Rapper Kendrick Lamar performs onstage during FYF Fest 2016 at Los Angeles Sports Arena on August 27, 2016 in Los Angeles, California. The biggest surprise is that "XXX." which features U2 is not a cheesy affair and that it actually offers some of the harder hitting verses on the album.
The Compton California native has done all of that in short order, a little over a decade to be precise and several really good albums but his third studio album "Damn" that released this past Friday makes you say just that. Lamar isn't a Christian rapper in the conventional sense - his songs aren't in explicit exaltation of His glory - and though DAMN. is redolent with Biblical references, the temperament is decidedly Old Testament, filled with cold wrath and righteous punishments owing to the wages of sin and the blood of innocents.
Where 2015's To Pimp A Butterfly was a sprawling jazz/rap love affair, the production on DAMN. is a flex in transcending genres.
The album has been anxiously and hotly anticipated since Lamar surprisingly dropped the first single, "HUMBLE", March 30 to rave reviews.
Its 14 songs, all titled with brief concepts such as "FEEL.", "LOYALTY.", and "DNA.", explore dualities within both the soul and American society.
Want your voice heard? The centerpiece of these deliberations is "FEAR.", which, at almost eight minutes, is the emotional center of the album.
I'm not saying this is a for sure thing that's happening but how rad would it be to get 2 Kendrick albums in less than a week. Titles include "PRIDE.", "LOVE.", "LUST." and "FEAR.", all of which Lamar aims to explore and express his discontents related to each huge concept. There's no telling what Kendrick is up to, as the rapper has been great at keeping his releases under wraps, but at least fans know that there is more Capri and K. Dot stuff in the vault.
Germany urges Turkey not to move away from Europe
In the meantime, the AKP must reflect on how to respond to the two pieces of really bad news for it in the referendum results. The EU has been quick to warn Turkey any return of the death penalty would mean the immediate end of its membership bid.
Watch him take it down in the player below.
One of Fox News' most notorious commentators and hip-hop cynic Geraldo Rivera didn't appreciate the inclusion of his name in Kendrick Lamar's "YAH", and made a decision to speak his mind about it on his podcast that aired Friday (April 14).
With the release of his instant classic To Pimp a Butterfly, Kendrick Lamar usurped the throne of hip-hop, but questions emerged concerning would come next.
"At some point, those guys have to cop to the fact that by encouraging this distinctive culture that is removed from the mainstream, they have encouraged people to be so different from the mainstream that they can't participate other than the racks in the garment center and those entry-level jobs", Geraldo said.
There's a danger in putting too much weight on any entertainer to serve as a proxy for collective action.
In the past, Lamar's most ambitious songwriting ("The Blacker the Berry", "Sing About Me, I'm Dying of Thirst") has tended to hinge on unexpected brushes with mortality. But though he can be preachy at times, he doesn't suggest he's above reproach. His anxieties and unease around his own foibles are meant to mirror our own - and likewise, his struggles towards salvation and redemption are lead-by-example exhortations for us to do the same work, lest we risk perishing in a damnation of our own making.
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