Vince Staples Tries to Disarm a Mass Shooter in “Blackberry Marmalade” Video

Vince Staples is back with his first new solo song in two years and it’s a dark one. Over a noise-rock beat, “Blackberry Marmalade” seems to be about modern anti-establishment views aligning with horseshoe theory, and includes the refrain “Promise me you won’t gun me down” along with references to Kanye West crashing out and Princess Diana. It also comes with a graphic, age-restricted music video co-directed by Staples and Bradley J. Calder. You can watch that below.

The “Blackberry Marmalade” video is filmed in the style of a first-person shooter game. In it, the cameraperson lifts a gun in a parking lot and targets Staples, who tries and fails to disarm them, before entering a diner to stage a mass shooting. It ends with a quote from Martin Luther King Jr.: “So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be.”

Near the beginning of the music video, a red hat with the word “Crybaby” is resting on the dashboard of Staples’ car. A date is also embroidered on its side, with some fans speculating that it indicates a future release date. Not only has it been two years since Staples dropped an album, but that record, 2024’s Dark Times, marked his final project with Def Jam. That means “Blackberry Marmalade” is his first single as an independent artist.

It’s not been silent on Staples’ end since Dark Times, though. He linked up with Jpegmafia for his I Lay Down My Life for You song “New Black History” and JID’s track “VCRs” from God Does Like Ugly. Season 2 of The Vince Staples Show also aired on Netflix last fall, only for the streamer to cancel it in January.

Revisit Alphonse Pierre’s column Vince Staples Turns Rap Stardom Anxieties Into Comedy on The Vince Staples Show.