The first encounter for many with Death Grips, including myself, was the tidal wave of critical praise surrounding “The Money Store.” Initial listens often sparked confusion, even repulsion. Despite knowing their fervent fanbase, becoming a convert myself felt improbable. Discerning whether I even liked it was a struggle. My immediate reaction was to seek a comprehensive analysis, hoping to decipher the sonic assault I’d just experienced. Unlike readily available guides for artists like Kendrick Lamar or Frank Ocean, resources for “The Money Store” were scarce, often consisting of bewildered fan posts struggling to articulate the album’s essence.
Today, “The Money Store” is frequently championed as a contender for the greatest album of all time. This article aims to dissect and articulate the reasons behind this profound impact and enduring legacy.
Contents:
The Album Artwork: A Visual Manifesto
Compositional Breakdown: Deconstructing and Rebuilding Hip-Hop
Interpretational Abstract: Cubism in Lyrics and Sound
Track-by-Track Breakdown: Unpacking “The Money Store” Song by Song
The Fever (Aye-Aye): Abstract Violence and Sickness
Lost Boys: Outsiders on the Edge
Blackjack: Gambling with Fate and Fortune
Hustle Bones: Self-Aware Braggadocio
I’ve Seen Footage: Paranoia and Hyper-Awareness
Double Helix: The DNA of Death Grips
System Blower: Sonic Anarchy and Institutional Demolition
The Cage: Mental Confinement and Escape
Punk Weight: The Evolution of Punk in the 21st Century
Fuck That: Disjointed Fury and Rejection
Bitch Please: Unapologetic Confidence and Power
Hacker: Meta-Commentary on Technology and Culture
Conclusion: Beyond Comprehension, Towards Individual Meaning
Profile & Publishing Details
Death Grips, the Sacramento, California-based trio comprised of Zach Hill, Stefan Burnett (performing as Ride), and Andy Morin, unleashed “The Money Store” in 2012. This marked not only their major label debut (and only release under such circumstances) but also their critical and popular breakthrough. “The Money Store” followed their initial full-length release, Exmilitary, and preceded No Love Deep Web (NØ LØV∑ D∑∑P W∏B), released later the same year. Death Grips consider these three albums a cohesive trilogy.
Originally released by Epic Records (a division of Sony Music Entertainment) on March 24, 2012, the album infamously leaked onto YouTube ten days prior, on March 14th. Since their departure from Epic, Death Grips has independently re-released The Money Store on vinyl, underscoring their DIY ethos. Widely regarded as their most critically lauded work, it consistently scores around 8/10 in aggregated reviews, establishing it as one of 2012’s most acclaimed albums. Notably, The Money Store earned a perfect 10/10 score from influential YouTube music reviewer Anthony Fantano, often credited with popularizing the group. It became the first of four Death Grips albums to chart on the Billboard 200, peaking at #130 in its debut week. To promote The Money Store, Death Grips embarked on a brief five-show tour, including a performance at Coachella 2012. A more extensive tour was initially planned but was cancelled to prioritize the completion of their next album, No Love Deep Web. Touring resumed in October 2012, supporting both albums. The Money Store comprises 13 tracks spanning approximately 41 minutes:
- Get Got
- The Fever (Aye Aye)
- Lost Boys
- Blackjack
- Hustle Bones
- I’ve Seen Footage
- Double Helix
- System Blower
- The Cage
- Punk Weight
- Fuck That
- Bitch Please
- Hacker
Analysis Abstract
“The Money Store” operates on a highly conceptual, figurative, and abstract plane, drawing connections to various art movements including Modernism, Expressionism, Surrealism, Cubism, Psychedelia, Pop Art, and Punk. Lyrically, it delves into themes of violence, occultism, crime, mental health, counter-culture, popular culture, nihilism, individualism, hedonism, and libertinism. These themes are conveyed through vignette-style mini-narratives, presented with extreme subjectivity, anarchy, and a harsh interpretation of reality. The album masterfully shifts perspectives as Death Grips navigates its sonic landscape, ultimately championing individuality in the face of a dark and perilous world.
“These songs were conceptualized in all these weird, random ways. We approach music almost like musique concrète: We’re sampling our day-to-day along with the filthiest things off of YouTube and trying to build powerful music out of all this stuff that’s usually seen as trash.”– Zach Hill for Pitchfork
The Album Artwork: A Visual Manifesto
“The Money Store” is instantly recognizable for its exceptionally striking album artwork:
tms-1200
The cover image originates from a zine by artist Sua Yoo, who has significantly influenced Death Grips’ visual aesthetic, notably with her image gracing the cover of their instrumental release Fashion Week. Death Grips themselves have elucidated the album cover’s meaning in a Pitchfork interview:
“On the cover you have an androgynous masochist on the leash of a feminist sadist who’s smoking. The sadist has carved Death Grips into her bitch’s chest. There is an overly confident quality to the woman smoking and a calmness to the androgynous masochist.”– Death Grips for Pitchfork
The group sought a cover embodying the “same progressive and edge ideology” driving their music, aiming to represent their “views on sexuality and modern society.” They elaborated:
“We consider ourselves feminists, we fiercely support homosexuality, transparent world leadership, and the idea of embracing yourself as an individual in any shape or form. Acceleration is a mantra, we’re not a political band, we are freaks and outsiders. It was important to project that message and energy through the artwork of this album. This is free thinking and eternally open-ended music… [The cover] is like an ambassador to the sound.”– Death Grips for Pitchfork
Beyond its immediate shock value, the album art of The Money Store resonates with deeper symbolic layers. It shares compositional elements with the High Priestess and The Devil cards from the Tarot deck, forging connections to subsequent Death Grips releases, artwork, and recurring esoteric themes. Stefan Burnett, in particular, seems to inject these occult and esoteric dimensions, evidenced by lyrical references and even his extensive tattoos, including the Baphomet symbol on his palm, the Necronomicon Gate on his chest, and a Haitian Vodou Veve on his shoulder.
Intrigue also surrounds the album’s title, The Money Store. Some interpret its oxymoronic humor as reflecting the album’s thematic duality and a potential critique of capitalism, lampooning the relentless “rat race” with ironic naming. While tangential to some lyrical content, the most concrete origin of the title stems from Sacramento’s distinctive ‘The Ziggurat’ building, intentionally designed to resemble an ancient Mesopotamian pyramid:
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“What’s the most comically ugly building in Sacramento?There is the Ziggurat building in Sacramento, it is designed like a giant stepped pyramid. It’s an amazing building, it used to be the headquarters of a loan company called The Money Store.”– Death Grips for L.A. Record
Thus, The Money Store title operates on multiple levels: a literal reference to a Sacramento landmark, an ironic commentary on commerce, and a symbolic representation of the album’s multifaceted and layered nature.
Compositional Breakdown: Deconstructing and Rebuilding Hip-Hop
Compositionally, The Money Store begins by dissecting hip-hop into its fundamental elements: rapped poetry, beats, and instrumental production. Death Grips’ sound emerges from stripping these components bare, hyper-exaggerating each, and then forcefully reassembling them. Their creative process is communal, with conception and music creation occurring as a unified group effort, though each member has distinct areas of focus. Stefan Burnett concentrates on lyrics and vocal performance, Zach Hill on drumming and production, and Andy Morin on production and engineering. Notably, Andy and Stefan are sometimes absent from song credits, and one tour featured only Stefan and Zach performing with backing tracks, highlighting the fluid and adaptable nature of their creative roles.
This “hip-hop turned up to 11” approach serves as the fundamental vehicle not only for Death Grips’ sonic identity but also for conveying the album’s conceptual weight. Just as classic West Coast hip-hop artists like The Notorious B.I.G. or N.W.A. delivered street poetry, painting vivid narratives of gang life and racial oppression, Death Grips’ lyrics inhabit a similar hardcore ethos, amplified to extremes. They are saturated with violence, fear, danger, occultism, and profoundly detached mental states. Ride’s vocal delivery is often described as resembling a “violent, deranged homeless person,” embodying an accelerated, neo-punk response to the hardcore/gangsta rap that preceded them.
