Imagine just for a second, sitting down with
your husband and making a promise. And not a
promise to start a business or take a cross -country
road trip or save up for a house. You look each
other in the eye and make a literal life or death
pact. Which is just so intense. Right. You vow
that if you haven't made it in your chosen career
by the time you turn 30, you are both going to
take your own lives. Wow. No plan B. Just this
ticking clock. a loaded deadline and a desperate
need to escape the lives you're currently living.
It is an incredibly jarring premise. Right. And
I mean, what's crucial to understand here is
that this wasn't it wasn't a metaphor. Right.
It wasn't just some edgy posturing. It was a
very real agreement made back in 2013 by two
cousins from New Orleans. But the contrast, like
the contrast is what makes this so insane, because
today that same duo is literally praying together
before massive stadium shows and releasing music.
Christmas a day. It's quite the pivot. It's massive.
We are of course talking about Scott Arsenault
Jr. and Aristos Petrou or you know better known
to millions of people around the world as Scrim
and Ruby to Cherry. Yes. Together they're the
underground hip -hop powerhouse known as Suicide
Boys. So welcome to the Jeep Dive. Glad to be
here. To figure out how they pulled off one of
the most radical, unexpected character arcs in
modern music history, we're looking at a massive
stack of sources today. We've got everything
from their earliest, grimiest SoundCloud uploads,
Billboard interviews, to legal documents from
industry feuds. And that deeply revealing live
stream from 2025. Yes, exactly. And you know,
we're digging into this because even if underground
hip hop or punk rap isn't anywhere near your
daily rotation, Their story is really the ultimate
case study in human reinvention. For you listening,
it forces a profound question. Like, what actually
happens when you build your entire identity around
a no plan B, do or die mentality? And then you
survive. Exactly. And then you actually survive.
OK, let's unpack this. Because I want to pause
on that for a second. Surviving really wasn't
part of their original business model at all.
No, not even a little bit. So to understand how
they got to where they are now in 2026, we have
to look at the mundane, everyday frustration
that birthed that extreme pact. We're talking
about two guys who were deeply deeply dissatisfied
with their lives. Yeah, they were just stuck.
Right. Like Scrim was hustling, literally selling
drugs just to buy his first laptop so he could
start DJing. He went to Delgado Community College,
DJed some college parties, and ended up working
at a used furniture store. Selling used furniture.
Selling used furniture. And he held that job
for three years, only to get fired simply because
he got new tattoos on his hands. What's fascinating
here is how it's such a grounded, frustrating
reality compared to the larger -than -life, untouchable
personas they would eventually adopt. Oh, absolutely.
And Ruby's background is very similar in that
sense. His father was a Greek Cypriot immigrant,
actually a former soccer head coach who came
to the US on an athletic scholarship. You're
right, right. Ruby grew up playing violin and
drums. And he eventually drummed in a local punk
band called the Vaporats. But he was totally
disillusioned. You know. Because the band just
wasn't going anywhere. Exactly. His bandmates
just didn't care enough about the future of the
band. So he stuck working as a waiter at his
dad's restaurant. And get this, he actually kept
that waiting job all the way until 2015. Wait,
2015? Yeah. Well, after Suicide Boys was already
formed and actively releasing music. See, that
actually makes me wonder about the psychology
behind their pact, because people always talk
about the do -or -die mentality in startup culture,
right? Like, burn the boats, we have to succeed
because there's no backup plan. The Silicon Valley
mindset. Yeah, exactly. But this was a literal
do -or -die incubator. It raises this question,
does creating art under the literal threat of
death make the art pure? Or does it just make
it more desperate? Well, I think it does both.
And honestly, that combination is exactly what
made them so magnetic. You take scrimsier for
hip hop production, and you smash it together
with Ruby's punk rock apathy and aggression.
It's a crazy mix. It is. The result was a completely
uncompromising, genre -blending ethos. I mean,
when you genuinely believe you are already a
dead man walking, you aren't trying to fit into
a radio -friendly box. You don't care about the
radio. Right. You aren't worried about making
A &R executives happy. You have zero to lose,
which means you have total creative freedom.
And we really need to look at how that nothing
to lose energy translated into the actual mechanics
of their rise, because they utilized the internet
in a way that just wasn't possible a decade earlier.
