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Kendrick Lamar - The Blacker The Berry

While ‘good kid, m.A.A.d city’ chronicled Kendrick’s personal development, this hints at the forthcoming LP tackling larger issues.

10th February 2015

Expectations for anything that was to follow an album like ‘good kid, m.A.A.d city’ were impossibly high for Kendrick Lamar, and it’s probably what led to the largely stunted reaction to his first taster of new material, ‘i’, which was released in September of last year. Since then, even Kendrick himself has said the single isn’t representative of his new album, and ‘The Blacker The Berry’ certainly shows off a different corner of his repertoire.

The track directly and forcefully addresses topics of race and inequality in America, spitting lines such as “you hate me, don’t you / you hate my people / your plan is to terminate my culture” over haunting production from Boi-1da. The song’s lyrics back up Lamar’s recent outrage over the troubles in Ferguson, and hints at the forthcoming LP tackling larger issues; while ‘good kid, m.A.A.d city’ chronicled Kendrick’s personal development. Lamar himself has said that no single track will fully represent what to expect from his new album, but a cut as mighty in its meaning as ‘The Blacker The Berry’ can only be seen as a statement of intent for what’s to come. “Fuck you / no, fuck y’all / that’s as blunt as it gets”. Indeed.

Tags: Reviews, Kendrick Lamar, Listen