Zach Hill’s background is rooted in the rock-oriented music scene of California, with extensive session work and several projects of his own. Hella, a mathy noise rock band typically consisting of just two members, is his most recognized project outside of Death Grips, providing a platform for his virtuosic drumming. His solo work perhaps represents the purest expression of his unique skill and style. Hill is renowned for drumming with such intensity that his hands bleed and for generating piles of broken drumsticks during single performances, his bass drum kicks often mistaken for two separate drums due to their speed.
Andy Morin, often perceived as the most understated member, possibly due to a less overtly creative performance presence, joined after Zach and Stefan had already initiated the project. An older friend of Zach’s, Morin had previously produced on some of Hill’s drumming projects. Morin’s contribution is crucial in assembling Death Grips’ signature glitchy, industrial, eclectic, and alien soundscape.
“Yeah. Not necessarily music. We wouldn’t talk about what this thing would sound like. It was all about empowerment for ourselves, not for other people. We’d talk about it like it was another person who was in the room. It was about this place where we could let out a lot of internalized things with hyper-velocity. We would talk about a super-inspiring sound as a concept, like a drug you’d take. There were a lot of philosophical conversations. At the start, we never really once talked about what kind of sounds we’d make, or instruments we’d use.”– Zach Hill for Pitchfork
Stefan Burnett’s history with hip-hop stretches back to the mid-90s, when he left visual art studies at Hampton University to pursue rapping in an experimental hip-hop group called Fyre. While Fyre achieved limited mainstream success, they produced several lo-fi and progressive albums. Burnett, under the moniker Mxlplx, showcased a different aesthetic in Fyre compared to Death Grips, yet his lyrical style in this earlier project clearly foreshadowed his later work. After Fyre disbanded, Burnett turned to painting. Zach Hill’s first visit to Burnett’s home revealed it “stacked floor to ceiling with paintings,” highlighting Burnett’s diverse artistic background.
“Lyrically, Death Grips represent the glorification of the gut…the id..summoned, tapped, and channelled before being imprisoned and raped by the laws of reason… All songs are written collectively and then maximized through painstaking attention to detail. We practice the art of deconstruction with the devotion of possessed fanatics. Both idealists and pessimists live in delusional fantasies rooted in their incapacity to deal with the way of things. We are realists. Anyone who feels safe is a brainwashed lamb ready for the slaughter.”– Stefan Burnett for CLASH
Aggressive tone and content were hallmarks of early hip-hop and rapping. Death Grips amplifies this aggression to an extreme. Now known as Ride (often mislabeled “MC Ride” due to a suspected missing comma in an early review), Stefan Burnett often shouts his lyrics with a violent intensity, often bordering on incomprehensibility, making even N.W.A. sound comparatively subdued. Instead of the ego-driven persona of, say, 2Pac, Ride’s delivery feels more like an unfiltered stream of raw, unconscious thoughts and reactions to the world. Consider this iconic lyric from N.W.A.’s “Fuck the Police”:
Fuck the police! Comin’ straight from the underground
A young nigga got it bad ‘cause I’m brown
And not the other color, so police think
They have the authority to kill a minority
This verse delivers a clear message with a discernible cadence and flow. While not strictly Shakespearean, the meter loosely resembles iambic pentameter, with a pleasing pattern of emphasis and stressed syllables at line endings. The rhyme scheme is also logical (“brown” and “underground” being a slant rhyme, but achieved naturally). It’s a well-composed verse, demonstrably influential in hip-hop. Now contrast it with these Death Grips lines from “I’ve Seen Footage,” conveying a similar theme:
armored cop open fire glock
on some kid who stepped so
fast was hard ta grasp what even happened
til you seen dat head blow
off his shoulders in slow mo
While depicting a similarly violent scene—in this case, graphically explicit—cadence is largely disregarded. Ride spits these lines out like written prose, a jarring barrage. Lines 1, 2, and 4 maintain a consistent syllable count, each occupying a bar. However, to preserve the “so,” “blow,” and “mo” rhyme scheme, line 2 is truncated with a pause, and line 3 crams two-and-a-half lines into two bars, delivered with the inflection of a single line. Ride pushes through with brute force, eliding a syllable from “happened” to link it to the contracted “until” (as “’til”), conveying a graphic image in just four lines within five bars, with a recognizable rhyme scheme. Where N.W.A.’s lines utilize interplay of emphasis and relaxation, Death Grips’ lines are pure emphasis. The meter is similarly loose, particularly in line 3’s syllable contraction and combination. However, it’s primarily written in trochaic meter, the opposite of Shakespearean iambs, resulting in a downward inflection at each line’s end. If N.W.A.’s lines pulsed upward like a heartbeat, Death Grips’ are like an arrhythmic, backward heart attack.
This lyrical style and convoluted delivery are hallmarks of Death Grips, pervasive throughout The Money Store and their entire discography.
Sampling, another cornerstone of hip-hop, is taken to unprecedented levels by Death Grips. They incorporate ambitious samples from sources as diverse as The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix to obscure YouTube videos of Venus and Serena Williams grunting or the Vancouver Skytrain. Their signature is twisting and mutilating samples to near-unrecognizability, sometimes taking fans years to identify them. Many likely remain undiscovered. Confirmed samples, detailed in song breakdowns below, often seem random, perhaps chosen to broaden the group’s references and create something contrived from chaos and fragmentation.
Interpretational Abstract: Cubism in Lyrics and Sound
When initially interpreting Death Grips’ lyrics, Pablo Picasso’s Cubism came to mind:
Picasso-beret-768×1035 (Marie‐Thérèse) (1937) – Image via Christie’s
The connection might not be immediately apparent, but both Picasso’s style and Death Grips’ lyrics share traits: distinctiveness, unusualness, and cryptic nature. Cubism is often described as depicting subjects from multiple perspectives, jarringly overlaid. This lens proves useful in deciphering some of Death Grips’ more impenetrable lyrics. Consider these lines:
i got this pregnant snake
stay surrounded by long hairs
a plethroa of maniacs
and spiral stairs
make your water break
in the apple store
sink or swim, who fucking cares
cut the birth cords
These lines, from the final track “Hacker,” are initially baffling. They resemble Garden-path sentences, where initial context misleads interpretation by the line’s end. Grammar and syntax appear correct, yet the topic shifts before comprehension solidifies. I propose these four lines originated from two separate vocal takes of three lines each, stitched together, most evident in lines five and six. “Make your water break in the Apple Store” makes sense independently, yet listening closely reveals a split after “Make your water break,” with “in the Apple Store” seemingly attached from a separate take. Separating these intertwined topics reveals two more coherent verses:
i got this pregnant snake
make your water break
Sink or swim, who fucking cares, cut the birth cords
and:
stay surrounded by long hairs
a plethora of maniacs and spiral stairs
in the Apple Store
Both sets become clearer individually. The first analogizes the album’s release (expanded further in song breakdown). The second references Apple consumers (“long hairs,” like Californian hippies) and Apple Stores, known for extravagant glass spiral staircases. Intriguingly, both sets retain rhyme schemes and consistent forms after separation, both with AAB schemes, and their third lines slant rhyming (AAB CCB). Their combination preserves the “snake,” “break,” and “hairs,” “stairs” rhymes, and capitalizes on the “cords,” “store” slant rhyme, possibly missed had they remained separate. Combining vocal takes, rather than pre-written mashed lyrics, preserves emphasis and flow, even fragmented, in the final product. “Break” still feels like a line ending, even mid-line.
Why combine them? Beyond strengthening rhyme schemes, their meanings are juxtaposed. Ride compares a dark, idiosyncratic analogy of the album’s release to the “plethora” of maniacs consuming Apple products. Like Death Grips, Apple boasts a distinct aesthetic, passionate consumers, and a progressive design philosophy. Whether understood or liked, Death Grips “cut the birth cord” of The Money Store. Like water breaking prematurely in an Apple Store, the album was thrust upon the world.
This technique allows Death Grips to create two verses in the space of one, achieving Picasso’s multiple viewpoints. These lyrical perspectives are superimposed in a word painting, adding a fourth dimension, akin to how Picasso’s painting of the woman in the orange beret showcases facial features from shifting viewpoints in a stationary, two-dimensional space.
