by Amanda Davis

Last summer, it seemed like every other video on my TikTok for you page used the song “PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN.” Users were either lip-syncing “At my wedding I won’t wear a gown, yeah / I would rather wear Lady Gaga meat dress,” or confusedly demanding what genre of music this was. I thought at first that the algorithm had just caught on to my newfound obsession—as I seemed to be the only one of my friends who had heard the song—but “PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN” quickly garnered hundreds of thousands of streams following its online success. Now, with their fourth album in the works and an upcoming tour, it’s clear that QUEEF JERKY is in the music game for more than just a viral hit. 

The comedy rap duo, comprised of YouTube personalities Dev Lemons and Nick Green (Dev Limes and nickisnotgreen, respectively), released their debut song “QUEEF JERKY” in January 2022. The track features a funky electronic beat that winds up being more of a focal point than the lyrics, but it’s in their following single, “QUEEF’S BACK,” as well as their debut album QUEEFLEMANIA, that the duo would fall into the distinctive sound listeners have come to expect from them. With their absurd but clever lyrics, pop culture references, and electronic beats, Dev and Nick prove that there are no hard and fast rules to music. 

Although QUEEF JERKY’s style is pretty polarizing, the people who get it, get it. I quickly became a fan after discovering them last year, because their music is just plain fun to listen to. Their sophomore album, THE MICHIGAN LEFT—which features hivemind riley and DJ Grant—is an excellent follow up that puts the group’s talent on full display. The opening track, “20,” starts with a swanky instrumental aptly juxtaposed with bars that rhyme “nucleus” with “riducleus.” “LLC,” meanwhile, cranks up the bass with a beat I can never resist turning my stereo all the way up for. 

By this point, the duo had already been using TikTok to promote their music, posting behind the scenes videos and audio from their songs. It seems that today, more than ever, the internet has become the number one place to share and discover music. QUEEF JERKY took full advantage of this to spread the word about their third album, QUEEF UNDERGROUND. Dev and Nick posted videos of themselves lipsyncing their new songs with captions such as “Did we just make the song of the summer???”  

In my opinion, they certainly did. “PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN” was stuck in my head for months, ended up as my #5 song on Spotify Wrapped last year, and had me eagerly anticipating the album’s release. There was nothing special about the promotion of their new single—all the group did was post a few videos using the audio—but it clearly worked. In her video “Making A Song Go Viral By Doing Everything Wrong,” Dev talks about the online success of QUEEF JERKY, particularly in comparison to her solo project under the name Dev Lemons. “The most fascinating thing about this,” she says, “is not only with ‘PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN’ but with this entire album…there were so many things about this that we did just completely wrong. Industry standards and norms that we completely ignored.” Rather than worry about playlisting or heavy promotion, as Dev had with her solo EP Delusional, the duo simply uploaded the song to streaming platforms a few days before its release. And somehow, it worked—“PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN” began reaching tens of thousands of streams per day. The mix isn’t perfect, the lyrics are complete nonsense, and the promotion strategy was nontraditional, but listeners connected with the song. 

QUEEF UNDERGROUND, which came out three weeks later, did not disappoint. The duo, joined by fellow YouTube creator ethan is online, are at their creative best in this album. Each track stands on its own, from the upbeat raps in “EMINEM TYPE FEET,” to “MEATY FUN,” which starts off with an industrial electronic beat before mellowing out. The final track on the album, “SPAGHETTI NOODLES (IN A CAN),” is where the band seems to be a bit more genuine (at least, as genuine as a QUEEF JERKY song can get). The instrumental, which features a piano melody over a lo-fi beat, holds back for the first half of the song but builds in intensity right before Ethan’s verse. He closes the album with the lines “Future, past, and present / I don’t think I’ll make it to Heaven / Christ was born in a manger / I was born and raised like a stranger.” 

The group performed live the day before QUEEF UNDERGROUND was released, with Dev and Nick wearing the matching Eleven from Stranger Things dresses that have become a signature look for them. They continued to promote the album online, including fake Genius lyric videos for the songs “PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN” and “MEATY FUN.” They’ve released two more singles since then, as well as focusing on other projects. Most recently, the duo has announced that their fourth album, ABSOLUTE MADNESS, will be released this spring. They will also be going on their first tour, a “countrywide world tour” with dates in May and July.  

Love them or hate them, it’s always refreshing to see artists create purely for the fun of it. QUEEF JERKY’s infectious, straight-up goofiness is what draws so many people to their music—it’s hard not to enjoy yourself and laugh along with them.