Landing a Kendrick Lamar an interview (ahem, we caught one) as he has risen from underground wunderkind to A-list rap titan status has become increasingly difficult. The New York Times linked up with the Compton rapper before the release of To Pimp a Butterfly, which is burning a hole in the Hip-Hop game, and squeezed some interesting details and quotes out of him.
Since the Internets is all about efficiency, we compiled 9 things we learned from Kendrick Lamar in the interview.
Peep game in the following pages…
God Body
Kendrick is saved.
Mr. Lamar, who grew up in Compton, Calif., had previously been saved as a teenager in the parking lot of a Food 4 Less, he said, when the grandmother of a friend approached him after a tragedy, asking if he had accepted God. “One of my homeboys got smoked,” Mr. Lamar recalled. “She had seen that we weren’t right in the head. That was her being an angel for us.”
Nearly a decade later, having found that fame and riches did not offer additional salvation, or happiness, he “wanted to take it to the next level — being underwater,” he said. “I felt like it was something I had to do.”
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Photo: WENN.com
Traveling Man
Traveling the world gave him greater perspective, and the concept album format helps him share his views.
“You take a kid out of Compton, and he has to meet these different types of people that are not black,” Mr. Lamar said. With this challenging 75-minute story of “survivor’s guilt,” he has also doubled down on the concept album format, forgoing obvious radio singles and daring fans to invest in close readings at the risk of commercial success.
The Word
Kendrick is aware of how vested his fans are in him and his music. But there’s one being he isn’t touching.
For many fans, “I’m the closest thing to a preacher that they have,” Mr. Lamar, 27, said from the couch of a Santa Monica studio where he recorded much of the new album. “I know that from being on tour — kids are living by my music.” However, he added: “My word will never be as strong as God’s word. All I am is just a vessel, doing his work.”
Blue Collar
Songs about opulence are all good, but they’re not K. Dot’s bag.
“You know the songs that are out — we all love these songs,” he said. “They sell a lot of singles and make these record labels a lot of money.”
But those “really living” in the streets don’t want to hear boasts about murder and drug dealing, he continued. “They want to get away from that,” Mr. Lamar said. “If it comes across as just a game all the time, the kids are going to think it’s just a game.”
Sorry Ladies
Kendrick is still seeing his high school sweetheart, but you won’t catch her on the ‘Gram.
In addition to being religious, he rarely drinks or smokes, eschews fancy clothes and jewelry and has reportedly been in a quiet, decade-long relationship with his high school sweetheart. (“I don’t want to put somebody else in the spotlight and make them a celebrity when they don’t want to be a celebrity,” he said.)
“Respect Ourselves”?
His response to critics who said he didn’t say enough about Eric Garner and Mike Brown:
That shooting of an unarmed teenager by a police officer “never should’ve happened,” he said. “When we don’t have respect for ourselves, how do we expect them to respect us?”
“When I speak, I speak for self first — this is my experience,” Mr. Lamar said in response to critics who said he was ignoring institutional racism. “I know where I come from. I know the hurt that I’ve caused families,” he added. “These are my demons.”
As for police brutality and political disenfranchisement, “I know the history,” he said. “Black and brown pride have been taught in my household for a long time.”
To Pimp A Butterfly‘s Cover
For those wondering, he explained the album cover’s concept.
On “Hood Politics,” over a foreboding Sufjan Stevens sample, Mr. Lamar bridges the gap “from Compton to Congress,” comparing politicians to gang members: “Demo-Crips and Re-Blood-icans.”
The cover of “To Pimp a Butterfly” addresses that juxtaposition in a striking image by the French photographer Denis Rouvre: shirtless black men of all ages, gripping 40-ounce bottles and stacks of cash, posing in front of a White House backdrop.
Mr. Lamar said the cover represents “taking the same things that people call bad and bringing them with me to the next level, whether it’s around the world or to the Grammys or the White House. You can’t change where I come from or who I care about.”
Politics As Usual
Don’t call To Pimp A Butterfly a “political” record.
But to call “To Pimp a Butterfly” a political record “would be shortchanging it,” Mr. Lamar said. “It’s a record full of strength and courage and honesty” but also “growth and acknowledgment and denial.”
“I want you to get angry — I want you to get happy,” he said. “I want you to feel disgusted. I want you to feel uncomfortable.”