Oh, the SoundCloud era. Yeah. In June 2014, they
released a three -track EP called Kill Yourself
Part One, The Suicide Saga. They put it on SoundCloud
and Bandcamp, and then they just kept going.
They didn't stop. No. They released nine more
iterations of that Kill Yourself series in the
following months alone. How does a duo even produce
that much music that fast? Well, they did it
by exploiting the completely lawless DIY nature
of the SoundCloud ecosystem at that time. Because
it was the Wild West. It really was. In the traditional
commercial world, releasing an EP takes months
of planning, clearing samples, marketing, distribution.
But in 2014 SoundCloud, there were no gatekeepers.
You just upload it. Exactly. You just make a
track in your bedroom, drag the audio file into
your browser, and it's instantly available to
the entire world. Now it's wild. And Scrim produced
all the beats himself. often using the pseudonym
Bud Dwyer, which, by the way, is a very dark
homage to the Pennsylvania politician who infamously
took his own life on live television in the 1980s.
Which definitely cements the grim aesthetic they
were going for. But let's talk about the actual
sound, because it's highly specific. Yeah, it
is. They were heavily influenced by 90s Memphis
rap. Specifically groups like Three Six Mafia,
for anyone who doesn't know, Memphis rap from
that era is characterized by this very lo -fi,
gritty cassette tape hiss, heavy 808 bass beats,
and really dark, almost horror movie inspired
lyrics. But pulling from that sound actually
got them into some hot water, right? It did,
yeah. Using those specific stylistic markers
and samples, drew some very mixed reactions from
the originators. Former Three Six Mafia member
Gangsta Boo was highly critical of them. Really?
Yeah, she felt like they were co -opting a culture
and a sound that just wasn't theirs. But on the
flip side, founding member Juicy J fully embraced
them. Oh, interesting. He actually mentored Suicide
Boys and even had them produce his mixtapes featuring
massive mainstream artists like AAP Rocky and
Cardi B. That's a huge cosign. But, you know,
the friction didn't stop with Memphis rap legends.
The DIY method of just grabbing audio and throwing
it online eventually collided head on with the
corporate music industry. Oh, the Deadmau5 situation.
Here's where it gets really interesting. In 2016,
the massive EDM producer, Deadmau5, went after
them for copyright infringement over their breakout
track, Antarctica. Right. The song heavily sampled
Deadmau5 and Cascade's track, I remember, and
Deadmau5 publicly blasted them for using his
intellectual property without consent. And this
perfectly highlights the culture clash we're
talking about. In the commercial music business,
you have to pay upfront to use someone else's
audio that's called clearing a sample. Yeah.
Deadmau5 operates in that highly regulated commercial
space. Suicide Boys were operating in this underground
where sampling is just viewed as a fundamental
part of the artistic process. It's just what
you do in hip hop. Exactly. Because the law is
the law. Suicide boys had to pull Antarctica
off streaming platforms. It stayed gone for almost
four years before they finally got the legal
clearance to put it back up in 2021. But see,
an uncleared sample is almost quaint compared
to what the media was actually hyper focused
on. The lyrics. The real controversy was their
lyrical content and their imagery. We're talking
explicit graphic discussions of suicidal ideation,
severe depression, heavy drug use and blatant
satanic imagery. Very abrasive stuff. Very. To
a casual observer or a concerned parent, it looked
incredibly dangerous. But I want to push back
on the initial perception of the duo here, because
Scrim actually addressed the satanic stuff in
an interview, and he claimed it wasn't literal
devil worship. He called it a metonym. Right.
A metonym is a literary device where you use
one concept to stand in for another related concept,
like saying Wall Street. when you really mean
the financial industry. Exactly. He explained
that all the satanic imagery, the inverted crosses,
the 666s, was just a metaphor for the negative
manipulative effects of money and drugs. That
makes a lot of sense. And it was also a blatant
rebellion against organized religion. It was
shock value, absolutely, but there was a specific
philosophical point behind it. It wasn't just
edge for the sake of edge. But understanding
that distinction is really crucial to understanding
why their fans are so intensely loyal. Because
they got it. They got it. While the mainstream
media looked at Suicide Boys and saw something
offensive and destructive, their cult following
experienced something completely different. To
the fans, this music was therapy. Suicide Boys
were mainstreaming conversations about deep depression,
anxiety, and hopelessness within hip hop. A genre
that historically hasn't always left a lot of
room for that kind of profound vulnerability.
