The ATL star makes audacious choices and pushes the boundaries of rage-rap. Atlanta rage disciple Ken Carson has long followed in the sonic footsteps of his mentor and label boss, Playboi Carti. On his 2026 album xperiment, he takes cues from the title and pushes himself away from these stylistic origins—sounds that have turned him into one of ATL’s biggest stars. Despite Carti coming through on the album’s second track, xperiment features some of Carson’s most audacious creative decisions to date. He embraces the goodwill he’s built as an opportunity to test the boundaries of his style. He succeeds with flying colors, which is, coincidentally, a rather apt way to describe the sonics of this record, too. xperiment is a technicolor fever dream, harnessing some of the distortion, chaos, and noise of earlier rage-rap-inspired projects (X and A Great Chaos) and blending it with minimalism (“shadeson” with 2hollis), bubblegum pop (“ghost” with Lil Uzi Vert), and mid-2010s Atlanta trap (“drug kit” with Young Thug). For the OG fans, though, there are still plenty of moments that recall early Ken Carson, like “wrist,” which is a reminder of how captivating he is when employing aesthetics of yore.