Corrigendum 17th Oct. 2021:
*When initially writing this breakdown (2018-2019), I randomly selected the “Hacker” lyrical passage as a generically interesting sample. I had no preconceived notion of its origin or meaning, and the Cubism angle arose organically during research and consideration.
Nearly a decade after the song’s release, a Death Grips member openly discussed the meaning behind one of their lyrics. Pitchfork’s 25th-anniversary article included musicians’ favorite albums from that timeframe. Zach Hill named U.S. Maple’s 2001 album, Acre Thrills, explaining their influence on Death Grips.
Remarkably, the exact lyrical passage I analyzed is explained by Zach as recounting his first U.S. Maple live performance in 1999, opening for Pavement. He described their performance as “a big pregnant snake on stage squeezing all the air from the room and doling out oxygen when it hissed,” “long hairs” referencing their first album, Long Hair in Three Stages, and “Spiral Stairs” being Pavement’s second guitarist’s nickname.
Given my interpretation’s context, I don’t see it as invalidated. This new information highlights the cryptic nature of Death Grips lyrics. Extracting Zach’s U.S. Maple experience from that passage without prior knowledge would be futile based solely on literal and figurative word deduction.
I added this reflection from a band member during a time when Death Grips is largely considered defunct by fans.*
“As a group, we’re perceived in large part as male or very aggressive, but we don’t think about those things. There is no gender to this group. It’s androgynous. But we know that perception. Peoples’ hangups with sexuality, gender, and nudity– it’s similar to how I feel about organized religion. It’s toxic and poisonous to the human mind, and the development of humans in the modern world. In our own modest way, through our artwork, that’s what it represents: pushing past everything that makes people slaves without even knowing it.” – Death Grips for Pitchfork
Track-by-Track Breakdown: Unpacking “The Money Store” Song by Song
The preceding analysis provided a contextual overview of the album and Death Grips’ style for newcomers. Now, each song will be analyzed to reveal more specific meanings and connections. The aim is to illuminate interesting points rather than over-analyze or impose definitive interpretations, which would be overly lengthy and restrict individual understanding.
Lyrics are sourced from the Death Grips website, containing spelling errors and structural discrepancies from the recorded versions. These are likely shorthand drafts, reflecting Ride’s phonetic vocal delivery, often sounding Caribbean or African-influenced. Production edits likely account for the final version’s differences. These official lyrics, despite imperfections, are the best available source for breakdown purposes, especially given the subjective nature of deciphering Death Grips’ work. Layout changes, primarily line breaks, are made to align with Ride’s delivery for clarity, hopefully without distorting original context. Lyrics are indented and blue; breakdowns follow in standard paragraph form.
Get Got: The Deranged Getaway
Samples: Papito, Iba one – Music from Saharan Cellphones, Vol. 1 – Yereyira
“Get Got” kicks off The Money Store with a frenetic, unhinged getaway narrative, told from the fragmented perspective of someone grappling with severe mental illness, intoxication, or both.
The music video is quintessential Death Grips: DIY and raw. It feels almost parodic, primarily consisting of shots of Ride in various locations, gesturing and lip-syncing to the lyrics, mimicking stereotypical rap videos. However, its aesthetic is stark and dark. Many shots are unlit, composition and structure are disregarded, utilizing rudimentary camera equipment and cheap, glitchy digital effects. Three primary shots recur: Ride seated in a chair in San Francisco’s Chinatown, walking in the dimly lit Stockton Tunnel nearby, and waving police lights at night in front of the Sacramento Capitol building. The rest is largely unintelligible or brief shots of similar scenes. It verges on parody by deconstructing classic hip-hop music video tropes, mirroring the music’s deconstruction and disjointed reconstruction of hip-hop elements. In simpler terms, they likely improvised, grabbed a camera, and filmed their interpretation of a rap video in California.
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“Yereyira,” one of Death Grips’ more eclectic samples, originates from Music from Saharan Cellphones, a compilation series from which they draw four samples across The Money Store. Compiled from Mali, these volumes showcase music popular in communities around the Western Sahara Desert, shared via Bluetooth peer-to-peer networks. However, between the two volumes’ releases, extremists seized control of the region and banned music. Having navigated major label distribution, a Deep Web ARG, and torrent-based album releases, Death Grips’ interest in alternative and unconventional music scenes and distribution methods is evident. These fragmented Saharan Cellphone samples are integral to The Money Store‘s sonic DNA.
get get get get
got got got got
blood rush to my
head lit hot lock
poppin off the
fuckin block knot
clockin wrist slit
watch bent thought bot
tail pipe draggin volume blastin
bailin out my brain red light flash
dem stop i smash
abraxas, hydroplane, massive
catch this flight flow
rainin madness
mastered mine and laced
the ave wit black cat fish tailin
waves of stratus
curb right ta far left lane
The album’s opening verse immediately establishes a strong tone and methodology. It describes speeding in a stolen, hot-wired car, mounting curbs, music blasting, running red lights, smashing stop signs, burning tires (“stratus” of smoke), and swerving onto the wrong side of the road.
drilled a hole into my head
pierced the bone and
felt the breeze
lift my thoughts out
dem sick bed
wit a pair of crow
skeleton wings
know nothin since then
it seems
been floatin through
the nexus threadin dreams
This final verse alludes to Trepanning, an ancient surgical procedure involving drilling a hole in the skull, historically to release evil spirits. Here, it’s a perhaps overly literal metaphor for opening the mind, analogous to Ride’s lyric writing and vocalization, suggesting the ideas uncovered are “crow with skeleton wings,” blown from the “sick bed” of his mind.
The song’s narrative becomes clearer when read in reverse. Starting with Ride’s trepanation, he ends up “floating through the nexus threading dreams,” losing his sanity. Like a werewolf (“lycanthropic manic cycles”), he awakens in a rage and heads to the nearest city. Further dissociating from reality, sleep-deprived and manic, he finds a bar to blackout drink. The opening lines then depict a crazed chase from imagined threats. Paranoia stemming from mental instability permeates the narrative lyrics. Attempting to grasp it all at once is futile; it’s raw stream-of-consciousness, expertly rendered from the perspective of someone detached from reality. This is the modus operandi for much of the album’s lyrical content.
The Fever (Aye-Aye): Abstract Violence and Sickness
Similar to “Get Got,” “The Fever” delivers fragmented glimpses of insane violence juxtaposed with abstract visual imagery. This mode of existence is termed “The Fever,” depicted as a literal sickness or mental ailment.
Samples: Casio Computer Co., Ltd. – Sounds Effect 88
The music video opens with an idiosyncratic night shot of Ride hanging by his fingertips from an unusual door frame seemingly opening into empty space on the second floor of a Sacramento building (North corner of J and 20th streets). The rest of the video is a live performance, disorientingly edited: rapid scaling, abrupt transitions, cropping to Ride’s face, and frequent shifts between fixed perspectives and digital stabilization relative to Ride’s exaggerated movements. Filters are applied, elements fill with static, colors distort, and contrast dulls, evoking a semi-corrupt file fleetingly transmitted through an illicit internet network.
The sample is one of many sound effects from Casio keyboards, an interesting concept to build a track from a single effect rather than traditional instrumental keyboard playing.
aye, aye, pass the dro my way
or no way twenty fo no 25-8
These lines introduce “25-8,” recurring in the album. It’s an exaggeration of “24-7” (24 hours a day, 7 days a week), emphasizing something so constant and intense it transcends time. Likely alluding to The Beatles’ “Eight Days a Week,” with similar meaning. Also connected to a 25g 5/8 needle, common for insulin or steroid self-injections, thematically relevant. 25/8 (25 divided by eight) is an ancient Babylonian Pi approximation, used in architecture, potentially familiar to Stefan Burnett, who has Pi digits tattooed on his torso (out of order). While an interesting connection, its relevance to the song is unclear. Contextually, “Twenty fou- no, twenty five eight” shows him correcting himself, escalating “24-7” further. This stream-of-consciousness style places the listener directly inside Ride’s mind.
fuck it
upside down in a
soft top bucket
screamin
shred it
These lines reference John Berendt’s novel Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. The book’s line is:
“It’s like my mom always said: ‘Two tears in a bucket, motherfuck it.’’
