Well, the internet exploded for all the right reasons yesterday, with the early release of Kendrick Lamar’s new album To Pimp A Butterfly. Whether it was released accidentally or on purpose we’ll probably never know for sure, but I can definitely say that it is very brilliant. Complex, uncomfortable, angry and brilliant. I have so far listened to the whole thing twice over and am not yet in a position to detail a full review or opinion, so watch this this space over the next couple days.
Anyway, one of the first things we all noticed about the album (other than the immense focus on race) was the phenomenal list of featured guests, producers and so on. Kicking things into gear is the very first track, Wesley’s Theory, produced by Flying Lotus, featuring Thundercat and the legendary George Clinton. Snoop Dogg, Pharrell Williams, The Isley Brothers and Sufjan Stevens are also among the list of producers, writers, features and samples involved.
We’ve already seen what FLyLo and Kendrick can do together. K-dot featured on Never Catch Me, off the brilliant 2014 album You’re Dead! and it’s clear that they had a lot more up their sleeves… Now, we’re not normally a website keen on posting about tweets, but when it’s an extended series by Flying Lotus talking about his work with Kendrick, we’ll make an exception. I’ll let his words do the talking:
The album seems to have been removed off iTunes, but for now you can stream the whole album off Spotify: