This feature contains spoilers from the film Is God Is.

Revenge is a dish best served with an earthy, corporeal soundtrack from award-winning multidisciplinary artist Moses Sumney — at least according to director-playwright Aleshea Harris and her thrilling new film, Is God Is.

An impressive adaptation of Harris’ own 2018 stage play, Is God Is follows identical twins Racine the Rough One (Kara Young) and Anaia the Quiet One (Mallori Johnson) on their quest to exact total revenge on their violent, absentee father (Sterling K. Brown) by disfiguring them as children while burning their mother alive. Featuring additional standout performances by Vivica A. Fox, Erika Alexander and Janelle Monáe, Is God Is reframes the neo-Western genre through a Black Southern Gothic aesthetic that allows Harris to blend her commentary on domestic violence and the Black nuclear family with supernatural elements like twin telepathy. Distributed by Amazon MGM studios, Is God Is stands as one of the first legitimate awards contenders of 2026. And Sumney’s stirring score is a major reason why.

Sumney joined Is God Is after the studio reached out to him in the summer of 2024. Despite not “having any ambition to be a film composer,” Harris’ riveting, “self-assured” screenplay sold him. And, though he didn’t quite know it at the time, his decision-making was guided by unmistakable “full-circle” energy.

As a first-time film composer, Sumney tapped co-composer Joseph Shirley, who assisted Oscar winner Ludwig Göransson on Creed, Ryan Coogler’s Michael B. Jordan-starring boxing epic. Sumney played a small role in that film, also penning several songs for Tessa Thompson’s character. Naturally, Thompson serves as a producer on Is God Is. And that’s not to mention Sumney casually meeting Harris at three-time Tony nominee Jeremy O. Harris’ [no relation] house while Is God Is thrilled the Soho Repertory Theatre.

“I loved Anaia from day one. I always felt really connected to the quieter twin since I’m the quieter sibling,” he tells Billboard. “I could relate to that ugly duckling-ness she had, and I really loved the opportunity to think about what it could mean for the twins to share intuition. What would their telepathic connection sound like?”

To answer that question — while also rolling with the film’s “intimate” production budget — Sumney turned to his own body. Even when his and Shirley’s score, which pulls from blues, gospel, rock and folk music, incorporates whirring synths and piercing keys, Sumney struck his own body, scratched up floors and stretched his own voice to its limits as a “playable instrument.” It’s an approach that extended to the eerie whistle Brown’s character wields as a sonic motif throughout the film. That balance of unique human production and the steely, almost-barren feel of the film’s New Orleans set gave way to a score that’s as visceral as it is immersive.

In an expansive conversation with Billboard, Moses Sumney details the making of the Is God Is score, explains how he recruited Kara Jackson for soundtrack single “Sins of the Father” and teases his first new studio album since 2020.

How familiar were you with the stage play?

I never had an opportunity to see the stage play, but I had heard of it — especially because I met Aleshea around the time of the production, really casually, at my friend Jeremy O. Harris’ house. When they brought [Is God Is] up, I thought it was a really brilliant and bold thing for a studio to be making. Especially when you look at all the boxes: first-time director, Black, female, original story, unique IP, etc. It seemed like a rare opportunity for this to even exist in the world.

Generally, what was your creative process like?

I was working with a co-composer, a brilliant man named Joseph Shirley, whom I’ve actually known for a long time. I knew I needed someone who had scored proper movies before, since I’ve only ever scored short films. He had the brilliant idea of creating a sonic world for the film before it even went into edit. I came on before they shot the film and went to set to get a sense of what was happening.

Because the world of the film is so tactile and the relationship between the twins is so deeply personal, it made sense for the music to be personal. Also, the budget was very intimate. We wanted to use my physical body as much as possible, so a lot of the sounds are my voice, even when there are synths and keys. We did all that before we even saw any dailies. Once they went into edit, we got an early cut of the whole film and started going scene by scene.

It’s almost SOPHIE-esque, the way you stretch your voice to its absolute limit as an instrument. Why did the human voice and body feel like the right sound to ground this score?

Oh, I appreciate that — I love SOPHIE! It just made sense, but maybe it’s also my style. So much of my work is vocal looping, vocal layering, stacking harmonies and [background vocals], and I’ve been experimenting more and more with turning my voice into an actual playable instrument. I’ve also been making an album concurrently, and that has been a lot of the theme.

We definitely wanted to make something that harkened to the American South and blues, but we did so in a way that felt unique instead of bringing in banjos and upright bass and going full Delta backwater vibes. We wanted the music to feel progressive, even though it’s a Western, and there are all these American and Americana tropes happening throughout.

This movie is essentially a neo-Western that blends supernatural elements with an overarching Black Southern Gothic aesthetic. How did those different energies manifest in your score?

We tried to find space for everything. We had moments with really compositional strings, but we also found space to make you feel like you’re in rural Louisiana. And looking at their girls and their taste, there’s a point where Racine is head-banging in the car to a Death Grips song [“Guillotine”], which is so good. They’re cool girls, don’t get it twisted! So, that influenced a lot, and that was Aleshea’s choice from the beginning.

