crushed under the thumb of globalisation. As such, it’s comforting to know that Curry stands firm in his own path, one that honours where he comes from and where he’s headed. Where previous projects were heavily influenced by his upbringing, this current era shows the “full range of every part of the South, from Memphis to Texas to Miami, Florida, Georgia, everywhere. I give everybody their flowers wherever they’re from,” he says.
from left: PRADA coat by COURREGES, jumper and trousers by DIOR MEN, hat by JACQUEMUS
At the heart of this is a humility and a hunger that brings it all back down to earth. He’s more excited about the fact that he’s building a real bond with André 3000 – after they exchanged numbers having bumped into each other on a trip to Tokyo last year – than trying to reach for a feature. “I’m like, yeah, I could be friends with my favourite rapper.” When I ask him about the future, he makes a point to say he’s “working diligently” on new music, and “it’s going to be better than the last [project]”. But nothing feels as humbling as his sense of community. Of wanting to make music accessible to his fans, “I wanted to make it so simple that you sing it back [on tour],” he says. Of wanting to give back to the city that has taken him in, “I may be from Miami, but at the end of the day, I’m a Los Angeles resident. In the face of danger, everybody left… and I’m like, so y’all gonna come back when it’s all good? No, I’m finna stay in the paint.”
Denzel Curry is still in the paint. And if his work ethic and growing legacy are anything to go by, he’s never leaving it.
Taken from 10 Men Issue 61 – MUSIC, TALENT, CREATIVE – on newsstands March 24. Pre-order your copy here.
DENZEL’S WORLD
Photographer MAGNUS UNNAR
Fashion Editor MARIANGEL ROBLES
Talent DENZEL CURRY
Text MAXINE SIBIHWANA
Hair IMAN THOMAS using PRO-LINE Oil Sheen and ROYAL MIRAGE
Make-up SARAH HUGGINS at The Wall Group
Fashion assistants SERGIO BETALLELUZ and GEORGIA EDWARDS
Production MARTHA BARR at Tiagi and SONYA MAZURYK
Special thanks to CHANTELLE-SHAKILA TIAGI, JAMES CUNNINGHAM and REES ESCOBAR
Jewellery throughout Denzel’s own
