kendrick lamar’s cosmic catastrophe…a review by ali’s baby
“i’ve been goin thru sum…1,855 days…i been goin thru something…be afraid”
kendrick lamar's villainous turn reveals a rebel poet, a rejection of his self-appointed saviorism that revels in tha contradictory; an intelligent, well-intentioned, yet deeply flawed record that deftly portrays its creator as a well-intentioned but deeply flawed man…a star falling out of orbit
kendrick lamar is an artist who deals in cosmic drama…his records- razor sharp in their delivery, nearly flawless in their conceptual execution- weave ethical paradigms, profound judgements, family trauma, nd multiple subjectivities; his narratives are sprawling, depicting elemental forces of good nd evil at constant war within tha conscious of a rapper whose skill is only matched by his deeply humanistic prose…kendrick’s greatest ability, tha hallmark of his penmanship, is his empathy; he bridges divides nd makes sense of tha dichotomies of his internal nd external realities- a good kid vs. a maad city, a disillusioned caterpillar pimped into a butterfly (adorned in riches but farther frm his cocoon than he ever imagined), reveling in all facets of tha human condition- waywardly projecting a deep fear of divine judgement; they are psychedelic dramas- cultural icons nd religious figures are a constant, protagonists are flawed yet rendered in a loving complexity that reveals as much as it endears- he paints a community flawed in their upbringing but righteous in their intention…collapsing lifetimes of rights nd wrongs into a state-of-the-union on tha world outside his window; kendrick is a writer obsessed with morality, with tha flawed people in his past nd present trying their best in an even mor flawed world- a poet that seeks tha divine even in tha most abject. wat makes him special is his incredible ability to tackle these dense topics of Black life nd death without pretension, he is a non-judgemental observer nd confidant throughout his discography- documenting tha inner conditions of his subjects with a compassion previously unseen in tha rap canon…he instead reserves his most pointed judgements for his own inequities, his own moral failings; kendrick is an author who’s sense of humanism stops at his own rights nd wrongs. his music feels so removed from tha holier-than-thou condemnation nd finger-wagging so ever-present in conscious rap because he reserves his most scathing critiques for himself…despite his clear sense of responsibility towards his community, towards a positive impact wrt his music nd artistry, tha obsessive compassion granted to his subjects- regardless of their past sins, he cannot grant himself tha same narrative grace. in kendrick’s world, he is damned.
mr. morale nd tha big steppers is, in many ways, tha most flawed kendrick lamar album. it rejects tha grand narrative swells of his previous work- tha stories of inner growth that make up good kid, tha final confrontation with artistic responsibility nd tupac’s ghost that punctuates butterfly, tha eternal limbo of damnation (tha question of wickedness or weakness) present in damn…wat is most apparent on mr. morale is not grand concepts or new narrative folds but a real sense of kendrick lamar as subject; revealing a decidedly villainous character portrait that challenges tha prescriptions of moralistic authorship previously assigned to his work. a kendrick lamar record that rejects empathetic engagement in favor of contradiction. he deftly mines nd ultimately condemns tha impacts of patriarchy nd misogynoir on tha Black family- yet features known rapist kodak black on no less than 3 songs. his misguided attempts at tolerance come into sharp relief on tha unlistenable auntie diaries, hurling slurs with glee as he affirms his "love" nd acceptance of his uncle nd cousin. he’s also at his most profane throughout- ranging frm tha half-baked jabs at “cancel culture” on tha biting N95 to a straight up re-creation of domestic abuse on album…highlight? low point? we cry together- and yet at his most intimately vulnerable nd breath-takingly sincere on momma i sober nd father time. i’m drawn to this quote by author mary ann calo in her appreciation of tha critical fallings of influential African american critic alain locke here; mr. morale is a record that struggles “with the relationship of artistic form to content or subject, arriving at imperfect solutions” (see calo, 96)...tha flawless wordsmith has not just embraced imperfection here, he makes it foundation. dulling his narrative humanism to reveal tha subject that most deeply draws his ire, himself; he pens a text unconcerned in its conceptual failures to better discern his own…his failures as a husband, as a father, as an artist, and arrives at a conclusion that innovates as much as it confounds. kendrick lamar is a writer who has always dealt in tha cosmic, creating grand operas of shifting perspectives nd pleas for salvation…on morale he sidesteps any saving graces, he spits on his own good-will, nd in tha making manifest of his failures as both subject nd author he forges a cosmic catastrophe.
stars are just projections of long-gone celestial bodies, a series of measurements in frequency nd impact that determines its relative distance to us as its observer. as an audience kendrick lamar has always felt like a star within our orbit, an arbiter of a larger collective that astonished in his ability to inspire. this is a pulitzer prize winning artist. a rapper defined by his ability to connect past tha blusters of celebrity to communicate tha relational. that rapper is still present on mr. morale nd tha big steppers, nd he is not our savior. lamar has shut out tha world on mr. morale, fully disconnected frm our imaginaries- throwing out tha iphone nd tha news cycle in favor of tha therapist's couch…rendering his failings as both artist nd human being in a level of detail only possible for a rapper of his extraordinary talent. he becomes a villain whose outright failures is barely balanced by his altruistic intentions, leaving a project less involved in tha overall ethical sum of its very messy parts nd moreso concerned with introducing a decidedly jagged edge to his persona…it’s message is clear; kendrick lamar is not tha voice of a generation, he is not a rallying cry. after a five year hiatus, rap’s resident poet laureate arrives at his throne to announce himself as an unreliable narrator- a man plagued by his infidelities, his hypocrisies, his moral failings nd imperfect solutions- realizing a rebel poet in a tumultuous process of one step forward-two steps back…a conceptual nd formal affirmation of tha scars formed in one’s healing frm trauma that ends in a firm, final statement; that kendrick lamar is a flawed man, a man with a lot of work to do, nd that we, his audience- seeking his glorious word frm tha mountain tops, are no longer a concern…a star falling out of orbit in real time, violently untethered frm any previous metric of observation. does it need to exist? does its leaps nd bounds outweigh its murky pitfalls? do i even fucking like tha record? im not sure, but i do know it provokes…it creates a gutural impact whose weight is determined by a rapper that continues to amaze, even while he’s making ya flinch. tha mask of kendrick’s perfect humanism is absolved- leaving sum a lot messier, sum that’s honestly not fun to look at, something that deservedly draws critique nd condemnation as much as it astonishes nd excites…sum definitively mor human…this is oklama, mr. morale…nd we is tha big steppers…
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