These lyrics could be a sequel or expansion of “Get Got”‘s narrative. The jarring insanity, previously permeating, now dominates. The Berendt reference, “upside down in a soft top bucket,” suggests a car crash aftermath in a convertible, fitting with the previous song’s events.
by any means necesserated
blade cut me
sewer drain grated
bubonic plague
spreaded faceless
lurking in the deadest spaces
on your knees, black goat anus
christo anti clan of shameless
came ta whip those
into shapeless
here we go, devastated
here we go…
This verse contains dark spiritual/occult references, possibly suggesting blood sacrifice, being trapped (grated) in a sewer, and the “Black Death”/Bubonic Plague spread. The Black Goat is a significant symbol in Satanism, representing fertility or vitality, a black goat specifically suggesting bad luck or omen. It directly connects to Stefan Burnett’s tattoos: two Baphomet tattoos (related to the Knights Templar, also referenced later) and H.P. Lovecraft’s Necronomicon Gate via Shub-Niggurath (The Black Goat of the Woods), featured in Lovecraft’s Mythos.
diamonds scrapin the marrow, out my core
whos in the mirror
whos at the door
someones there
wasnt there before
ceiling connected
to the chord
pull it, pull that shit
i got the diamonds, scrapin,
sidin, wastin my life
in altered states dem
back it up, i got the fever
The imagery of “diamonds scrapin’ the marrow out my core” is harsh, a gritty, visceral description of intravenous methamphetamine or heroin injection. It evokes a gruesome image of a coroner scraping crystal buildup and marrow from hollowed veins or bones. “Cord” spelled as “chord” might be intentional wordplay, or a simple error. “Sidin'” reads like “slidin’,” diamonds sliding through veins, but could also mean “siding,” like side effect or taking a side. The track culminates in a dark ending, presumably a chair pulled from under Ride, a cord around his neck attached to the ceiling.
Lost Boys: Outsiders on the Edge
Samples: Death Grips – Live from Death Valley – Fyrd Up
If “Get Got” established Ride’s violent, detached manic state, and “The Fever” metaphorically depicted it as illness, “Lost Boys” less abstractly describes a group in this state, the “lost boys.”
Death Grips are not the first to self-sample in hip-hop, but they do so more frequently, throughout The Money Store and beyond. They also share samples across releases and remix themselves in other artists’ songs, creating potential remixes of sample remixes. The “Lost Boys” sample is from Live from Death Valley, an EP released after Exmilitary. The sampled song, “Fyred Up,” contains three noteworthy references. “Fyred Up,” with the alternate spelling of “fire,” obviously nods to Stefan Burnett’s prior project, Fyre. It self-references in the lyrics: “told rigor mortis grips,” rigor mortis being post-mortem muscle stiffening, perhaps offering insight into the name Death Grips and one possible interpretation. Thirdly, lines from “Fyred Up”:
are you sure that it’s tonight
cause if it’s not I might get got
the complication of your system
unexpected, don’t wanna be the victim
“Fyred Up” broadly explores being outside “the system,” vulnerable to societal rejection, referred to as “you might get got.” This concept, this mental state or position, has been expressed through The Money Store thus far, providing the title for the first track, “Get Got,” and defining the phrase.
(lost boys)
other side of da tracks
scuzz outsiders
nothin ta loose
strike of midnighters
lost boys
The idiom “wrong side of the tracks” is referenced in the second line, colloquially denoting the “bad” side of town. “Tracks” also alludes to vein inflammation or damage from chronic intravenous drug use. These first three songs together break down “getting got”—how it happens, to whom, and, most importantly, how it feels.
Blackjack: Gambling with Fate and Fortune
Samples: No confirmed samples discovered.
“Blackjack”‘s lyrics, similar to preceding tracks, describe ripping people off and stealing using Blackjack and gambling analogies.
The music video features an intro absent from the regular song version: a color-changing Clonazepam pill (benzodiazepine for seizures) with a background sample resembling a depression medication advertisement, lasting only seconds before the song begins. The main video is framed as if viewed through a porthole—actually the outer bezel of a floor light, from a picture later used as The Powers that B album cover. Variations of this picture appear in the “I’ve Seen Footage” video.
Capture
shawshank the box
cant be contained
man came ta pick the lock
empty the vault
and leave no trace
sleep dont wake
This references Shawshank prison from Stephen King’s novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption (adapted to film as The Shawshank Redemption). Spoiler alert: the plot revolves around a famous prison break, but this reference seems the opposite—breaking into a lockbox or safe at night while everyone sleeps.
(cant do a thing but fold)
comin from that hit me until twenty one
makes your chips mine
high king, ace, to knees the place
put down by g’s raisin the stakes
no need ta count the deck i own it
These excerpts contain Blackjack references. Blackjack is a one-on-one game against a dealer, aiming for the highest card value without exceeding 21. “Hit me” and “count the deck” are Blackjack terms, meaning to request another card and memorizing gameplay to calculate card probabilities, respectively. “Folding” and “raisin the stakes” are poker terms; “fold” means conceding a hand, “raise” means increasing the bet. Blackjack bets are placed pre-round and cannot be altered mid-round.
Hustle Bones: Self-Aware Braggadocio
Samples:
- Rodney O and Joe Cooley – U Don’t Hear Me Tho
- Casio Computer Co., Ltd. – Sounds Effect 88
“Hustle Bones” marks a shift towards lyrical lucidity. Previous tracks felt like unfiltered insane perspectives, while “Hustle Bones” is more self-aware braggadocio directed at the listener.
The music video presents another iconic Death Grips concept: camera and drugs inside a spinning clothes dryer. The opening shot is disorienting, camera spinning with the machine, seemingly fixed as cannabis swirls. Money stacks and an open beer are also inside. Briefly, a canine gimp mask, like the album cover, appears. Camera fixed to the door, it occasionally swings open, revealing Ride rapping exaggeratedly, as if awaiting the dryer cycle’s end.
Capture
Unusually for Death Grips (excluding self-samples), they sample a hip-hop song here—the only instance on The Money Store. The sampled track is typical early 90s Hardcore West Coast Hip-Hop, bearing the same relationship to Death Grips as the N.W.A. verse discussed earlier. The sample’s album, Fuck New York, reflects West Coast rappers’ frustration with New York critics’ East Coast bias.
hustle bones comin’ out my mouth
The meaning of this recurring line is debated. Some interpret “bones” as money, Ride’s income deriving from his vocal output. Others see “hustle bones” as lyrics—fragmented remnants of a past lifestyle, memories and lyrics as skeletal remains.
eons beyond the line never crossed, by dem punks livin soft
while i ride that bomb dr. strangelove into the sun
look no hands megatons rode like man
we can’t lose no shit, no shit
This references Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, the Cold War satire ending with a B-52 pilot riding a nuclear weapon to detonation, triggering a doomsday machine. A Megaton is a unit of explosive energy, equivalent to millions of tons of TNT. Ride riding a bomb with megaton yield is likely a nuclear bomb. The verse depicts imagining a line uncrossed by “punks livin soft,” Ride being “eons beyond” by riding a bomb into the sun. “Megatons rode” describes this, but can also be past tense of himself, if he was “Ride,” he’s now “rode,” consumed by the bomb.
I’ve Seen Footage: Paranoia and Hyper-Awareness
Samples: No confirmed samples discovered.
“I’ve Seen Footage” is a conspiracy-tinged account of seeing too much “real shit,” hyper-aware yet paranoid to the point of reality blurring. The song is known for “noided,” a meme in the Death Grips fanbase, a contraction of “paranoided,” embodying the song’s essence.
It has one of their most unique and telling music videos, a rapid succession of images chronicling the world from Death Grips’ perspective. Many are in their signature “cursed” style—dark, flash-lit, seemingly narrating a Death Grips tour: members traveling, setting up shows, setlists, music video scenes, malls, airports, planes, backstage areas, etc.
