From Struggle to Success: Kendrick Lamar's 'good kid, m.A.A.d city'.

KENDRICK LAMAR: GOOD KID, M.A.A.D. CITY

SCORE: 92/100

More than a simple album, good kid, m.A.A.d city is a coming-of-age story formatted as a companion to Kendrick Lamar's real life growing up in the slums of Compton, being a good kid surrounded by drugs and crime and succumbing to the trials and struggles that came along with his upbringing. 

The album follows a concept built on youth and peer pressure, growing up in the hood and seeing the horrors that come with it, with Compton being one of the most dangerous places in the world for black teens in the 80's and 90's - and even further into now. Kendrick had very much been shaped by his upbringing and where he was raised, and every experience is reflected in each verse within this album, painting potent pictures and using symbolic lyricism to make Kendrick one of the most historically incredible rappers of a generation. 

Kendrick details going down a dark path of rebellious crime and heinous acts due to the environment he is stuck in, being around negative role-models and creating harm for others to fit in and have a life like everyone else in a dog-eat-dog world. It's an album that is labeled as a "short film" on its cover, and there's no wonder as to why this is - Kendrick's artistry is immediately apparent, and entirely striking. 

The album is incredibly, deeply real. From the dialogue and pauses to the harshest moments, every single thing in this dark Compton story is realer than you might think. 

good kid, m.A.A.d city acts as Kendrick's first label release after his debut albums and mixtapes that came prior, with his work getting him signed to Interscope and Aftermath (as well still being with Top Dawg) in 2012 - with this album coming within later portion of the same year. The album is a dramatic portrait of the gang lifestyle and influence that riddled Compton, and Kendrick was living it firsthand; these aren't just stories, they're what his real life consisted of. 

The style of good kid, m.A.A.d city lyrically is highly consciously political and aware of crime and gang life - no sugarcoats, just real, raw rhymes backed by some of the best hip-hop producers in the industry, with artists like Dr. Dre and Pharrell Williams helping to elevate Kendrick's rapping and sound within the album. Lamar enlisted many features throughout the mid-late halves of the album, from classic rappers like MC Eiht and his peer at the time, Drake - before their more recent falling out. 

Not only is the album an artistic marathon with songs and hits great enough to give a listener whiplash - it was a major commercial hit for Kendrick, brining him up to superstardom and making him one of the most iconic rappers of the 2010's; the album was fresh - unique and laced with old-school flows and influences in a more "modern" format, and the impact was immediately massive and completely infectious at every turn.

The production on good kid, m.A.A.d city is absolutely striking. Each beat is delicately and immaculately crafted to absolute perfection, and it's impossible to find a single flaw in the production whatsoever. It's west-coast hip-hop at it's absolute best, and this is an album that is constantly sharp and at its best points, it's as definitive and consistent as it gets, and the massive amount of variety on an album like this is something that is hard to come by. 

He had gotten out of his roots, but that influence still remained in his blood and stuck with him, with this album being a big departure from his debut LP to go back to his "Compton roots". He had confirmed this distinction and change from his first album while being interviewed for XXL magazine, with his comments providing insight into the inspiration that shaped him and this album - it's a complete return to his roots, and it shows exactly where he started and ended up. "I couldn't tell you what type of sound or where I [will] be in the next five years as far as music... Back to the neighborhood and [going] back in that same space where we used to be, got [me] inspired. So this album won't sound like Section.80." [Lamar for XXL, excerpt from Wikipedia]

"The kid that's trying to escape that influence, trying his best to escape that influence, has always been pulled back in because of circumstances that be." [Lamar for HiphopDX, excerpt from Wikipedia] 

Despite some changes in plans for the album and the short amount of time from his signing to Aftermath/Interscope, the album came out near-perfect, it's a perfect showcase of Lamar's life, and it ends off right where he began. 

Out of any rapper, Kendrick had the most right in the world to talk about life surrounded by gangs - and nothing he said was fake, everything was a form of reality that hip-hop hadn't seen since 2Pac. His influences are clear and controlled, and he reigns in his influences and ancestry in a way that no other artist could do in such a striking manner. 

Lamar's father was a former gang member and hustler, and his mother was a hairdresser - with both of them being from South Side Chicago and relocating to Compton when they were teenagers, which is where Kendrick ended up being born. For seven years of his life, Lamar was an only-child, and he was described as being a loner by his mother, Paula. Throughout his young life, he had experienced having to live in low-income housing, poverty, and homelessness. Him and his family relied heavily on food stamps to survive, and Kendrick often had to go without eating due to the poverty they faced. Despite his rough childhood, he recalls having positive memories of sneaking into his parents house parties - where his interest in hip-hop began, and what would eventually spark his career slowly. No one knew what he would become and how he would get himself out of poverty and struggle. 

