When black protests spill out onto the streets, as they have done in 2020 with the killing of George Floyd, “Alright” is often the anthem that gives comfort to the frustrated and the grief-stricken. It was a memo to the world watching, a showcasing of the conditions inflicted on African-American communities past and present.īut the song was truly placed into the legacy of a generation following the protests against police brutality that surfaced in 2014, after the killing of Mike Brown in Ferguson a year before the song was released, and prevailed throughout the following years with the killings of further black Americans at the hands of the police. When performed at the 58th Grammys he arrived on stage shuffling in a chain gang from a prison cell, limbs bound. Throughout, he purges the personal and generational traumas delivered to black communities by police brutality and systemic racism and finds a resolute optimism in a future brighter than the present moment. That tone of liberation is captured on “Alright”, an anthemic rallying call that became a symbol for black protest across the world. The message was clear: it was a portrait of defiance and empowerment for those the country had left behind.
At their feet lies a judge sprawled across the floor, eyes crossed out and presumed dead, gavel loosely held in his fingers. The album cover depicts a powerful photograph of Lamar and his childhood friends posted up on the White House lawn, bare chested with bills and alcohol bottles in their fingers. It was an extended gaze at race and class in America, as well as the candid journaling of his own internal battles with depression and his wavering mental health.
To Pimp A Butterfly presented new themes and new sounds. While many listeners pined for the guttural, long winding raps of the previous album, Lamar was ready to steer in a new direction. In 2015, after the acclaim and accolades of Good Kid, MAAD City, Lamar released a long-awaited follow-up. They are examples of the tales of sorrow and regret, the muffled screams that never made their way out of their city but will now live forever on the tones of Good Kid, MAAD City. The conversation was real, he later revealed in an interview, and both brothers passed before the album was released. It’s an abrupt fade to black for another friend who Lamar witnessed die young and afraid in Compton. “And if I die before your album drop, I hope…” he says, before gunshots cut his message short. “You ran outside when you heard my brother cry for help,” the brother says and then thanks Lamar for cradling his sibling as he took his last breaths. The first verse casts listeners back to a scene from Lamar's childhood, where after witnessing the murder of a best friend, he narrates from the perspective of the victim's elder brother. Twelve minutes in length, it’s the first half that is dedicated to these true stories. “Sing About Me, I’m Dying Of Thirst”, the album's tenth song, is a visceral stare at life in the darker corners of Compton and sees him share personal stories from friends and residents he once knew, people who battled with traumatic experiences, who lived and died with scars from the grief of gang shootings and teenage prostitution.
Through 12 tracks, we follow him through the perils, pleasures, traumas and troubles that accompanied his teenage years in the town and listen on as he delves on loss, grief and desire in the shadows of the city of angels. The record is an intense, lucid biographical depiction of a day in Compton.
Second album Good Kid, MAAD City was where Lamar first found mass appeal.
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