Annotation 2020-01-14 085508
While many images are indecipherable or lack context, some stand out: photos of an early show with a guillotine prop, a gold bar, Lady Gaga posters, drugs, Zach Hill’s old home address on a package, early album artwork concepts for Government Plates and The Powers That B, the police lights from the “Get Got” video (possibly in Stefan Burnett’s house?), dead animals, and Stefan inscribing “Death Grips” everywhere. Many frames became popular memes, possibly linked to the rise of “cursed” memes. Headphones, high volume, unfocused gaze into the video create a hypnotic effect, drawing you into their world. It’s footage constructed from shared experiences, shady dealings, and touring—a literalization of the lyrics.
“The line “I’ve Seen Footage” was from a conversation I had with this street-person dude in Sacramento named Snake Eyes. A friend of ours recorded him on the porch in a conversation– he didn’t know he was being recorded. He was all fucked up on drugs and shit, just rattling off all this crazy information. He was talking about structures on the moon. I mean, I talk about those things, too. So we were talking about moon structures, and Snake Eyes says, “I’ve seen footage! I’ve seen footage of it!” And I was like, “That’s good!””– Zach Hill for Pitchfork
This encounter inspired not just the title but the entire song. The verses sound like Snake Eyes, a drugged street wanderer, speaking.
whats that
cant tell
hand held dream
shot in hell
deep space ghetto (streets)
show me somethin
i aint seen before
mystery hind that
death door
Ride can’t discern “that,” it’s a hellish dream filmed on a phone. The only unseen thing is post-death.
got a no-no goin, one time
creeps up behind me
over my shoulder
turn around try to see
but its nowhere
noided, noided
static on my blindside
“One time” is police slang. Turning to check, Ride finds nothing, feeling “noided”—his peripheral vision filled with static, fuzzy, suggesting he’s being followed, paranoid. “Noided” and distrust of perception reappear in the album, serving as a filter for interpreting lyrics, suggesting non-literal interpretation.
whats the science on
flyin that high
Sounds like a fake moon landing conspiracy rant, ironically inspired by a moon structure conversation. Both “noided” and perceptual distrust recur, filtering subsequent lyrics; if a lyric is confusing, “noided” suggests non-literal interpretation.
Double Helix: The DNA of Death Grips
Samples:
- The Beatles – Magical Mystery Tour – Blue Jay Way
- Cheb Wasila – Music from Saharan Cellphones, Vol. 2 – Hwa Heda
- John Lennon – Plastic Ono Band – Mother
“Double Helix” refers to DNA structure, breaking down Death Grips’ musical DNA and their relationship to music overall.
Another iconic Death Grips music video, filmed entirely through a 2007 Toyota Prius’s reverse parking camera. Ride menacingly gestures and raps into the camera, creating a feeling of being trapped in a locked car, taunted by Ride, visible only through the parking camera, adorned with the ominous “Check surroundings for safety” message.
Annotation 2020-01-14 112718
The song samples Music from Saharan Cellphones Vol. 2, released January 5, 2013, months after The Money Store. Both volumes were compiled in 2010. Sahel Sounds (compiler) held this track for three years before release, and pre-release bootleg cassette editions of these songs existed. This sample was also used by Grimes in a 2011 DJ mix, Weird Magic Mix, credited as “untitled,” a collaboration with another Saharan Cellphones artist. Death Grips’ and Grimes’ paths to this sample are speculative, but release date and crediting discrepancies show these songs’ and compilations’ eclectic nature at the time. Death Grips clearly sought far-reaching samples. Major label signing likely facilitated clearing ambitious samples; clearing a Beatles sample is challenging. Exmilitary also contains ambitious samples but remains officially unpublished as a “mixtape,” possibly due to sample clearance issues.
Death Grips discussed their Beatles connection:
“For whatever reason I had a vision John Lennon would be a big fan of Death Grips.
Oh man! Thank you very much. They’re [The Beatles] often a topic in the music that we make. The way they did their shit and how they went about making their music through stages of development. At the same time highly conceptual. We talk about The Beatles all the time, how we want to be The Beatles of Rap. I say that without arrogance, it is just something to aspire to.”– Death Grips for The Source
Sampling “Blue Jay Way” seems pointedly referencing Los Angeles, uncharacteristically for The Beatles:
There’s a fog upon L.A
And my friends have lost their way
We’ll be over soon they said
Now they’ve lost themselves instead
These lines, even down-to-earth, resonate with Death Grips lyrics. Set in a house on Blue Jay Way in the Hollywood Hills, where streets are bird-named, George Harrison wrote the song while staying there. The sampled song is referenced in “Double Helix” lyrics:
be back when you think im gone
blue jay way, dont belong
double helix phoenix from beyond
Interpretations include: George Harrison not belonging on Blue Jay Way, Death Grips not belonging in that LA area, or the sample feeling out of place in a Death Grips track. As one of The Beatles’ more unsettling songs, it’s a fitting acknowledgement of Death Grips’ aspirations, implying The Beatles are part of their DNA.
The track opens with descriptions of Death Grips’ music production:
bangin bones on roland
jungle rottin chicken
skeletal system bombin
unidentified genre abductor
hit it from the back formula fucker
hooded executor of cookie cutter
cant wait ta pull dat trigger
shut gunner
Roland, a Japanese electronic music instrument company, likely produced gear used on this album. “Jungle” is likely the electronic genre they sometimes share elements with, but their version is “rotten.”
This is Death Grips’ DNA, their double helix. They’re the “unidentified genre abductor,” “formula fucker.” “Hooded executor” is interesting; usually “hooded executioner,” the one who hangs people. But Ride says “executor,” someone carrying out a task, often overseeing a will. “Execute” means both justly killing and performing a task. Meanings combine:
- Death Grips are the hooded executioner of cookie-cutter music, twisting and defying formulaic music.
- They execute (create) cookie-cutter music—apt given their sample use and genre combination. Hooded because even if “cookie-cutter,” it’s uniquely dark and twisted.
Reality is both. Like everything on the album, perspective shifts meaning. Death Grips “execute” cookie-cutter music, and they also “execute” it.
(so you really wanna know how i freak it)
This hook repeats, “freak it” being a verb the band identifies with, recurring in interviews and album lyrics, notably in “System Blower,” covering similar themes. “Freak it,” defined on Urban Dictionary (2007): “to do something really well; improvise musically; rock hard; making a cool song; being original.” Death Grips use it to describe their music-making process.
“The production is definitely a huge part of the aesthetic, what is the process for making the “beats” on this record?
We just freak it out…work the graveyard shift.”– Zach Hill for Coolehmag
This track is an invitation into their process, a glimpse into the minds behind Death Grips.
System Blower: Sonic Anarchy and Institutional Demolition
Samples:
- Venus Williams grunting
- Vancouver Skytrain acceleration sound
“System Blower” describes music so loud it destroys sound systems, likened to riots, anarchy, and societal institution destruction.
“For example, in the song “System Blower”, there’s this part that goes, “WA-WA-WA-WA-WA,” and the drop is the sound of Venus Williams screaming when she hits a tennis ball. It was in a video we found on YouTube. The only things we sampled were things like that, things from everyday life. We all carry around camcorders; we’ll record sounds with digital cameras and use those sounds on our records, with a real disregard for sound quality. We’ll build something around something that’s just fucked– like, you just shouldn’t use it. But there’s a majestic quality to that rawness. When people talk about how our music is like rap music, but punk, I think they’re talking about our use of instrumentation like that.”– Zach Hill for Pitchfork
Zach Hill clarifies the non-musical samples’ purpose: taking everyday elements and twisting them into something unrecognizable and dangerous. It’s about reframing life and music, a philosophy crucial to the album.
yeah we came to blow your system
you know what im sayin
kill it or die
braggin about how you had it all dialed
well whats up now when your shit is
The opening line establishes the double meaning: “blow your system” refers to both sound systems and institutional systems. The recurring line’s end, “when your shit is…”, foreshadows a recurring hook in “Hacker”: “When you come out your shit is gone.” “Blown” can be interpolated, as each instance is followed by examples of their music and its intent to “blow the system.”
stupid dopefiend beat low hung blood spray
all over da death stomp drums
scum worshipping speaker ripping
pun2k weight holding heretics
boundary reapin frequency
freakin out till we’re like that track
sound so sick
Introduces “pun2k weight,” a 21st-century Punk form, explored further in the “Punk Weight” section. Another instance of “freakin,” like “freak it,” but sounds like the expletive.
just for kicks cant fuck wit dis
sadomaso-kiss my fist
suck my dick, its not cool
im too sick, what time is it
system blower, systems over
deep in da klink base cut straight to da chase
like a triple shot of 180 proof kill-o-watts
riots audio violence breaks your windows
and takes all da loot
“Sadomaso-kiss my fist” is a pun, inserting “kiss my fist” into Sadomasochism, a portmanteau of sadism and masochism (pleasure from giving and receiving pain, often sexual), relating to the album cover.