Kendrick grew up tough, being introduced to violence in Compton when he was only five years old, witnessing a murder while he sat outside of his apartment. That moment in time changed his life forever, and it changed his perspective - moments like these were real, and he stated that "It let me know that this is not only something that I'm looking at, but it's something that maybe I have to get used to." [Lamar for NPR, excerpt from Wikipedia]. He had witnessed his second murder by the time he was only eight - but the school system helped him as best as it could for some of his younger years. He was noted as an excellent student, being a great listener and having an exceptionally advanced vocabulary when he was only in the first grade - he was careful, concentrated, and focused; these aspects would later help to shape his career as a rapper, which he began to have interest in pursuing after he had heard a recording of his voice. 

He fell in love with the craft of songwriting after studying linguistics more in his school curriculum, poetry was his beginning into writing rhymes in the seventh grade - a writing form that was brought into his school after his teacher had taken notice towards ongoing racial struggles between students. This led him to learning symbolism, rhymes, and metaphors amongst other writing forms that helped him to thrive as a songwriter - this young start made his songwriting what it is today, and his beginnings nearly mirror those of 2Pac when he was starting out; just with more grit. 

That same teacher helped him to improve his prose and structure, making his writing less profane and helping him to find the balance that he has kept throughout his career - it's a mix of what he was taught and what he has always felt, and writing helped him to deal with the trauma and depression he faced throughout his life and the hardships he had faced within it. 

As he got older into his teenage years, things took a change when he was forced to attend summer school, leading to him becoming heavily involved with gangs and the crime they were involved in. Despite his attempts to avoid this, it was inevitable, and he suffered from many health scares, losses, and encounters with the local police. 

It wasn't until an intervention that was arranged by his father that he finally changed, Lamar had converted to Christianity and got baptized as a sixteen year old after the passing of his friend, and he had finally started to break the chains that held him down. He started to break the chain that so many poor black youth and adults suffer from in America, and it takes a soldier to get yourself out of something so severe. 

"You can put all your feelings down on a sheet of paper, and they'd make sense to you. I liked that." [Lamar for Rolling Stone, excerpt from Wikipedia]

What makes good kid, m.A.A.d city so impressive is how full of depth it is musically. Some of the songs are endlessly memorable, and the sheer amount of iconic tracks and material within the album is something no other rapper could pull off quite like this. Kendrick's flows are absolutely striking, and his rapping skills are absolute masterclass. Lyrically, Kendrick reigns in his life and makes a name for himself on the very things that haunted him throughout his childhood and teenage years, and it led him to where he is now. The variety in the songs, from slower, more introspective songs, songs about relationships, and hardcore songs about crime and gangs - good kid, m.A.A.d city does everything all at once and hits every mark harder than the last. 

It's an album that takes risks, something full of ambition. It isn't just a collection of songs, it's a stream of conscience, it's Kendrick getting everything out of his system and onto the pages. There are few albums that are so open and honest, and the honesty that Kendrick paints is something that any artist could learn from. There are very few rappers that could keep consistency for a twelve-minute song, but Kendrick does it all within this album, and it's one of the most impressively gritty and sorrow-filled victory laps any celebrity has ever taken - yet he has always stayed humble and good throughout it all. 

There's something so rare and hard to pinpoint about this album - it feels like listening to a collection of stories, it feels like listening to someone get out everything they have ever experienced all at once, and it only took an hour and eight minutes for Kendrick to do so; and yet it isn't even quite his own story. It's impressive to think that he was able to make a concept album that isn't fiction, it's fact. This isn't just another concept album, it's his life story and hardships in song. He was still young enough to be able to lament these small moments of adolescence on each track, and the album uses vivid details to create an album full of massive, rare depth. 

Kendrick himself is a rare gem in the music industry. Despite everything he had gone through and all of the horrors he had gotten used to, he remained good. He wrote to cope, he made songs to vent, and he got his frustrations with the city he grew up in out through verses. He had fallen to peer pressure and grown up in the wrong crowd; but he broke that cycle and got himself out of it all, helping others in the process and using his celebrity status to quietly help people - not for praise, but out of the good of his heart and the understanding in his soul. 

Despite this album seeming impossible to beat, Kendrick managed to come out of this album even better than when he was in it, and the doors he opened with this album were something nobody could have predicted. With an incredible amount of talent and a great team behind him, he managed to do it all and accomplish everything every rapper has ever dreamt of - he used his struggle and turned it into immaculate success, and there will never be another rapper like Kendrick Lamar in this world.