One Week Before the Deadline, Ken Carson Was Gaming in the Studio: "Underground" Doesn't Really Exist Anymore

Seven days out from the album deadline, the first thing Ken Carson did was walk into the studio, fire up the PlayStation 5, munch on a McDonald's burger, and knock out a few rounds of EA Sports FC 26. Tucked away in Atlanta's Midtown, the unassuming Violet Isle Studios houses a 1980s SSL 4056G mixing console in the control room, while the 525-square-foot room next door has a black grand piano and an air mattress piled with T-shirts and a pair of red-and-white Rick Owens sneakers — neither the piano nor the mattress has seen much action lately. This is Ken Carson's territory, where he usually rolls in around evening and works through until dawn.

The 26-year-old is now Opium's most prolific artist and one of the headliners for ComplexCon 2026. He's juggling multiple projects at once: the follow-up to "Xperiment," his new album "Cartunez," is about to drop; he's got a tour launching this fall; he's sharing the ComplexCon stage with label boss Playboi Carti; and he's also working on a joint album with labelmate Destroy Lonely that's roughly 50% done, slated for an October 30 release. On top of that, he just dropped a WWE collab collection, with T-shirts featuring wrestling legends he grew up watching — Stone Cold Steve Austin, Undertaker, Rhea Ripley, John Cena, and Danhausen.

Talking about a recent trip to Utah to record with YoungBoy Never Broke Again, he described heavy snowfall and himself wearing nothing but a zip-up jacket, riding along with YoungBoy in an off-road vehicle with the same oversized tires as the ones Kanye West and Carti drive, tearing through the snow. "We recorded a lot of songs," he said, without giving an exact number. "When two artists get together, they're bound to pull each other's style in a new direction." He said he's recording every single day, but only about 7% of what he makes actually reaches fans. "Sometimes putting a song out just drains your energy."

The most striking take from the whole interview is Ken Carson's growing impatience with the word "underground." He doesn't think anyone currently wearing that label has actually earned it: "If you can sell out a two-thousand-cap venue, you're not underground anymore." He pointed to Nettspend's Gucci collaboration as an example of something that no longer fits the underground image. In his view, this new generation of artists doesn't need to rely on the music to build a following — "you get the right haircut, wear the right clothes, and you've got fans" — a stark contrast to how he and Destroy Lonely had to grind it out back in the day. He's shared this same observation with ApolloRed1 and OsamaSon, joking in his own words that he's been "playing mentor."

For this tour, he handed the opening slot to New York newcomer Xaviersobased — the two couldn't be more different stylistically, one making "pretty songs," the other leaning dark — but Ken Carson says his tour can be a platform to put young talent on the map. As for "Cartunez," he describes it as a return to his original sound, a departure from the more experimental "Xperiment," and an album made for his day-one fans.