The Cage: Mental Confinement and Escape
Samples: Death Grips – Death Grips (Next Grips)
“The Cage”‘s larger concept is unclear, but given the title and lyrics, it resembles “The Fever,” but Ride’s mental state is likened to a cage instead of illness. Alternatively, “The Cage” could be literal—prison or incarceration, with lyrics suggesting a character evading the law.
hopes that mo cash will help you cope
sorry ta tell ya.. but it won’t
how do i get out then?
you dont
These lines illustrate both literal and metaphorical cages.
The hook features wordplay:
(i say kill it like ya, you say hate it
kill it like ya hate it
kill it like ya hate it
i say arrrgghh you say cant take it
i cant take it i cant take it)
It’s a parody of musicians’ overused crowd interaction, with Ride also voicing the audience with different inflections. First round: Ride says “kill it like ya” as a cue for “hate it.” Second round: “arrrgghh” is the cue, but “arrrgghh” and “I” are interchanged. It shifts from call-and-response to Ride simply saying “I can’t take it.” Through repetitions, Ride varies pronunciations and intonations, using “arrrgghh,” “I,” “Ow,” and “Oh” in the “__ can’t take it” phrase, slightly altering meaning each time.
terrified by da way a bassilisk come out him
skin so fast not the first wont be the last
barrel of my gun down the hatch 187
deep throat chokin eat dis fourty-four magnum dic
A Basilisk is a mythical snake killing with its gaze. The line refers to skin shedding, like snakes, bearing similarity to following lines. A comparison between forcing a gun down someone’s throat and snake skin shedding is implied. 187 is likely a Springfield rifle model, and a Fourty-Four Magnum is a famous, once-powerful handgun.
rainin blood, burnin paper
a j acksons catchin vapors
Andrew Jackson, seventh U.S. President, on the $20 bill. “Burning paper Andrew Jackson catching vapors” means burning money, perhaps even a joint rolled with a $20 bill.
Punk Weight: The Evolution of Punk in the 21st Century
Samples:
- Cheb Wasila – Music from Saharan Cellphones, Vol. 2 – Hwa Heda
- Jimi Hendrix – Are You Experienced – Manic Depression
“Punk Weight” is relatively abstract. No clear narrative or message; lyrics are glimpses. “Punk weight,” stylized as “pun2k weight,” seemingly represents Punk for Y2K (year 2000), an evolution or “answer” to 70s Punk.
This Saharan Cellphones sample is the only one with appreciable lyrics—Moroccan Arabic, difficult to decipher. It’s likely a Gnawa song detailing a narrative between two people, based on Sufism. Death Grips likely chose it for aesthetic reasons, not semantic interpretation.
Only one recorded interview with Stefan Burnett exists. He named Jimi Hendrix as a favorite musician, then stopped himself, reiterating inward inspiration and disinterest in idolizing others. Why sample Jimi Hendrix’s “Manic Depression,” twisted beyond recognition? The answer lies in Jimi Hendrix and 1967, his landmark album’s release year. 1967 was a turning point for Rock and Roll/Psychedelic music. Hendrix’s Are You Experienced, The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Doors’ S/T, Pink Floyd’s The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, and Jefferson Airplane’s Surrealistic Pillow all released within months, ushering in drug-influenced Psychedelic Rock. But the first, most influential, edgy, drug-infused Rock and Roll of 1967 was The Velvet Underground & Nico. Punk hadn’t formed, but TVU&N is considered the first Proto-Punk album, linking heavy drug use and perverted sex to Rock and Roll. All Punk, Psychedelic, Experimental, Underground, or Alternative music owes debt to it, including Death Grips.
“I was talking to Lou Reed the other day, and he said that the first Velvet Underground record sold only 30,000 copies in its first five years. Yet, that was an enormously important record for so many people. I think everyone who bought one of those 30,000 copies started a band!”– Brian Eno for the Los Angeles Times
Death Grips’ samples are obscure, seemingly meaningless. Connecting Jimi Hendrix to this song, suggesting his album represents Punk, might be a stretch, but it acknowledges Death Grips’ deepest roots.
warholian nightmare
storm the gates
25 8, twelve gauge pun2k weight
(25 8 pun2k weight out yo flesh)
Another TVU&N connection: Andy Warhol reference.
“Actually, we kept talking about the ‘Warholian nightmare’ while we were making The Money Store. We kept talking about this record as directly relating to certain things about Andy Warhol, if we had to choose an artist. It’s the same, in our minds, as pop art.”– Zach Hill for AQNB
Pop Art, starting in the 1950s, reacted against Fine and Abstract Art. Often ironic, it uses popular culture images, especially advertising, decontextualized, visually mimicking mass production (screen printing). Warhol took known imagery from outside art and re-presented it, shifting artistry from visual skill to image context and intent. It challenged perceptions of popular imagery and fine art contexts. Death Grips share this representation of ideas, taking dark, eclectic life parts and reprocessing them into synthetic sounds in unexpected spaces. Like Warhol made a supermarket shelf a gallery, Death Grips formed sounds and concepts into an album.
cri_000000318242
This connection is significant because Andy Warhol produced and managed The Velvet Underground during Proto-Punk. They joined his “Superstars” collective, part of his projects. “Warholian nightmare,” Death Grips’ album concept, defines “pun2k.” Warhol’s integral role in Punk’s formation, leading to Death Grips, makes them the nightmarish, abstract Pop Art version. Punk and Pop Art were counter-culture, but now are less so. Death Grips remain contrary to current music ethos (at least when The Money Store released), and their Punk and Pop Art concepts feed into “pun2k.”
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That explains “pun2k,” but “pun2k weight” remains ambiguous. “Weight” often seems redundant, yet sometimes links “pun2k” to other concepts, like “25 8 pun2k weight out yo flesh,” referencing Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice‘s “pound of flesh” (Shylock’s debt demand), “pound” being weight. “25-8” is used again, tied to “pun2k weight,” sounding like a boxing weight class. Ride used “punk” derogatorily earlier, so “pun2k weight” could be the weight of a weaker person. “Twelve gauge” is shotgun ammunition gauge, barrel diameter. “Gauge” and “weight” are synonymous, like wire gauge can be described as its weight. Other usages: “smoke pun2k weight for breakfast,” and “scale richtor pun2k weight of dis sound.” Here, “pun2k” seems redundant; “weight” is key, like the Richter scale or cannabis weight (grams/ounces). “Pun2k weight” is diverse, a state and a mass, always related to that state.
end beat limbo, baba spitting
blood in slow mo, la la chimney
“Baba” is respectful term for older male or “father” in several languages.
off in the rhythm like
beta in the bong
“Off in the rhythm” references “flow,” creative state often linked to cannabis. Beta is a brainwave frequency related to focused mental activity, altered by cannabis.
mic spray kyrlon
“Kyrlon” is misspelling of Krylon, spray paint. Reference to their Adult Swim segment where Ride spray-paints a microphone red (RED MIC=MC RIDE?).
ask samo how he flipped that material girls pancakes..
as zydeco copper kettles
Reference to underground New York artist SAMO (Jean-Michel Basquait), active in the late 70s. SAMO was a graffiti tag. “Material girl” is Madonna, Basquait’s pre-music career girlfriend. Zydeco is Louisiana Blues. The line describes their relationship as loud or unpleasant (“copper kettle”), but “pancake flipping” and “Zydeco” references are unclear. One of the album’s most confusing lines.
