Writing about Music is first of all subjectivity – otherwise, you might as well become a Wikipedia contributor. That being said, we have the feeling of being completely objective when we affirm that Kendrick Lamar is, until proven otherwise, the greatest rapper of the 21st century.
Despite his small 65 meter height, the Compton artist can afford to look at the competition from the window – and Bruno Mars straight in the eye. Which he never really did until the disastrous March 22, 2024, release date of “Like That”, a song on which K.Dot was invited to settle the score for a Drake who had clearly not learned the lessons of the past. What followed was a surge of verbal violence worthy of the 90s, until Kendrick Lamar marked the end of the recess with an incendiary “Not Like Us” produced by Mustard. If the vitality of the sequence should not make us forget the sometimes very limited nature of certain blows, we can also rejoice that it is at the origin of an album that is exceptional in every way at a time when Drizzy is more busy recycling his drawer funds or playing alone on the big screen of his basketball court.
If TikTok has already seized on the “Mustaaaaaaaaard” screamed on a “tv off” which elevates Dijon McFarlane to the same level of sonic obliteration as the Dr. Dre of 2001ce GNX out of nowhere avoids the pitfall of the concept getting too dangerously close to a Not like us : the album unworthy of the usual rigor of its progenitor. And even though this record seems like a big decompression hit, Kendrick Lamar is too smart to fall into that trap. Of course he does not forget that the beef from last summer is probably his biggest moment since the “DNA” / “HUMBLE” sequence orchestrated by Mike WiLL Made-Itand that he alone is capable of coming up with this 'something else' to which we all aspire in a somewhat amorphous US rap. SO GNX offers variety in the productions (the synthesis task of the discreet Subwave is colossal), surprises in the guest list (070 Shake would have been in its place on “wacced out murals” but it brings us an unknown mariachi singer), and enough nice side steps to confirm that if this new album comes to surf on the Olympic form of Mr. Lamar in 2024, it will not This is nothing like an opportunistic or poorly thought out project. And above all, if GNX does not come to revolutionize the music of the Californian, it is crossed by this legendary inspiration from elsewhere that we find in the daron Nas since he was friends with Hit-Boy. In other words, the packaging is as impeccable as the execution but above all there is a pleasure dimension that is obvious.
Pleasure, the word is out: for his first post-TDEKendrick Lamar embodies the breakup in a GNX feverish, perfect negative of the dense and labyrinthine albums that preceded it. Sort of DAMN. which would have evacuated its lengths, this sixth album is a vibrant tribute to the heralds of the West Coast (“Reincarnated”, Tupac much?) and the Californian lifestyle (the bass of “dodger blue” was designed for a lowrider ride, that's for sure). Uninhibited and often touching (notably the two titles with SZA), he recalls how much the beef with Aubrey Graham or his proximity to his cousin Baby no liberated an artist who above all lived his genius in complex pieces depicting his many torments. By reversing the balance of power, by putting the form just before the substance, GNX does not disappoint. It's quite the opposite: Kendrick Lamar has never been so close to achieving unanimous approval. As the other said: what a time to be alive. Especially since this may not be the end of the story yet.
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Music
