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For those of you that aren’t huge tans of hip hop,
like me, you might not know who Kendrick Lamar
is. Although by now, you might recognize at least
one of these three songs: “ Swimming Pools
(Drank),” “ Bitch, Don’ t Kill My Vibe,” or “Poetic
Justice.” All of which are fromjLamar’ s second
album, “ Good Kid, M .A.D.D C it j,” released Oct.
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2 2 ,2 ^ 2 ..
Lamar’s new album, “ DAMN.” was rjjfeased on April 14.
Just like the title, all of the songs featured in the album are capitalized
accompanied with a period.
The first song, “ BLOOD.,” is an introduction to the album in sense.
■ si
abomination,” hit hard afe the idea that being a person of color in a
white man’ s world is a hard lire. So whether your name is well known
or not, you have to stick together arid have each other’ k back in this
cruel world that we l i ^ H y
Anyone that has
Lamar released an ^ É alb u m , knows the
song “ HUMBLE.” One of my friends introduced me to the song and
said, “ This song makes hie wanf to drive around and do crazy shit.”
“ HUMBLE.” was released on its own 15 days before the album. This
is one of the most upbeat songs on the album, and could easily be a
great song on i t ^ ^ K but oddly enough it fits perfectly into the album.
This song was also made into a music video. It’ s a materpiece that
you’ll just have to watch it.
In “ HUMBLE.” Lamar sings,
L
j l ’m so fuckin’ tired of the photoshop
Lamar notices a blind woman who looks like she’ s struggling to find
something, so he walks up to her and asks if she needs help.
She responds by killing him dead on the street. My take on this intro
show me somethih’ natural like ass with some stretch marks”
is, you can’t trust everyone you m eef’Bh the street. The outro to the
^ ^ S ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ M e m i n i s t s , even thoughrnerW eussm gancr
song is a FoxNews excerpt.
In June of 2015, Lamar opened the BET Awards standing on top of a some other explicit languange, Lamar is still respectful to his audience.
It’s hard to pick a favorite when the entire album is great, but “ LUST.” ,
graffiti cop car performing the song, “ Alright” from his third album,
is in my top five. The beat in the beginning, pans from the left speaker
“ To Pimp a Butterfly” which was released in March of 2015.
Later, Eric Bolling and Kimberly Guilfoyle th en criticized his to the right, and back a few times, making you feel a little disoriented.
Which is a great transition into this song from “ HUMBLE.”
performance in a Fox News segment.
Lamar starts singing,
In “ BLOOD.,” Lamar samples the news segment, where Bolling said,
“ I need somewater
“ Lamar stated his views on police brutality with that line in the song,
something came over me
quote ‘And we hate the popo, wanna kill us in the street fo’ sho.’ ” and
hot to simmer down
which you hear Guilfoyle reply with, “ Oh please, ugh, I don’t like it.”
might as well overheat... ”
: •
t’ s obvious that Lamar’s views on police brut^ity
The
theme
of
being
disoriented
follows
through
this
song as blood
haven’t
changed
since
last
year,
and
he
wanted
to
make
that
very
iavi
rushes his “ favorite Vjtfi” and his heart races like a junkie’s ab he tries
cleat in this album.
The next song, “ DNA.” was made into a music video
A H .,” the to get a girt to have sex with him.
This album is an am a^ fcp iece of art that is Kendrick Lamar’s life.
third song in the album is playing in the background. They zoom in
Un Larner sitting in an interrogation room, cuffed to the table with a The transitions in between each song are so smooth, the first time
you listen A the album all the way through you might catch jjgjiself
lie detector next to him on his right. A bjack cop walks in and starts
to interrojjgte him. He says, “ You k n o v ^ ^ p t DNA stands for? Dead looking down at the playiist to see if you’re still on the same song or
if it’ s changed.
N i g H H H L a t i o n .”
Jja r
I could e a silf ramble onabout how great this album is^especially
The cop takes a seat next to the lie detector and the excerpt of Fox
Newsfrom “ B1£)OD.” echoes in, h e ^ K to start the lie detector and after r e s e a ^ B g deeper intoxhe m ean irkof every song a n ^ B in g
r
is electrocuted. Then the song starts, “ 1 got loyalty, got royalty inside
m yD N A^gg^
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¡r DNA an
The vi ideo and the lyrics, “ My DNA not for imitation,
L < I
•C lackam as Print MAY 3,2017 theclackamasprint.com
together p a rts ff the puzzle yourself?^
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hoe they arfe connected.
.
But the more you listen to it, th e lio re you notice and start to piece
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