“Punk Weight” also foreshadowed Death Grips’ link to Björk. Their connection’s origins are unclear, but around this album’s release, Björk released Biophilia remixes, including Death Grips’ Sacrifice and Thunderbolt remixes, incorporating a production element from “Punk Weight.” Soon after, Death Grips cancelled a tour, withdrew to complete NO LOVE DEEP WEB, and reportedly Björk reached out to Zach Hill during a difficult period. Their biggest collaboration is Niggas On The Moon, part of The Powers That B, Björk featured on all 8 tracks, instrumentals being cut-up samples of her singing, some from unreleased Vulnicura. She often includes Death Grips in DJ sets, typically “Guillotine” or instrumental tracks. Björk’s and Death Grips’ mutual fandom is evident; they seem complementary, perhaps antithetical.
“i am proud to announce my vocals landed on the new death grips album ! i adore the death grips and i am thrilled to be their “found object”. i have been lucky enough to hang and exchange music loves w/ them and witness them grow !! epic : onwards !!”– Björk on Death Grips
Fuck That: Disjointed Fury and Rejection
Samples: Yeli Fuzzo – Music from Saharan Cellphones, Vol. 1 – Abandé
Likely the album’s most lyrically disjointed song, lacking consistent narrative or decipherable meaning beyond Ride’s loud “fuck that.”
third rail
over one nine breakers
lit throat, cut creator
hung from dem nail
hang em high
savior faire
trans-siberian epic
trek through dat next switch
set it off the roglyphic
jackal headed dawn of the under
check it, check one
you can suck it
till i get disgusted
“Third rail” is train power delivery. “One nine breaker” sounds like CB radio slang used by American truckers. Channel 19 is common; “Breaker” signals wanting to talk on a channel, here channel 19. Syntax reversal makes it sound like ending, not starting, communication, supported by “over” denoting phrase end in radio communication. Also reminiscent of circuit breaker, cutting circuits when overloaded. This links CB slang to train power. These lines evoke suicide attempt by laying on tracks, electrocution short-circuiting the third rail, tripping the breaker, “ending communication.” “Savoir faire” (French, “know how”) means knowing what to do in any situation, “streetwise.” Trans-Siberian Railway is famous for its epic length across Russia. “Through dat next switch” references railway switches allowing trains to take multiple paths, suggesting Ride’s path to change is a long, cold journey, cutting communication and tripping the breaker. “Roglyphic” is contraction of Hieroglyphic. “Jackal-headed” is Anubis, Egyptian god of mummification and afterlife.
get off mine i got that juice noo style
cut your brain stem as my combat boots
grind your head to the cadence of this dreath
stompin mu-sick as fuck contagion
wagin war with all you knew..
bitch
mossberg ballistic flux massive
my shure beta 58a hazmatted pump
pump slugster radioactive ride
through a mine field laced wit black magic
straight from the mayday…
naw fuck that (ONE) broke off its axis, polar shifted
granite knock made ta off every last bitch on this planet
fuck that, naw, fuck that
“Dreath” seems to be “death” misspelled. Ride’s delivery is harsh, “death stompin’ music,” with lyrical cubism. “Mu-sick” split across lines allows “sick” to start a new line, “mu” preserving the “juice,” “boots,” “mu,” and “knew” slant rhyme scheme. “Mu” likely references 4chan’s /mu/ board, where Death Grips were active early on, posting leaks and hosting their ARG. Mossberg is gun manufacturer, Slugster a shotgun model. Shure makes audio equipment, BETA 58A is a microphone, possibly Ride’s. Imagery is vivid, Death Grips at their most self-descriptive. Colorful descriptions pale in comparison to these lyrics: black magic minefield, combat boots grinding brainstems, lyrics fired point-blank through a radioactive shotgun, everything disintegrating as Earth is knocked off orbit in a “sick as fuck contagion.”
dealer push your wig all the way back head
wear your face like a yamaku
lapse never can tell where you’re at
eyes stuck on the sky always gettin jacked
tryin ta lookin the mirror like..
“Yarmulke” is Yiddish for skullcap, Hebrew “Kippah.” Ride puns, combining “Yarmulke” with “collapse” to describe ripping hair back so scalp collapses, face slides up like a Yarmulke, eyes looking skyward.
“Fuck That” is raw Death Grips: violent tribal drums, glitchy production stripped bare, minimal framework for Ride’s guttural vocals, all for a simple statement: if it’s not Death Grips, “fuck that.”
Bitch Please: Unapologetic Confidence and Power
Samples:
- Death Grips – Exmilitary – Thru the Walls
- Death Grips – Exmilitary – Takyon
Another loud self-brag from Ride, directed at the listener.
when shit goes down
ill be there
wit my hand on my gun, and my eyes on the road
ghost ridin ta hell fuck if i care…
who wanna catch my droze
give a fuck blood
i aint goin nowhere
templar night and day, live an die by the code, code of the street
how ta stay in the zone, how i own it and freak it to da base of da bone
“Droze” is a colloquialism for Ride’s attitude: ultimate omnipotent confidence and power.
Pun in “templar night and day.” Knights Templar were Medieval Catholic military order during Crusades. Ride likens his “25-8,” “pun2k,” “night and day,” “code of the street,” “droze” attitude to Templar Knights of Crusades.
cuz i run this lik like dogtown ripped that raw shit like none other
low down dirty shit shot off this hip
death grips, mothafucka
Dogtown was Santa Monica, California area, 70s skateboarding group Zephyr Competition Team hangout, popularized by Lords of Dogtown and Dogtown and Z-boys movies.
Like “Fuck That,” “Bitch Please” is best appreciated by simply listening loudly. “Hacker” and “Punk Weight” may have intense breakdowns, but “Bitch Please” is pure sonic force.
Hacker: Meta-Commentary on Technology and Culture
Samples:
- Blue Devils – The Ditty
- Death Grips – Live From Death Valley – Poser Killer
- M83 – Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming – Midnight City
The full trifecta of Death Grips sample types: obscure YouTube video, self-sample, and recognizable mainstream song, twisted beyond recognition, all in one track.
Despite their prolific output since, “Hacker” remains one of Death Grips’ most popular and accessible songs, full of quotable, meme-worthy lyrics. An important, defining Death Grips track.
Lyrics deviate from previous tracks, reminiscent of Weird Twitter, especially Dril’s word salad style, rearranging mainstream to obscure cultural elements into non-sequiturs. Ride embraces Weird Twitter, creating a twisted, meta-comparison of Death Grips, The Money Store‘s release, technology, internet, and popular culture.
The track opens:
goin back to Tangier
with some jordans and a spear
post-chrisitan shit
post chicken or the egg addiction shit
pass the sherm stick
neo-reality
be the freak you wanna see
just dont follow me
im on a journey to
the center of three
grab your fucking chain and drag you through the bike lane
while everybody’s like no
Much to unpack. Tangier is ancient Moroccan city (nearly 3000 years old), historically important link between Africa and Europe, diverse international cultural nexus, attracting rich, diplomats, artists, spies, anyone can blend in. Jordans are Nike shoes. Lines 3 and 4 distill philosophical worldview. Christianity defined European views on life, happiness, purpose for long time. “Chicken or the egg?” is also ancient philosophical dilemma. Current ethos moves past these defining factors. Science answers “chicken or egg” (literally). Rationality popular relative to Christianity in spirituality, ethics, philosophy, psychology. Sherm stick is PCP-dipped cigarette, powerful dissociative hallucinogen, known for psychotic, dangerous behavior.
These references amalgamate dynamic vernacular and styles. Death Grips’ 4chan and Deep Web links are known; memes popular there are clear influence. Non-sequiturs “Goin’ back to Tangier With some Jordans and a spear” and “Post chicken or the egg addiction shit” aren’t necessarily existing memes, but no context and literal finality, tinged with irony, are reminiscent of existing memes, especially Black Twitter’s Ebonics style.
