This Guy Makes the Worst Music of All Time

Welcome to LOST WEEKEND, VICE’s new Monday briefing.

The last few weeks have brought proof that some songs are so reprehensible, so irredeemably awful, that the only way to accurately describe them is by inventing a genre named after the most annoying people you’ve ever met.
Since going viral, Kill Karl’s comedy rap-metal—itself an aggressively cursed descriptor—has been variously described as “line cook music,” “mom’s new alcoholic boyfriend music,” and “music for polyamorous people who work at Domino’s.” But by far the most common label given to his tracks—including “I’m a Metalhead, Bitch” and “Give Me a Fucking Cheese Burger”—is “coworker music.” Those who’ve never peered forlornly across a fast-food kitchen or call-center phone pit while questioning their life choices might not understand this immediately. Those who have, can likely imagine only too vividly Kill Karl’s face, superimposed on the colleague smirking back at them.

Browse the comments on a post about Kill Karl and the same references come up again and again: Insane Clown Posse, Mindless Self Indulgence, Attila, Tenacious D, “Weird Al” Yankovic, System of a Down—one particularly droll tweet imagines Serj Tankian looking at a Kill Karl video “like Oppenheimer looked at Hiroshima.” These artists work across different genres, scenes, and sounds, yet they all have something in common that makes them the favorite bands of “the people keeping this country moving.”

After spotting the original post above, which has now received 14.5 million views, I sent an email to the man behind Kill Karl, musician and producer Jake Kodweis. He was too busy to talk until late last week—maybe because, as he’d later tell me, he’s just signed a record deal with a subsidiary of Universal Music. Remarkably, we are now into our second week of Kill Karl discourse, which he’s capitalizing on with his newly released single “Should Have Been a Motherfucking Email”. (Sorry to break this to you, but he’s also got a new album on the way.)

Jake lives in Upstate New York. He used to be in a band called (yes) Gonculator who were signed by an independent label when he was 19 (and, it appears, once performed on the same bill as Rufus Wainwright…), and later got into producing and engineering. Around 18 months ago, he launched his Kill Karl project on an unsuspecting public and at the end of last year released a debut record called Suck on My Album (one can only imagine what Rufus would make of all of this). He says Karl is a satirical character who is intended to be deliberately provocative. Perhaps this is why you might think his music sounds like it’s been precision engineered to inflict upon law-abiding civilians the kind of optimized torment usually reserved for black site jihadists. 

There’s an inescapable avalanche of ironies here: a ragebaiting online persona mirroring many of the most polarizing musical moments from the last 30 years (nu metal, horrorcore, musical theater), generating endless engagement from Finstas, burners, and pseudonymous accounts who see his output as a reflection of the bleak state of the “real world.” Like Clavicular, it’s tempting to see Kill Karl as “a kind of sin-eater for the neuroses of his entire generation.”

However you want to intellectualize it, Kodweis is probably getting the last laugh; a man who’s been described as the “final boss of coworker music” has quit his day job. (If you were hoping HR would get him to clean up his language, you’d better think again.)

I interrupted his new life of leisure, funded by your rage, for a chat.

VICE: Have you seen the post that’s been doing numbers over the past week? It’s now at more than 14 million views…
Kill Karl: Dude, I had no idea. I’m not even on Twitter. I mean, hate speech on the internet or negative reactions to my music, that’s not a surprise to me, but the fact that there is one post on Twitter about me and my music that’s getting 14 million fucking hits is news to me. That’s fucking cool. “Coworker music,” I think it’s awesome—the whole point of this project is to get a fucking reaction, right? So, if people are making memes and calling it whatever they want to call it, it means they’re paying attention.

Some people are saying it’s the worst music of all time. Doesn’t that bother you?
Kill Karl is that voice in your head before you filter yourself. It’s the part of you that has the impulsive thought, the inappropriate joke, the selfish reaction, right? Before you stop and think, “Uh, maybe I shouldn’t say that shit.” As human beings, we are perpetually engaged in this struggle of whether to let Karl out into the world or to kill Karl. People are just so tired of the polished, no risks, cookie-cutter kind of shit. Everyone wants to show people how perfect they are, but Karl is the complete opposite: messy, impulsive, honest, silly, and crude… fart jokes. It’s all just very fucked up and human.

So it’s supposed to be ironic?
Well, yeah dude. It’s extreme on purpose. Subtlety isn’t really the point here. I take these normal emotions and just push them until they become cartoonish and absurd. That’s where all the humor and discomfort comes from. I’m not exploring the perfect image or trying to be the cool guy. This is a true human mess. The goal isn’t just to trigger people for the sake of triggering people. I want people to acknowledge that weird, uncomfortable, and ridiculous part of themselves that they usually hide.