They were speaking a language of pain that millions
of kids felt but just didn't know how to articulate.
So they build this massive cult following by
giving a voice to hopelessness. But this brings
us to a massive thematic collision. The success.
Right. What happens to the art when that hopelessness
starts generating millions of dollars? It's a
huge problem. By 2018, their fame is skyrocketing.
Their debut studio album, I Wanna Die in New
Orleans, drops in September and hits the top
10 on the Billboard 200. Huge numbers. They are
getting platinum records. Eventually songs like
And to Those I Love Thanks for Sticking Around
would hit over half a billion streams. But the
terrifying reality was that the suffering in
their music wasn't an act. It was actively destroying
them. Yes. The wealth didn't cure the underlying
issues at all. It just funded them. Behind the
scenes, the addiction that fueled so much of
their music was spiraling completely out of control.
Scrim made a horrifying admission in an interview
later on. He revealed that the physical and psychological
grip of his drug addiction was so severe, he
would actually lure people from Craigslist. to
rob them just to get money for drugs. Wait, really?
At the height of their fame, he's robbing people
off Craigslist? Just to feed the habit. That
is so incredibly bleak. It shows you exactly
how addiction actually rewires the brain. It
overrides logic, success, and morality entirely.
And it inevitably started fracturing the group.
Yeah, things started falling apart. In late 2018,
there were heavy rumors that Suicide Boys had
officially broken up after some really ominous
tweets. went out. Management had to step in and
clarify that they hadn't broken up, but that
Scrim was dealing with severe personal issues.
They had reached the breaking point. Think about
the irony here. The pact they raid in 2013 was
to end their lives if they didn't succeed. Right.
Now they had succeeded beyond their wildest dreams,
but the drug addicted lifestyle they cultivated
to cope with the pressure was going to kill them
anyway. The deadline was still there. The deadline
was still looming, just in a different form.
Something had to give. So in February 2019, Scrim
made the choice to live. He got sober, committing
heavily to 12 -step programs and therapy. And
Ruby's turning point followed shortly after.
In October 2020, following an intervention by
their management team, Ruby checked himself into
a drug rehab facility. Wow. He's remained sober
from hard drugs since then, though it's worth
noting he's been open about the fact that he
still smokes marijuana. But the core dynamic
of their lives fundamentally shifted. It had
to. Which begs the question, so what does this
all mean? If your entire brand, your aesthetic,
the literal name of your group, and your deep
connection with millions of fans is built on
active self -destruction, How do you continue
making music when you decide you actually want
to live? If we connect this to the bigger picture,
it's an incredibly difficult pivot. They couldn't
just put a new coat of paint on the Suicide Boys
brand. Right. It wouldn't work. Getting sober
meant they had to strip the house down to the
studs and pour a completely new foundation, even
if the fans only wanted the old house. It touches
on that toxic myth of the tortured artist. That
you need pain to make good art. Exactly. The
idea that great art requires suffering. And if
you heal your trauma, you lose your edge. It
actually took a hiatus of over a year to figure
this out. Yeah. When they came back in August
2021 with the album Long Term Effects of Suffering,
they were surviving. but openly acknowledging
the scars. And the incredible thing is the fans
stayed with them. They racked up more platinum
plaques. They launched these massive Gray Day
arena tours year after year, bringing out huge
guests. It was a massive success. But nothing
could have prepared the music world for what
happened next. We're moving into the current
era, 2024 through 2026, and the evolution is
just shocking. It began subtly with their aesthetics,
really. Back in 2017, Scrim actually covered
up an inverted cross tattoo on his forehead with
a pitchfork. OK, yeah. But by 2024, he was openly
talking about covering up that pitchfork with
a crucifix. OK, wait, let me play devil's advocate
here, because... When artists make a drastic
pivot like this, especially moving toward religion,
a lot of people immediately assume it's a PR
stunt, right? Oh, sure. Or a grift. Exactly.