This verse feels analogous to several things: the group, this album, the album’s release, Death Grips’ internet presence, popular and music culture presence. It says something like “[We’re] goin back to Tangier…” “[This is] Post-Christian shit,” correlating to album creation and meaning. Listening feels like Ride grabbing your bike chain and dragging you through the bike lane while onlookers watch. The second verse’s comparison to Picasso and the first verse’s context show verses 2 and 3 operate similarly, with similar meanings. Individual lines illustrating this:
you’re an intern on wikileaks
most loved therefore most hated
Wikileaks is divisive, little middle ground in public opinion, like Death Grips.
game changer
reclusive aggressive
yingin’ and yanging’
noided
“Game changer” is clear, proven true for this album. “Reclusive aggressive” is wordplay on “passive aggressive.” Yin and Yang are dualistic Chinese philosophy representing change, Yin and Yang are extremes on a scale of interchange, like Western “Light & Dark,” “Positive & Negative,” or “Good & Evil,” showing integral “opposites,” one unable to exist without the other. “Yingin’ and yanging'” is Ride’s participle describing erratic thoughts and behavior, mood swings. Contextualizes album artwork’s duality, clearly relating to Yin and Yang symbol, Taijitu:
1024px-Yin_yang.svg
info warrior jack the hacker
the rolling stoner profit on disaster
Early Death Grips was more than a trio; Info Warrior and Mexican Girl were “ancillary” members. Real names were mostly unmentioned, “Flatlander” alias covered production side (now misattributed to Andy). Info Warrior focused on visuals, co-producing Exmilitary. “Info Warrior” in lyrics sounds like Info Wars, American far-right conspiracy website hosted by Alex Jones. Next line references The Rolling Stones.
my existence is a
momentary lapse of reason
got the DNA of Gothic lemons
shred it thirteen times
out of eleven
Nihilistic reference to Pink Floyd’s A Momentary Lapse of Reason. Gothic lemon is dark, sour, fitting Ride’s DNA. Last two lines remind of “fall down seven times, get up eight,” twisted. Ride will always “shred it,” “13” is unlucky.
burmese babies under each arm
screamin beautiful songs
the cray cray ultra contrarion
havin conversations with your car alam
First two lines sound like kidnapping or celebrity philanthropist adopting Burmese babies, their “beautiful songs” juxtaposed with car alarm. Ride is “cray cray ultra contrarion,” “cray” dated slang for “crazy” (2012 slang revival by Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “Niggas in Paris”). “Contrarion” is contrarian, rhyming with “car alarm” and “arm.” Ultra-contrarian disagrees with everyone, contrary to world. Literal meaning: Ride stole your car, talking to himself while driving off, alarm blaring. Deeper meaning: Burmese babies’ screams compared to car alarm, like us listening to Death Grips’ “beautiful songs” is like conversing with a car alarm.
Every line is self-analogous through cultural references, contrived dualities, convoluted spellings, philosophy, and style.
“Lady Gaga is an example of making the most out of going major with universally positive results. The way she’s inspired people to embrace themselves as individuals in an age of such gross conformity and harsh ignorance is admirable.”– Death Grips for L.A Record
Here, Ride rephrases their Lady Gaga admiration:
gaga cant handle this shit
If she inspires individuality against conformity, even with major label backing, Death Grips take it so far even she can’t handle it.
prodigal, fuck that nautical
teachin bitches how to swim
“Teachin’ bitches how to swim” is an enduring Death Grips line, often miscontextualized due to bridge repetition. Like “25-8” in “The Fever,” stream of consciousness. Ride was about to say “prodigal,” corrects to “nautical” (like “Good, wait no, Great”), as if “nautical” is greater than “prodigal” because of sound similarity. Established as “nautical prodigal,” “Teachin’ bitches how to swim” becomes brag: impossibly reckless, no “bitch” can keep up. Continued later:
(teachin bitches how to swim)
now backstroke
through your k-hole
dont run
ya might slip
the table’s flipped now
we got all the coconuts bitch
So prodigal that being in a k-hole is nothing; “backstroke through it,” confident but vulnerable. Ketamine known for bad trips, hence “don’t run, ya might slip.” Unusual inflection, nearly infomercial-like. Theme continues to coconuts—currency in surreal nautical/island setting.
The album ends with the repeated hook:
i’m in your area
i know the first three numbers
i’m in
Beyond meta-allegory, the track embodies “Hacker”—identifying, tracking, taking down, or underground infiltrating mainstream, likely the listener by Death Grips. Reflects Death Grips’ music releases: YouTube leak before official release, Deep Web ARG, torrents, /mu/ spread. “I know the first three numbers” suggests US phone area code, tracking location to rough area. IP address or ZIP code also work. “I’m in your area” is repeated phrase in EPMD’s “Da Joint,” Death Grips referencing EPMD before; Exmilitary‘s “Takyon” name-drops them, references “Strictly Snappin’ Necks.”
Erroneous proposed link to Ryan Trecartin’s experimental film I-Be Area. Death Grips and Trecartin linked by @DeathGripz, The Money Store outtake sampling film dialogue, published in Adult Swim’s single series. Claims of further The Money Store and I-Be Area links—Stefan and Ryan going to art school, Stefan and Zach appearing in film, “Hacker” lyrics lifted from dialogue—seem untrue after research. Fair to link film title, repeated “area” in dialogue to “I’m in your area” in “Hacker,” but similar meaning unclear. Valid claim: “Hacker” and I-Be Area share themes, delivery of information and internet, mutually informing convoluted chaos. I-Be Area is sensory overload, like Death Grips in film form. Film’s concept: “what if internet communication translated to real life?”—feels apt while watching. “Hacker” comments on internet information transfer, but direct verbal connection beyond that is limited.
“Hacker” sets itself apart—least aggressive, most accessible, few lyrics purely “glorification of the gut.” More direct in concepts like individuality, crucially concluding the album.
Conclusion: Beyond Comprehension, Towards Individual Meaning
If the question remains, “What is The Money Store actually about?”, we can now answer, in Death Grips’ words: the id of Hip-Hop, the 21st-century answer to 20th-century Punk and Pop Art, and the free-thinking, open-ended empowerment of individuality.
Nick Cave explained liking Leonard Cohen’s “Avalanche,” despite indescribability. Its dark incomprehensibility places it outside reason, the “spongy gap” between song and mind allowing infinite interpretations. All art can be described this way, but The Money Store particularly occupies this space, tapping into a realm beyond language, outside Plato’s Cave. Perceiving it requires traversing infinite space to our minds. The simplest explanation of The Money Store‘s meaning is that there is none, it’s indescribable. The album connects to any topic or meaning uniquely for each listener. Whether intended or not, the “meaning” of The Money Store is discovering your own meaning through listening and its energy.
“I bought a pickaxe at the Home Depot in Glendale,” he remembered. “I concealed it in a guitar case, and I went down to the star. I put on some headphones; I was listening to Death Grips, which is some high-energy, ridiculous music. It gave me the energy I needed to tear through the star.”– Austin Clay for GQ on destroying Donald Trump’s walk of fame star
“That’s when I realized that Death Grips was my meth. I put that on and I can do anything and do it efficient as fuck. … Nico, Travis and I legit almost died because I decided to put on ‘Stockton’ and burn rubber at a red light, which resulted in my car spinning down at street at 60, 70 miles per hour at an intersection in Los Angeles around 2:45 on a school day. Not one scratch, no one hurt, not one car touched. I don’t know what it was, but it led me to believe that I had a grip on death (sorry, I had to say that).”– Tyler, The Creator on Death Grips
“Would you describe your music as surreal?
F: Partially… Death Grips are an outlet and a way to connect with people through something other than conversation or analyzation, to create something we don’t have words for yet.”– Andy Morin for The Quietus
Sources and Inspirations:
Quotes are linked in the text. Images are screenshots from music videos or referenced where appropriate. Lyrics are from the Death Grips website. Several interpretations and references came from, or were inspired by Genius annotations (use with caution). Discogs is invaluable for objective music release information. WhoSampled has the most comprehensive sample list. Frank Delaney’s podcast Re: Joyce, a Ulysses deconstruction, inspired this breakdown’s format. Lastly, the Death Grips subreddit for unconfirmed samples and obscure leads.
