the riffs and bops are too strong on Wesley's Theory. It more or less drowns out Kendrick, and he can't corral the beat. It gathers what I'm guessing to be all of the album's themes (black pride, anti-establishment, community outreach), buttressed by the snazzy, jazzy beat in a hodgepodge offering that kind of overwhelms. At least at first.
For Free? sounds like a cut gag from Black Dynamite.
One thing Kendrick is really good at - and all the great rappers have this talent - is to paint a picture. And with King Kunta, Kendrick is presenting you this embodiment of black spirit. Powerful, larger than life, thoroughly black - perhaps sauntering down the street. The track name and the baseline that sounds straight from a blaxploitation flick more than validate the idea (a bit over much, but it's cool). It's a brag track all the way through, but instead of money and cars like most rappers generically go on about, Kendrick is telling you he's got the crown cuz he's that nigga. Perhaps the best lyricist, the most poignant story teller, the most critically vaunted...but really the one (at least in the mainstream) that's gonna do the topics featured on his album justice.
It's the logical continuation of his sentiments on the Control verse that lit 2013 on fire, and kin to the first verse of his well received single The Blacker the Berry. And the relative lack of Kendrick's personal history or other such identifiers in the song make it seamless for the listener to self insert.
After such an energetic track full of flexing and braggadocios frolicking, tamping down that energy and bottling it with an oppressive song like institutionalized is sort of a surprising move. I suppose this song is meant to be the other side of the coin that is the black perspective - prideful yet sometimes self defeating. Building up artificial walls that strangle the potential of the hood. This is the kind of stuff that got Kendrick in a little bit of trouble a month or two ago. It's no coincidence that it's placed right after a track like King Kunta.
Coming out on the other side, that crackling potential (trapped) energy is released with a tight but upbeat number. These Walls is ostensibly about Kendrick's relationship with a felon's baby mother, though those 'Walls' allude to hood life, jail, and possibly Kendrick's own life. The clues are sprinkled throughout the track, but it feels like it should be simpler that that - it's a straightforward trail that kind of switches perspective in an almost haphazard fashion. This is the supposed to be Kendrick outside of the institution, but he feels connected to that life in more ways than one.
These three songs feel part of a greater whole. u pierces that harmony in jarring fashion, with a crooning ass Kendrick reiterating himself over and over. Once he gets into his flow he has probably left a solid amount of listeners at the skip button, but it becomes apparent u is meant to convey his vulnerability. Indeed, what is pride (and feelings in general) if not some fragile thing that can lead to darkness if that comfortable support falls through. He does lay it out there, but the theatrics and the voice become a bit much for me personally. I can appreciate the song because it is a nice, if not necessary, lead in to Alright, which has the cadence of a gospel song reimagined into a trap spiritual.
Not gonna lie one bit: I appreciate the bounce and vibe. This man Kendrick has been mournfully introspective for the last 4 songs and I'm ready to hit this bottle and get loose. I guess he agrees, because the bass is unfastened and finally allowed to stretch its legs. The hook is an affirmation that through all the shit Kendrick (and those like him) will go through, faith in oneself and faith in who or what you love gonna get you through it. This track is also the signal that TPAB is going to be dense. Even the light hearted shit is full of words and entendres which multisyllabic layering. Very few people are gonna know the words at concerts because Kendrick's delivery is a frantic percussion.
For Sale? and Momma assume that dark smokey jazz lounge theme that Kendrick has embraced with TPAB the most. He flows without much adherence to the supporting beats, with a free flow exposition that might glaze over a few eyes. Not to say they're boring or bad sounding, nah. These are the tracks that are kind of caught in between two diametric elements: Kendrick's voluminous verses and the chill jazz he's rapping over. You want to pay attention to the wordplay and interpret the poetry yet the smooth instrumentals compel you to just take it easy, man. These are the tracks, if one is so inclined to consume TPAB in full scholar fashion, that you're going to have to spin a few more times.
And while the energy picks up in the trail end of Momma, which converts into Hood Politics, Kendrick is only further incensed. It's apparent he's not going to slow down - he has a lot of shit to say. TPAB is a stream of consciousness album. Coherent but it's a deluge. It's like trying to breathe with your head stuck out of the window. Kendrick transitions seamlessly between themes to the point that you sometimes don't even notice, and by the time you do catch on he's whisking you further down the stream. contrast all of that with good kid, mAAd city, which is a movie that you can appreciate on a casual level. We all have to grow up, we all been in some situations, right? But self doubt, image issues, not feeling like you belong, struggling to be a voice of a people while also maintaining one's individuality, survivor's guilt, imploring your community to stop self destructing? Yeah, takes a bit more to lay that out.