A grift to tap into a new demographic. Going
from inverted crosses and anti -religious lyrics
to wearing diamond cross necklaces and hats with
crucifixes, that's a pro wrestling level reverse
heel turn. It is a huge risk. A massive risk
that could completely alienate their hardcore
fan base. How do we know this isn't just a new
persona? It's a fair question, and the full context
came out during a marathon livestream, Scrim
did in April 2025. And, you know, our goal here
isn't to debate the theology or endorse a specific
religion, but to look at the psychological mechanics
of this shift. Right. What does it take for someone
to entirely rewire their worldview? Yeah. Scrim
explained that the process of addiction recovery,
specifically the 12 steps which require acknowledging
a higher power, opened a door for him. Initially,
he just viewed the universe as his religion.
But over a few years of sobriety, he started
doing intense research. He talked about spending
years listening to Christian apologetics. For
anyone unfamiliar, apologetics is essentially
the intellectual defense of religious faith.
It's using logic historical evidence and philosophical
arguments to defend belief rather than just blind
faith. Exactly. He was listening to these complex
theological debates, trying to figure out if
the evidence for Christ was compelling enough
for him to actually believe it. And his conclusion
after years of this private research was, yes,
he converted to Christianity. He even admitted
on that stream that he was terrified of being
judged by his own fans, which is wild to think
about. It is. The same guy who used to rap about
robbing people and worshipping the devil was
scared of what his fans would think if he told
them he found God. But he said he eventually
saw enough miracles in his life and his recovery
that he just wasn't embarrassed anymore. This
raises an important point about the true nature
of vulnerability. A lot of artists hide behind
an edgy, dark facade because it's actually incredibly
safe. It's an armor. Choosing authenticity, especially
when that authenticity completely contradicts
the persona that made you rich and famous, requires
a profound level of bravery. And Ruby went through
a transformation alongside him. Yeah, in a July
2025 Billboard interview, Ruby is sitting there
wearing a camo cap with Jesus written across
the front in huge letters. Oh, wow. Yeah, complete
with a cross and ichthys, symbols the Jesus fish
all over it. In that interview, Scrim says he
God put them in their current position to help
people out. That's a huge shift. And Ruby completely
agreed, saying, especially now more than ever,
he even revealed that the two of them pray together
before every single show. And they didn't just
keep this as a behind -the -scenes personal change.
They made it the forefront of their art. In August
2025, they released the album, Thy Kingdom Come.
I remember that drop. The album cover featured
a wall of crucifixes and Orthodox Christian iconography.
The promo videos they put on YouTube were these
seven to eight minute mini documentaries focusing
heavily on Christian imagery, church choirs,
and even featuring local New Orleans converts
giving their testimonies. And then came the absolute
wildest flex for a group historically called
Suicide Boys. On December 25th, Christmas Day
2025, they surprise dropped an unannounced project
called Thy Will Be Done. On Christmas. On Christmas
Day. Just think about the incredible distance
two have traveled. We started this deep dive
with two desperate cousins trapped in dead -end
jobs in New Orleans making a literal blood pack
to blow their own heads off by age 30. And today
in 2026 they are a clean sober chart -topping
artists running a multi -million dollar independent
empire whose stated mission is to use their massive
platform to help save others. It's a total subversion
of their origin story. If you've ever felt trapped
by a reputation you built for yourself in high
school or at an old job imagine trying to break
out of a reputation built in front of millions
of hardcore fans. It's nearly impossible. But
they proved that reinvention is always possible.
You are never fully locked into the persona you
created during your darkest times. You can change
your mind. You can change your life. They survived
the no plan B mentality, not by stubbornly sticking
to the script they wrote when they were suffering,
but by being willing to tear that script up entirely
when it no longer served them. Exactly. But as
we wrap up, there's a final thought I want to
leave you with, leaning back into that tension
we talked about earlier. We often think of authenticity
as staying true to your roots. Right. But when
an artist builds a massive, wildly successful
brand entirely out of their own trauma, their
addiction and their pain, Do we, the audience,
truly want them to heal? Or are we, as consumers,
just commodifying their suffering? That is the
big question. Because Suicide Boys proved that
true authenticity sometimes requires betraying
your roots, alienating your fans, and killing
your past self to save your actual life. It's
a complex, heavy topic, but an incredibly important
one. Thank you for taking this journey with us
today. Thanks for joining the Deep Dive. We'll
catch you on the next one.