IDK’s ‘e.t.d.s.’ is a Kaleidoscopic Exploration of his Rugged Past Projected through Mixtape Nostalgia
Evan Dale | February 22, 2026
Hannah Sider
There have always been moments when listening to IDK that evoke in his listeners a nostalgia for the peaks of a bygone mixtape era. Like many artists who shined during the 90’s and early aughts, the Maryland rapper and producer lives by the sword of his sonic impulsiveness, weaving from one end of his knack as a hard-nosed, rapid-firing lyricist, towards myriad other musical directions striding experimentally with his vocals, poetics, and production. His sound has always been best served raw and unpolished, tethering his imperfections to those of a long lineage of MC’s and DJ’s – many of which have become his longstanding collaborators – that make music honest to its roots, rather than – as is so common across the modern rapscape – emphatically embellishing and romanticizing the craft overtop trend-strewn studio production for pop-adjacent consumption. With IDK’s newest project, Even The Devil Smiles (e.t.d.s.) he proudly drapes his established mixtape aesthetic in its proper mixtape nomenclature, leaning into that which has long defined his enigmatic sound and epochal defiance.
Thematically, IDK sources the project’s material from his personal run-ins with the American penal system, opening the project at the self-titled JASON MiLLS with a sampled phone call from a Maryland correctional facility, and continuing the storyline throughout its 35-minute runtime. Having himself been sentenced to fifteen years at the age of seventeen, he would have been released only last year had it not been for ultimately having to serve just three years. Every day is a coming to terms with his lock-up and what was so close to being lost at the hands of even more time served. e.t.d.s. is – at least in its discourse – the result of reflection on that intersection between reality and the hypothetical. As IDK puts it, the mixtape serves as "proof that creation could breathe in captivity."
Hannah Sider
IDK’s creativity has seemingly never been hampered by his life experiences, good or bad. If anything, his vibrant artistic explorations are so kaleidoscopic that for us everyday consumers, it can at times be easy to lose the thread in his work. His sound is broad and unpredictable, and his projects often result in feeling impressionistic and open-ended. And yet, for a career largely delineated by a lack of definability and explosions of impulsive musical experimentation, e.t.d.s. emerges as one of the most complete and cohesive additions to a canon that has always been marked by standout hits sprinkled throughout projects that have bled of stylistic risk-taking and have occasionally suffered from track-to-track noncooperation. Throughout e.t.d.s. however he finds stylistic confluence without losing the sporadic nature of his signature. There’s a balance between the two swinging ends of his pendulum. There’s no denying the mixtape as an IDK classic. His unmistakable creative identity is central to the project even as names large, fabled, and even posthumous stamp its 15-song tracklist.
The list of featuring rappers and guest producers across e.t.d.s. would be unprecedented for just about anyone else, but for IDK – who, for example, with 2021’s USEE4YOURSELF brought along Young Thug, Offset, Westside Gunn, MF Doom, SiR, T-Pain, The Neptunes, Rico Nasty, Swae Lee, Slick Rick, Sevyn Streeter, Trippie Redd, JVCK JVMES, Shy Grizzly, Lil Yachty, Kenny Mason, and Royce Da 5’9” – a robust list of talented friends is seemingly the norm. With e.t.d.s. he pursues a collaborative roster rooted in rap timelessness rather than the wide-ranging manifest that have underlined his prior collections. Black Thought’s lyrical mastery and effortless flow steal the show on P.O while IDK’s own verses are also of note. Posthumous verses from DMX (START TO FiNISH – S.T.F.) and MF DOOM (FLAKKA) stamp IDK’s prior collaborations with both now-passed artists with new work one last time. Pusha T brings his dark and methodic flow to LiFE 4 A LiFE, serving as a thesis of sorts for the project, reflecting a mentality first encountered upon IDK's incarceration at the age of 17. while RZA’s deft touch makes EVERYONE KNOWS a display rooted particularly in the uncut griminess of the 90’s East Coast aesthetic he helped birth.
Having also helped in the production of EVERYONE KNOWS, RZA’s contributions to the overarching sounds of e.t.d.s. are only one of the project’s top-shelf producing credits. KAYTRANADA and Conductor Williams – see his a drunken and sinister stumble of a beat on SCARY MERRi – also provide standout production to the mixtape’s sweeping yet fluid beatscape.
Fluidity has always shone a light on IDK’s ability as a producer to craft works that from track to track seamlessly bleed into one another, but e.t.d.s. is an exhibition of his further growth as an artist and a storyteller to imbue the project with the kind of cohesion and throughline that have escaped his prior work. The sporadic, free wielding nature that has defined his signature sound since day one still shines here, and the raw mixtape aesthetic of e.t.d.s. is central to its whole, but where his lack of sonic polish feels purposeful, his ability to produce a refined, complete project is equally defining of his continued growth.