Denzel Curry – King of the Mischievous South Vol. 2 (Album Review)

King of the Mischievous South Vol.2 (KOTMS 2) is the new album from Miami rapper Denzel Curry. As a Miami native and fan of Denzel, I was really looking forward to this project. I truly believe that Denzel is the greatest rapper to come out of Florida and has one of the best discographies of any artist in the last decade. This was only enhanced by his 2022 near-masterpiece Melt My Eyez, See Your Future, although Denzel’s record of releasing quality singles is a little shotty. Still, as I do with every album of Denzel’s, I have high hopes.

Let’s get into it.

The album starts off with an intro of the type you’d find in an interlude, which is strewn across this record. Overall, these interluding pieces are decent, though I won’t grade them as I do with the other songs.

The album starts with “ULTRA SHXT”. Off the rip, I figured that we were getting a different type of Denzel in this album. The song itself sets a certain tone that is very familiar to my ears as it is reminiscent of the South Florida rap scene from the 2010s. The beat itself is pretty good, reminding me of the type of production The Alchemist would use. I would say this track is good overall. Although, the thing that keeps me from giving this song a 4 is the vocal effects, which I didn’t find fitting.

That last sentence could act as a harbinger of what’s to come in this album, as it unfortunately does not get better than this one track.

The songs I’m going to mention in this paragraph have a few things in common, being that they’re not completely awful, but they have issues that are way below the caliber that Denzel should be working with. The first is “SET IT”, which follow the track prior. The song itself is completely unremarkable, including a generic beat, but it’s not offensive to the point where its worth overanalyzing. The feature from Maxo Kream wasn’t bad at all though. Right after it is “HOT ONE”, which does feature Denzel performing the way he’s supposed to, reminding me of earlier projects, on top of a very menacing beat. So what’s wrong with it? The features from Tia Corine and A$AP Ferg are horrendous, contributing nothing to the song and bringing it down a couple of notches. “GZ’ UP” is the second to last song. While it is pretty catchy, the chorus is atrocious to the point where it’s barely listenable.

“BLACK FLAG FREESTYLE”, right smack in the middle of the first half, might just be the worst song here. Forget the terrible lyricism, how did Denzel let himself get out-done by That Mexican OT on this song (whose feature wasn’t even that good, by the way)? It was at this point that began to wonder as to what happened between the making of MMESYF and this record. As I said, Denzel does have a history of putting out singles of poor quality, but he usually hits home runs when it comes to releasing an album.

“SKED” is going to be one of the few oases that you’ll find on this album. Denzel sounds like he’s returning to form (for now), with the features from Kenny Mason and Project Pat doing a good job this time. The beat is also pretty good, incorporating elements of a catchy deep bass line.

“COLE PIMP” is much like most of the song, being unremarkable overall. Of course, to no surprise, Ty Dolla $ign was just as lame as he was on Vultures 1. However, I will say Denzel have one of his better performances on this track. The opposite could be said of the next track, “WISHLIST”. The beat here is one of the best on the album, but I find Denzel’s performance very hard to appreciate. That being said, Armani’s feature was great, having a nice flow.

The next track, “HIT THE FLOOR”…Dear Lord….Why?

I will admit that the deep bass beat is quite tempting, slowly growing into a guilty pleasure. However, the interpolation of that classic track (which I’m not too fond of to begin with) is absolute cancer. And, of course, Ski-Mask sucks on this track, as he usually does.

In the last song, “HOODLUMZ”, we do get our final taste of classic Denzel. Overall, there’s not much I can really point out, but the beat is menacing and Denzel gives a very good performance, along with PlayThatBoiZay and A$AP ROCKY.

1. “KOTMS II Intro” – N/A
2. “ULTRA SHXT” – 3
3. “SET IT” – 2
4. “HOT ONE” – 2
5. “BLACK FLAG FREESTYLE” – 1
6. “HEADCRACK INTERLUDE” – N/A
7. “G’Z UP” – 2
8. “LUNATIC INTERLUDE” – N/A
9. “SKED” – 3
10. “CHOOSE WISELY INTERMISSION” – N/A
11. “COLE PIMP” – 2
12. “WISHLIST” – 3
13. “HIT THE FLOOR” – 1
14. “HOODLUMZ” – 3
15. “KMOTS OUTRO” – N/A

SCORE/Mediocre: I guess Billie Eilish won’t be the my biggest disappointment of the year. There isn’t much else I could say, at least nothing that would be new. Whether it’s the beat choices, some of Denzel’s performances, or having one of the worst rosters I’ve seen on an album, the record was barely able to hold itself up. Yet, the album was still able to give us some decent moments, although none of them are really worth going back to. Guess we’ll have to wait for next time.

[We rank singles, EPs, and albums on a scale of Poor, Mediocre, Good, Excellent, and Outstanding]