Kendrick Lamar is in a remarkable position – as he himself put it on his Black Hippy collective’s take on Rocko’s hit “UOENO”, “I fucked up the rap game and you ain’t even know it.” And he really has. He’s coming off of the best hip-hop debut album since Blu’s Below the Heavens in 2007, 2012’s good kid, m.A.A.d city, which was the most critically acclaimed hip-hop album in years and, you know, happened to also go platinum. And he’s showing no signs of slowing up. After releasing some of the best verses of the year - a show-stealing turn on Tech N9ne’s “Fragile”, his aforementioned verse on “UOENO”, and his last verse on the remix to “Bitch Don’t Kill My Vibe”, where he out-raps the greatest rapper ever, Jay-Z – now he’s back for more on “Control,” outshining Big Sean (and Jay Electronica) on his own song.
It’s been the music story of the week, if not month, but here’s a quick summary of what happened – Kendrick came, Kendrick saw, Kendrick conquered. After spending two minutes weaving together his usual lyrical magic (declaring himself the King of New York and King of the Coast at one point), he proceeded to call out several rappers he sees as his competition. But it’s a little more subtle than that. Here’s the part in question:
I heard the barbershops spittin’ great debates all the time
Bout who’s the best MC? Kendrick, Jigga and Nas
Eminem, Andre 3000, the rest of y'all
New ni**as just new ni**as, don’t get involved
And I ain’t rockin no more designer shit
White T’s and Nike Cortez, this is red Corvettes anonymous
I’m usually homeboys with the same ni**as I’m rhymin’ wit
But this is hip-hop and them ni**as should know what time it is
And that goes for Jermaine Cole, Big KRIT, Wale
Pusha T, Meek Mill, A$AP Rocky, Drake
Big Sean, Jay Electron’, Tyler, Mac Miller
I got love for you all but I’m tryna murder you ni**as
Tryna make sure your core fans never heard of you ni**as
They don’t wanna hear not one more noun or verb from you ni**as
What is competition? I’m tryna raise the bar high
Needless to say, hip-hop exploded overnight. Sure, Kendrick might be one of the biggest rising stars in hip-hop, but it’s been a while since a major rapper has so directly called out so many of his competitors. Hip-hop beef has been reduced to Drake declaring “every song sounds like Drake featuring Drake” while Game and Shyne tweet diss tracks at each other. Kendrick’s taking the name-drop to a level hip-hop buried away years ago.
What’s most impressive about “Control”, though, isn’t Kendrick’s gall. It’s that he structured his name-drops in such a casual, respectful way, that any serious diss back just comes off as an overreaction. Kendrick starts off by upping the legends and paying them their dues, casually inserting his name among the top, before calling out eleven high-profile “new-school” rappers. But that’s not the best part – the best part is that he doesn’t actually ever diss them. It’s respectful, telling them, “I love y’all, but when it comes to hip-hop, I’m not fucking around.” It’s gentlemanly, genuine, and somewhat imperious. It’s clever. The only real diss (and the one that legions of irrelevant rappers have latched onto) comes when Kendrick declares himself the King of New York, a city that he has virtually no ties to.
Now, this isn’t just any diss verse – this has the potential to be one of the most important verses of modern hip-hop. The best responses aren’t going to be the diss tracks shot back his way, even if a couple (shouts to Joell Ortiz and Papoose) are pretty damn decent. They’re going to come in the form of classic albums and massive sales, if his rivals really are going to step up to the plate. Kendrick’s remarks should serve as catalysts more than goads. The indicators of this verse’s magnitude ultimately won’t be the number of diss tracks recorded by angry New York emcees, it’ll be the quality of Drake’s album, of Pusha’s album, of Jay Electronica’s fabled Act II. For all the elaborate lyrical insults leveled at Kendrick in the last week, the best response came from Pusha T, who tweeted, “I hear u loud and clear my ni**a… @kendricklamar”. Let’s hope for hip-hop’s sake that the rest of Kendrick’s competition have taken his remarks equally to heart.