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Co-host
It's Jenny Death now. Jenny Death. Currently Jenny Death.
Host
When you may have been asking yourself. Turns out today, it looks like June 22nd on the schedule, if I'm reading that correctly. That's when. Jenny Death.
Co-host
That's right. Yeah.
Host
That's when it's coming out.
Co-host
When did it actually come out? It was 20 years.
Host
We talked about this last time it was March. I think it was March 2015.
Co-host
Yes. Well, what we're talking about, in case you're just catching up, which would be weird, I guess, because.
Host
No, I didn't see you there. Come on in. Sit down.
Co-host
This is. Yeah, sit down. We have to talk. Death Grips have just released the on. On today. March 12, 2015. Actually, no, that was just the track release.
Host
March 19.
Co-host
March 19, 2015. It's the second half of the double album by Death Grips. The powers that be follow up to the previous album by Death Grips, which also has a name.
Host
That's right.
Co-host
I think that we got around that issue. I think we got through that issue. Actually, I don't even think it's an issue. I don't think it's an issue either. People make a big fuss about it. Well, they really just troll Anthony Fantano about it. Cause he very conspicuously doesn't say it. And then they're like. All the comments are like, remind me what's on the moon, Anthony. I forget.
Host
Yeah. See, this is the type of shit that I don't like. This is the memeing of it. It's like, yes, it's the N word. You're not supposed to say the N word. But it's also the title of the album. It's fine to write. But also, you don't need to turn it into a joke about how white guys. You know, it's just like, we get it.
Co-host
It's understood, juvenile, and it's stupid. And I think that by. By treating it, taking it seriously as an artistic statement and gesture, which I Think, Lord knows the group themselves take seriously such things.
Host
Certainly.
Co-host
I think we. We are. We're not part of the problem.
Host
I hope not.
Co-host
But here we are with Jennifer Death.
Host
Sound like me. Michael Mouse.
Co-host
Michael Mouse. That's not that. That straight up doesn make sense at all. Because I don't think that his name is Michael. I don't think his name is Mickey.
Host
Mickey is short for Michael. It can be, at least.
Co-host
Okay, so the powers that be is here, all in one piece. All in its two pieces, the two tablets of this double album. And if you didn't like the last one, good news, this sounds nothing like the last one. Sort of, pretty much, mostly, yeah.
Host
This is. Honestly, this is the rock album. This is Death Grips, the rock group. To me.
Co-host
Well, it's, I think, to most people, on account of the electric guitar being.
Host
We love the guitar. We love the guitar on Jokerman podcast, one of our favorite instruments.
Co-host
Yes, that's indisputable. Yeah. Death Grips have sold their synthesizers and bought guitars.
Host
Boy, we have the second Losing my Edge reference in two consecutive episodes, folks.
Co-host
It's rock music yet again. And I don't know about you, I was very excited when this came out. And I was very titillated that it was so rock music.
Host
Like, I feel. Similarly, I think that we've talked about this throughout the series so far, the extent to which Death Grips is a rock band. And that's more or less applicable in some cases, musically speaking. But I think just in terms of their image, their approach to the art form of making songs, I think it's indisputable that they fit into that matrix. And then here we are on a record that really just does away with any sort of pretense on some songs at least, that they aren't a rock band, because it is a rock band. There's the electric guitar, there's drums. There is not singing necessarily, but it isn't always rapping either. I think that it's yet another example of how every release from this group is totally its own new universe. Even though this is back to back with the previous album making up a double album. I feel like the two records that compose the Powers that Be are maybe as dissimilar as any two other records in the Death Grips discography. There's some connection here and there. And certainly, like, lyrical moments, there are callbacks between the two records, but you could match, you know, no Love, Deep Web and Government Plates up and call that a double album. And I think that would make about as much sense as putting these Two records together and calling it a double album?
Co-host
I don't think so.
Host
Okay.
Co-host
I think that these two records are dissimilar, obviously, but I think that the choice to put them together is so deliberate and in some ways overstated. Maybe even that it can't help but be conflated as like one gesture. That these are like a yin and yang. This is. This is sour and sweet. More like sour and spicy maybe is a better way to think of it. But they're meant to be together. And I think these two moods are there to balance each other out in a way. I stand by the feeling that the previous disc is more personal and inscrutable and has to do with abstract interiority. And this one is more about how that manifests in the world. Like what's the out facing relationship with reality? It's not very friendly, but is spirited. It is like much more vivacious than the previous disc, which I think is. Is kind of in some ways like very dead. Not like lifeless, but kind of like. Kind of like it's sort of disembodied, I would say. Disembodied versus this. Jenny. Death is more like bloody and physical.
Host
Okay, that makes a little bit more sen. Yeah, I mean, it's tangible. And I think, you know, honestly, I think the guitar and the drums is. Plays a large part in that because it sounds real and physical and analog in some cases in a way that the previous album doesn't. But I do. I think there is certainly like a. Like a. An energy to the previous record that is here.
Co-host
Also, it's funny because I saw. I forget where some. One of the reviews reviewers said that Neighbors on the Moon was their least energetic or their least the least intense. There's like. Obviously it's the least intense Death Grips album so far, and I.
Host
Seems patently false.
Co-host
It's absurd not to like, backtrack too much, but the conversation we were having about whether or not that record is like something new. I still stand by this idea that what it is is like a. It's not necessarily new ingredients, but they're being combined in very radically new ratios. And there is one new ingredient with the Bjork stuff, but it's more about like playing around with the formula of what they do. And I think that that is what the Powers that Be as a whole represents. It is like a reckoning with what is Death Grips by Death Grips. And it's also important to note that it's. It's a posthumous album because Death Grips broke up right in 2014. Of course, via a napkin. If you look at the old news of Pitchfork.com July 2, 2014, death grips break up. They released a napkin, a photo of a napkin here which says, we are now at our best. And so Death Grips is over. We have officially stopped. All currently scheduled live dates are canceled. Our upcoming double album, the Powers that Be, will still be delivered worldwide later this year via Harvest Third World Records. Death Grips was and always has been a conceptual art exhibition anchored by sound and vision, above and beyond. A quote band to our truest fans. Please stay legend.
Host
Please stay legend. How much of that do you think was real at the time?
Co-host
Do I think that they believed that was true when they wrote that?
Host
Do you think that they actually broke up and then got back together? Or do you think that this was just another brick in the wall, so to speak, of the Death Grips conceptual art project? That is the existence of the band itself.
Co-host
I don't know that those two things are different. I think that when they put that out, I believe they thought, this is what we should do. We should break up like we are. This is it for what we're doing. Whether or not they felt that was going to be true forever, I mean, we can only speculate. I think the. The ending of this record being Death Grips 2.0. I think that basically, whether they thought they would be done forever or not, it was an important part of their artistic process to say they were done, even if they weren't. Because I think that that was the mood and the intent and the concept behind this record, in many ways.
Host
Fair enough.
Release Date: June 23, 2026
Podcast Hosts: Jokermen
This teaser episode introduces the Jokermen Podcast's new series on Death Grips, with a particular focus on "Jenny Death," the second half of Death Grips' double album, The Powers That B. The hosts riff on the album’s historical release, its context as part of a polarizing double album, Death Grips’ notorious self-contradictory art project persona, and their evolution as a group—especially their pivot to a more “rock” sound. The hosts promise nuanced conversation, steering clear of superficial meme culture around the band.
For further Death Grips discussions and deep dives into other artists, listeners are encouraged to subscribe for exclusive episodes via Patreon.