How Much A Dollar Cost is the most GKMC-sounding track on the album. All album Kendrick done wore 36 different voices and cadences, but here it's neutral and basic. A lot of people are going to say TPAB should been an album filled with songs like this, but I think that misses the point. The somber melody carries the feel of a denouement, but the triumphant horns interspersed through the song remind us all that this party ain't over yet. Cost poses a question that actually can get me on a huge free will, nurture v. nature and personal responsibility tangent, but I'm gonna leave that alone for now. I only wish my conversations with bums that look like Morgan Freeman were this profound. The ending of this track, like For Free? and The Blacker the Berry, reorients the perspective of the preceding verses (it's a little mechanic he uses to interesting effect throughout the album). Now the Kendrick knows the bum is God would he have given up that dollar? Should it matter that Kendrick assumed the bum would have used the proffered funds for smack and poison juice? Scripture says God is within all of us, therefore we are all godly and we should treat everyone as such. Even if their faith is divergent or their actions unsavory, love and do not judge. But to do such a thing is obviously impractical, so how can we embody that standard? This is where Cost leaves us.
It's interesting that Kendrick ends one song with an admission of a lack of empathy before launching into a song about loving all kinds of people with Complexion. I guess good pussy transcends all sorts of dissonances (it do). It's these apparent contradictions that stick out to me: Kendrick plays with expectations and perspectives all album. From certain points of view, any thing can look different even though they're objectively the same. Subjectivity is perhaps the true heart of TPAB: that society is a bunch of different perspectives and that true progress will come from understanding ones other than your own. That's how you are gonna make it, that's how racism will be overcome, that's how black men are gonna stop leaving hot ones in their brother. This is actually true, and I would call it super optimistic if I thought this was Kendrick actually preaching instead of simply presenting the mirror for the truth to reflect upon its surface.
The Blacker the Berry is the summary song, like Money Trees was for GKMC. And like Money Trees, Berry is the best (read: my favorite) song on its album. Each verse is an idea more fully explored in other songs (first verse, Kunta; second verse, Hood Politics; third verse, institutionalized), and similar to Cost the ending flips the script. There's an impressive amount of construction that went into this song, and it does well as the headline for the album. I wonder what compelled to put that woman's voice in the beginning. It feels noisy, but it's not around long and certainly doesn't ruin the song.
Kendrick does a lyrical tapdance all across Berry's grimy beat (and the melody kind of sounds like distorted police sirens, which is kind of cool). It's an evolution for Kendrick, and he uses his skill to chronicle a particularly stressed time for the black community. Kendrick feels he's the only rapper that has the courage and capability to even tackle such a subject. J. Cole pays lip service to the movement but Kendrick fully embraces the spirit of the black perspective and channels it into sound and rhythm.
You Ain't Gotta Lie is an okay song but it's kind of filler - more a primer for the next song after Kendrick left speakers on fire post-Berry. Maybe I'll like the song more down the road, but I would have preferred something that carried over the energy. This would have been the perfect space for a mAAd city type song.
The lukewarm single i returns on the album much more earthly. Going with the live performance angle as a dispute breaks out is a little gimmicky, but if you're going to do that to any song on that album it would have to be i, the positive image anthem that the hood tossed into the bushes when it was a single. It wins a Grammy but it still didn't satisfy Kendrick.
As his fame started to grow, Kendrick began garnering comparisons to past greats. This sentiment hit its peak after he dropped good kid, and Mortal Man is the recognizance of those comparisons. Even with the best intentions, making direct comparisons to legends and martyrs is corny at best. I can't fully get around that feeling with Mortal Man, but Kendrick does couch it by making the conversation a teacher-pupil affair. He's learning from Pac, he's not the new Pac. But this is the spoken word portion; there's still a musical component and it's pretty dope. "when shit hits the fan is you still a fan?" Kendrick asks. I can only think he's speaking directly to the listeners of this album in a meta sense: he's aware that TPAB might not be what his fans are looking for and definitely not what the contemporary rap crowd is checking for. But when Kendrick rolls up his sleeves and lets loose on real subjects in an honest way, he's going to do it his way. It's up to us to determine if we'll respect that honesty, when all we say we want rappers to keep it 100. Are we going to respect a master at his craft?
And really that's what it comes down to. To Pimp A Butterfly is particularly focused, almost to a fault. As the details are further consumed and scrutinized, the genius of TPAB is best appreciated. The album thrives under a microscope. But you pull back a bit and you get a ruthlessly dense album that demands your attention while also relying on coasting instrumentals with a relaxing jazzy hum. I could say that this is an intentional juxtaposition - that the alluring jazz fusion is the malaise of society and one's tendency to go with what's comfortable rather than demanding what is just. But at the end of the day music is about the pleasure you get from song. Musically, Butterfly is a good album, but (perhaps) only methodically is it a masterpiece.
On the whole, I really like this outing. Experimental and pointed albums such as these are good to see in an artist's stable. It shows growth and an unwillingness to compromise one's vision. It also shows awareness and that Kendrick isn't out of touch. All of these are good signs. Granted, you sometimes get a sense that he's trying too hard with this album, unlike GKMC where almost every track came naturally. There is such a thing as not knowing when to put the pen down. But TPAB is a wholistic endeavor, and those drawbacks simply come with the territory.
