Clipse’s 'Let God Sort ’Em Out' Lands on Major 2025 Best-Albums Lists

The album cover for “Let God Sort Em Out,” Clipse’s first full-length release since 2009, produced entirely by Pharrell Williams and cited among 2025’s most critically praised albums.

In a year crowded with releases chasing novelty, "Let God Sort Em Out" arrived doing something rarer: reminding hip-hop what endurance sounds like.

Sixteen years after their last full album, Virginia Beach brothers Pusha T and Malice returned as Clipse with a project that didn’t posture as a comeback or plead for relevance. Instead, it spoke with the confidence of artists who never left the conversation — only waited for the right moment to reenter it on their own terms.

Released in July and produced entirely by Pharrell Williams, "Let God Sort Em Out" quickly emerged as one of the year’s most critically respected rap albums, earning placement on multiple year-end best-of lists and drawing praise across outlets that rarely agree on hip-hop’s direction. Rolling Stone included the album among its Best Hip-Hop Albums of 2025, while the Associated Press cited the project’s lyrical precision and restraint as a standout in a year heavy on excess.

The recognition mattered — but not because Clipse needed validation. It mattered because the album landed at a moment when lyricism, structure and patience felt endangered. Rather than chasing trends, the brothers leaned into what time had sharpened: Pusha T’s surgical economy, Malice’s spiritual clarity and a chemistry that still snaps with the tension of lived experience.

The album does not attempt to rewrite Clipse’s past. It extends it. Tracks like “Ace Trumpets” and others across the record balance menace with reflection, street memory with consequence. Where earlier Clipse albums thrived on claustrophobic minimalism, "Let God Sort Em Out" breathes — not softer, but wiser. Pharrell’s production stretches without diluting, allowing space for confession, warning and triumph to coexist.

SIDEBAR: Why “Let God Sort ’Em Out” Led 2025’s Critical Consensus

Clipse’s “Let God Sort ’Em Out” didn’t dominate the year through hype cycles or streaming stunts. Instead, it earned sustained recognition through critical consensus across both hip-hop–focused and mainstream publications.

Rolling Stone
Included in Rolling Stone’s Best Rap Albums of 2025 coverage, praising the album’s discipline, precision, and refusal to chase trends — qualities repeatedly cited as defining strengths.

Associated Press (AP)
Featured in AP’s Best Music of 2025 reporting, highlighting the project’s lyrical patience and clarity in contrast to a year marked by excess and immediacy.

The Guardian
Appeared in The Guardian’s Top Albums of 2025 Readers’ Poll (All Genres), one of the few hip-hop albums to cross into the outlet’s broader year-end recognition.

HotNewHipHop
Ranked among the site’s Best Hip-Hop Albums of 2025, described as a “measured, powerful return” that fused Clipse’s street legacy with earned maturity.

Metacritic
Metascore: 83, reflecting one of the strongest critical consensus scores for a rap release in 2025.

Editor’s note: While year-end rankings vary by methodology, “Let God Sort ’Em Out” stands out as one of 2025’s most consistently praised rap albums across reputable critics and publications.

Critics responded accordingly. HotNewHipHop called the album a “powerful Clipse comeback,” noting how it fused unfiltered street perspective with earned maturity. The Washington Post highlighted the project’s emotional range — its willingness to confront loss, faith and legacy without sacrificing edge. Across reviews, a consistent theme emerged: this wasn’t nostalgia. It was authority.

That authority extended beyond the music. In a GQ cover story released later in the year, Clipse framed their return as less about reclaiming space and more about redefining it. Pusha T rejected the idea of a creative ceiling, positioning longevity itself as a form of resistance in an industry addicted to erasure.

That ethos was underscored quietly, but symbolically,  recently (see above) when Pharrell gifted Pusha T a Rolls-Royce Spectre Black Badge — a moment documented across music media and social platforms. The gesture wasn’t spectacle; it was acknowledgment. Of partnership. Of survival. Of a year when Clipse didn’t just reappear, they reminded people why they mattered in the first place.

"Let God Sort Em Out" now stands not only as one of 2025’s most respected rap albums, but as a case study in how veteran artists can reenter the culture without diluting themselves. No gimmicks. No apology tours. Just records built to last.

In a genre obsessed with what’s next, Clipse offered something more disruptive: proof that what’s true still carries weight.

Big Sean Expands Pistons Role as Team Pushes Global, Culture-Led Growth

Big Sean poses in Detroit Pistons gear in a promotional image shared on Instagram. The Detroit native was recently named the franchise’s creative director of global experience as part of an expanded partnership focused on culture, design and international fan growth. (Photo via Instagram / @bigsean)

The Detroit Pistons are leaning harder into culture — and into Big Sean — as the franchise tries to sell Detroit Basketball to the world in a moment when teams don’t just need wins, they need identity.

