KSI's "Thick Of It"

Submission 152

Part of a series on KSI. [View Related Entries]

About

KSI's "Thick Of It" refers to a 2024 song by YouTuber KSI, featuring rapper Trippie Redd. The song went viral on TikTok in October 2024, centering on the lyrics, "From the screen, to the ring, to the pen, to the king. Where's my crown? That's my bling. Always drama when I ring." Listeners mocked KSI's new song on TikTok and other social media sites, saying it sounded vapid like the default music of a video game or movie soundtrack. Many of the memes combined KSI's other business ventures like Prime Energy Drink and Lunchly into slang overload posts using the song, essentially satirizing the idea of a young Gen Alpha fan of KSI listening to the song while mindlessly consuming all of his products. The mockery largely riffed on Logan Paul, MrBeast and KSI's beef with Minecraft YouTuber DanTDM who called out the YouTuber trio for marketing low-quality products to children.

Origin

On August 31st, 2024, KSI and Trippie Redd performed their upcoming single "Thick Of It" at the DAZN X Series 17 Live Show. The performance was uploaded to YouTube^[1] on the day, gaining over 290,000 views in two months.

On September 28th, KSI uploaded a snippet of the song to YouTube,^[2] showing himself in a recording studio setting, singing into a hanging microphone. In the snippet, he starts by saying, "From the screen, to the ring, to the pen, to the king." Over six days, the video received roughly 164,100 views and 5,000 likes (shown below).

Lyrics

From the screen, to the ring, to the pen, to the king. Where's my crown? That's my bling. Always drama when I ring. See, I believe that if I see it in my heart, smash through the ceiling 'cause I'm reachin' for the stars. Woah-oh, oh-oh, oh-oh, this is how the story goes.

Music Video

On October 3rd, 2024, KSI released the song's full music video on YouTube,^[3] gaining over 737,800 views and 38,000 likes in less than a day (shown below).

Spread

Initial reactions to the song surfaced after KSI posted his snippet to YouTube^[2] on September 28, 2024. For instance, on September 28th, X^[4] user @Jaden_Rand405 reposted the snippet and complimented it, writing, "JJ gotta use the person who mixed this for the whole of his next album cuz this shit sounds clean asf 🔥🔥🔥," gaining over 1,400 likes in six days. The media was later disabled by the copyright owner.

Negative reactions surfaced en masse when TikToker^[5] @unreal.hiphop posted KSI's snippet on October 1st, captioning it, "WARNING!! KSI IS THREATENING TO RELEASE WHATEVER THIS IS!!!" amassing over 2.3 million plays and 177,400 likes in three days (shown below).

Top comments left on the abovementioned video made fun of KSI's song, like one from TikToker @user4368367568754 who said, "Minecraft movie end credit song💀💀💀," gaining over 45,600 likes in three days (shown below).

Other TikTokers used the sound^[6] of the abovementioned video for their own videos. For instance, on October 3rd, TikToker^[7] @marquitos.g posted a video that imagined how KSI felt singing the song in the studio, gaining over 9.5 million plays and 1.1 million likes in a day (shown below).

Similar reactions and jokes spread on the /r/ksi subreddit. For instance, on October 2nd, Redditor^[8] ltinfinity shared TikToker^[5] @unreal.hiphop's video to /r/ksi, writing, "There’s no way this is real😭😭," receiving over 5,900 upvotes in two days.

Others on TikTok shared photos in photo slideshows that satirized the idea of a young KSI fan consuming all of his products while listening to "Thick Of It." For instance, on October 3rd, TikToker^[9] @rustlordfromfortnite posted a meme of SpongeBob watching TV, reading, "Me taking a sip of my Prime to wash down my Lunchly while watching the Talk Tuah podcast and listening to that new KSI," amassing over 531,300 likes in a day (shown below).

By October 4th, 2024, the trend's primary TikTok sound^[6] had amassed over 5,700 posts.