“It’s important to have a supportive partner”

How did you get started with this then?
I was in a small local band that got signed by an independent label when I was 19.  During that time, I fell in love with the production process. I was the kid with the computer, the demo guy, you know. Eventually, I stepped away from the band and I started producing and engineering. I was searching for a way to stop filtering myself. A lot of artists are just trying to show the world the best version of themselves, but for me, I was looking for a way to do the opposite. January 2025 was the first song, “I’m a Metalhead, Bitch”—I put it out and maybe six weeks later, it blew up and I was not expecting it. I opened up and started swiping, and all I was seeing was other people using my music. I was like, “No way. What is happening?”

This is the sort of thing that doesn’t happen without TikTok—
It’s phenomenal. It’s a great time to be an artist. I do everything here in the basement of my home. I record all the instruments. I do all of the midi programming. I do all of the vocals. I do all of the mixing. and I do all of the mastering. When I’m recording I am stopping and laughing at myself constantly because I’m just letting out these ridiculous ideas and voices and characters and phrases. And I got to tell you, my wife, if she hears any of this shit through the vents, God bless her soul.

What does she think of the music?
She fucking loves it because she fucking gets it.

That’s good, there could be some awkward conversations otherwise.
It’s important to have a supportive partner.

“I grew up in an environment of musicians and people who are into musical theater”

You must have thick skin, though?
I’m not stupid. You’re going to put yourself out on the internet. You’re going to get heat. This is what the whole entertainment industry is. There’s no person out there who doesn’t have a hater. That being said, after about three or four months, I hired an assistant, because shit was just like flying at me and it was too much. To be honest, I don’t mind the hate, because they’re just people letting out their inner Karl. They’re actually just giving me more song ideas. I’m so grateful and feel so fucking blessed to be able to make a living with my art and my passion.

What do you think of the whole “coworker music” thing?
When the internet runs with something, whether they’re the lovers or the haters, whether the fans or the people who are trolling, and just reacting and giving their opinions on social media, it’s all part of just being a fucking artist, right? If you’re going to put yourself out there, you just have to expect it. This is kind of the world we live in, right? And if you’re not getting some sort of hate, you’re not doing it right.

They’ve been calling “I’m a Metalhead, Bitch” the most millennial video in history—
Is that a negative comment or a positive comment?

Depends how you feel about millennials, I suppose. Do you think there’s something distinctly millennial about what you’re doing?
There are influences from artists who were hitting in the 1990s and the early 2000s. But there are also modern influences. There’s a huge resurgence in nu metal right now. There’s a space for it and people are receptive to it or they fucking hate the shit out of it. Again, it’s split, like any good art.
Someone else put in the comments “this is how Hamilton sounds to me”—
I grew up in an environment of musicians and people who are into musical theater. So, I am going to gravitate towards that in my music. You can hear it all over my music. You can see it in my performances on TikTok. Although, I’ve never seen Hamilton.

“Fuck you for even suggesting that”

I’ve tried to watch it two or three times. A lot of people seem to relate to the clip where you talk about how you don’t want anyone to fuck with your friends. Have there been many occasions where you’ve had to stand on business?
Kill Karl comes from very real human emotions, but he’s not entirely me. The biggest misunderstanding is people thinking that Kill Karl is an actual way to live your life, like some kind of fucking manifesto. But I think you’re asking, ‘Have you been in a bunch of fights with people who’ve fucked with your friends?’ No, of course not.
I was wondering, would Karl ever go vegan, like is that something that might be on his radar?
No. Let me rephrase that, fuck no. And fuck you for even suggesting that. 

Have you got a final message for the haters?
Fuck you.

OTHER NEWS

• Ok, you’re Cohen to hate this next pun: Given it’s been so long since their last concert, it’s only appropriate that Fontaines D.C. marked their return to the stage after almost a year by playing a new song called “Marianne”. They debuted another new one called “Six Shot Morning”, which is what I’ve had today, hic.
• The Lit Pack by Ben Masters is a hybrid of literary biography, memoir, and autofiction, which follows a writer called Ben Masters as he tries to write the opening sentence of a book about the late 20th century London literary scene, only to be endlessly distracted by self-doubt and social media—which is basically how I feel every week when I’m working on my art (this column).
• Go to your local multiplex cinema tonight. Watch the new Anthony Bourdain biopic (Tony). Have a large popcorn at 4 o’clock in a mostly empty room. Scroll on your phone until the trailers start. Watch a trailer for Dune: Part Three. Be open to a world where you don’t have to rank everything you watch on Letterboxd, but give it three stars anyway. Enjoy the ride.

PREDICTION OF THE WEEK
As Harry Potter fans force the relocation of four hundred and thirty million pounds worth of undersea cable to “avoid Dobby’s grave,” the partially decomposed remains of what appears to have once been a house elf are discovered dumped on nearby headland.

BRAND NEW SENTENCE
“Drake instantly folded and started barking after this goth baddie told him to”
BONUS PREDICTION: KILL KARL’S NEW ALBUM…
…will feature an unexpected cameo from Rufus Wainwright on the track “Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk (and a Fucking Cheese Burger)”, which is comfortably one of the worst songs in the history of recorded music.

Follow Adam on Instagram @yungtolstoi

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