She also got the Prince estate to clear one of his songs [“Thunder”] while Janelle Monáe’s character is driving. The artists peppered throughout the soundtrack informed where we were going musically.

The whistle Brown’s character does is so chilling. How did you guys nail that?

Well, there was a cartoon that Aleshea really loved. I’m not actually sure of its origin, but you see it in an early scene when the girls are getting ready. In the flashback scene, when the man burns down the house, the cartoon is also playing in the background. [Sings.] “Sunshine, sunshine, sunshine.” We pulled the melody from that and had Sterling [K. Brown] whistle it, which made it feel much more ominous.

Talk to me about bringing the score into a more industrial space for that horror-coded showdown between the twins and Divine’s son?

One of the first songs that I wrote for the film was called “Bang! Bang! Bang!” I really wanted to go for something angry and industrial and maybe a tiny bit Radiohead-y, and we put that in that scene, which starts with him destroying their car. Then they go into a junkyard, so the literal metal of the environment in the scene really informed the score. In that song, I’m banging and scratching the floor and hitting my body; it’s a mix of humanness and rawness.

Talk to me a little bit more about your dynamic with Joseph Shirley.

Joseph was there to be the adult in the room. [Laughs.] We probably took turns doing that, but it was imperative to have him because I’m not going to pretend I know what it’s like to receive edit after edit of a thing and then turn it around on a dime. That’s the world he lives and breathes. I got to oscillate between being more of a dreamer and overseer, while also providing raw materials for what this should sound like. And Joseph is also a really brilliant musician from Louisiana, who brought a certain musicality and knowledge of how to operate within that system while maintaining incredible humility. We’re very different, and I think that worked in our favor.

What particular track or scene demanded the most from you in this process?

There are two scenes. I really wanted to get the opening montage right because we were setting the table for what the sonic world of the film is. But the one we kept going back to was the last scene in the movie when Racine goes off into the world alone. We knew early on that we wanted it to be a song, not just a score — and that was also a big part of my job, making as many song moments out of the score as possible.

It also had to be somber because she’s just lost her sister, and we’re coming off this really high-octane, dramatic moment with the fight with the dad. But then it has to immediately get hopeful because although she’s lost so much, she’s looking forward and she’s with child. There is a life still available to her. I would actually say Anaia’s life begins when the movie ends because she’s finally getting a chance to be an individual. So, we kept going back to that scene to see if it should be sadder or warmer or bluesier. Eventually, I wrote “Don’t Leave Me Be,” which had the perfect tone of warmth and hope and sadness.

How did “Sins of the Father” come together?

We had to make space for Kara Jackson, who is such a brilliant folk artist and our former U.S. National Youth Poet Laureate. We could not let the soundtrack go down without having a Black female voice present. “Sins of the Father” was initially written for the scene after the fire near the end of the movie. It’s in the end credits and just fits better there.

After everything was done, I reached out to Kara, whom I’ve been a fan of since her debut album [2023’s Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love?], and we had a really long lunch where I asked her to write a verse for the song. I told her the plot of the movie and got her to do a bit of a duet. I’m so happy that we were able to lead with that song.

Did you bring anything from your past acting experiences (The Idol, Maxxxine) to scoring Is God Is? When can we see you on screen again?

If anything, I’m really interested in making my own movies. Before I started acting, I was directing my music videos. Then, I started photographing, so I would be a better director. I started acting soon after that, and I even did Shakespeare in the Park [Public Theater’s Twelfth Night] last year. In a way, everything has been leading up to me writing and maybe even directing my own films. The ways I want to tell stories are so much richer than only making music or albums.

I was excited to go into this project and learn how the sausage is made. Even though I’m in my little department, getting to communicate across the board and see the process of a film from script to shooting to editing to post to [release] was really cool.

I don’t know how much my acting might have influenced my scoring, but my scoring will definitely influence my acting and filmmaking. I went to school for writing, so I’m always thinking of how to say the most with the least. And that’s really important in scoring, because I personally don’t like watching movies that are wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling sound, which is something Aleshea and I agreed on. You have to sit in the silence sometimes.

What recent film scores have resonated with you?

It’s so obvious, but Sinners is great. I didn’t see it until awards season, and I’m actually quite glad because there are obvious parallels between Sinners and Is God Is, so it was good that I didn’t have that in my brain. But I thought that was really brilliant, and everything Ludwig does is great. I really liked Halina Reijn’s Babygirl; I thought [Cristobal Tapia de Veer’s] score was really good and criminally underdiscussed. Same for the Bones and All score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. The Drama, as well; the soundtrack was just so good.

What can you tell us about your new album?

Hopefully, music from that will start coming out this year, maybe even in the summer. I’m really, really excited about it. I took a long break to figure out who I am, and I’m so grateful for the perspective that has given me and the kind of life experience it’s given me to pull from. This album is definitely going to be the most ambitious work I’ve ever made, but also the most honest work I’ve ever made, which is saying a lot. That will be the next musical offering for me, for sure.