On Sunday, the Pistons announced an expanded partnership with the Detroit rapper and entrepreneur, naming him the team’s Creative Director of Global Experience and rolling out a new initiative called “Creatives Across Continents” tied to World Basketball Day, which is observed each year on Dec. 21.

The move is framed as part of the team’s push for global fan growth and a bigger cultural footprint — the modern sports playbook where music, fashion and design don’t sit on the sidelines, they are an integral part of the game experience.

In the Pistons’ announcement, the team said Sean will be involved in future community engagement and international fan development, and that the initiative will invite designers and artists worldwide to create original work inspired by Detroit Basketball, with a collaborative retail collection planned for 2026.

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“Big Sean’s influence reaches far beyond music — he’s a global creative visionary who already brings Detroit wherever he goes,” Pistons Chief Marketing Officer Alicia Jeffreys said in a statement. She called the program “the next step in introducing Detroit Basketball to the world.”

Sean, in his own statement, positioned the role as both hometown loyalty and infrastructure — less “brand ambassador,” more “build something that hires and opens doors.”

“Detroit has always been rich with talent and culture, and my mission is to keep opening doors and hiring our city’s creatives to shine alongside one of the most iconic franchises in sports,” he said, adding that he’s “grateful to the Pistons for trusting me to help define what the culture of Detroit Basketball really means.”

For the Pistons, the headline is that the franchise is treating creative direction as an actual department with an actual title, then attaching it to a Detroit name that has always been intentional about Detroit as brand and birthplace. It also continues a relationship the team says has already included merchandise and experience work, with more details promised around future events and retail collaborations in the year ahead.

What the announcement does not include: financial terms, how finalists for the design initiative will be selected, or what creative control looks like in practice — the part that determines whether this becomes a real pipeline for artists or another glossy concept that lives mostly in a press release.

Still, the direction is clear. The Pistons aren’t just selling tickets. They’re selling a story about Detroit — and betting Big Sean can help translate it in a language the world already understands.

Romanian Court Sentences Wiz Khalifa to Nine Months in Drug Case

Wiz Khalifa performs during a live concert in 2023. The rapper was later sentenced by a Romanian court in connection with cannabis use during a 2024 festival appearance in Costinești. (Photo by Rickmunroe01, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Wiz Khalifa’s habit of lighting up onstage has long been treated as part of the show. In Romania, it became a criminal case — and, this week, the court issued its final ruling.

The Pittsburgh rapper, born Cameron Jibril Thomaz, was sentenced to nine months in prison by Romania’s Constanța Court of Appeal, which overturned an earlier penalty stemming from his July 2024 detention at the “Beach, Please!” music festival in Costinești. The ruling, issued Monday and entered into the court registry, followed an appeal by Romanian prosecutors and marked the conclusion of a case that began when Khalifa smoked cannabis during his live set.

According to court documents and a translated statement from Romania’s Directorate for the Investigation of Organized Crime and Terrorism, known as DIICOT, Khalifa was found to have possessed more than 18 grams of cannabis and to have consumed additional marijuana onstage in the form of a handmade cigarette. Under Romanian law, cannabis is classified as a “dangerous drug,” and public possession and use remain criminal offenses regardless of quantity.

Police allowed Khalifa to complete his performance before taking him into custody. He was detained briefly, questioned and released, and prosecutors later initiated criminal proceedings for illegal possession of dangerous drugs for personal use.

In the initial trial, a lower court imposed a criminal fine of 3,600 lei, roughly $800 at the time. DIICOT appealed that sentence, arguing it failed to reflect the seriousness of the offense under Romania’s drug statutes. The appellate court agreed, partially vacating the original ruling and imposing a nine-month prison sentence, to be served in detention, while leaving other aspects of the judgment intact.

The decision is final under Romanian law.

 

What the ruling does not immediately mean is just as important as what it does. Khalifa was not taken into custody this week, nor have Romanian authorities announced steps related to extradition, enforcement abroad or international arrest warrants. The sentence was pronounced by making it available through the registry rather than in Khalifa’s physical presence, a procedural detail common in Romanian appellate cases involving foreign defendants.

Legal experts note that cross-border enforcement of such sentences can be complex and often hinges on bilateral agreements, prosecutorial discretion and future travel. None of those questions were addressed in the ruling itself, and Romanian officials emphasized that Khalifa benefited from full procedural rights and the presumption of innocence throughout the case.

Still, the judgment stands as a rare example of a global rap star receiving a custodial sentence overseas for conduct that, in much of the United States, would no longer raise eyebrows — let alone criminal charges.

The case also underscores the cultural disconnect between hip-hop performance norms and international drug laws. Cannabis remains central to Khalifa’s public image and music, woven into lyrics, branding and decades of live shows. But Romanian law makes no exception for celebrity, context or stage persona.

Since the incident, Khalifa has not publicly commented on the appeal ruling. At the time of his arrest in 2024, Romanian authorities made clear that his status as a foreign artist did not alter the legal framework governing the case.