Kendrick Lamar
To Pimp A Butterfly 2LP vinyl

Lamar’s new album, To Pimp a Butterfly, doesn’t explicitly bill itself as a movie like good kid, m.A.A.d city did, but the network of interlocking dramas explored here feels filmic nonetheless, and a variety of characters appear across the album’s expanse. The opener, "Wesley’s Theory", turns the downfall of action-star-turned-convicted-tax-dodger Wesley Snipes into a kind of Faustian parable. Snoop drops by on "Institutionalized"; Dre himself phones in on "Wesley". The mood is wry, theatrical, chaotic, ironic, and mournful, often all at once: On "For Free? (Interlude)" an impatient woman ticks off a laundry list of material demands before Kendrick snaps back that "This dick ain’t free!" and thunders through a history of black oppression, spoken-word style, as if to say, "This money you crave, it’s blood money." The album is dotted with surreal grace notes, like a parable: God appears in the guise of a homeless man in "How Much a Dollar Cost", and closer "Mortal Man" ends on a lengthy, unnerving fever-dream interview with the ghost of 2Pac. 

The music, meanwhile, follows a long line of genre-busting freakouts  (The Roots’ Phrenology, Common’s, Electric Circus, Q-Tip’s Kamaal the Abstract, Andre 3000’s The Love Below) in kicking at the confines of rap music presentation. There’s half a jazz band present at all times; pianist Robert Glasper, producer/sax player Terrace Martin and bass wizard Thundercat give Butterfly a loose, fluid undertow every bit as tempestuous and unpredictable as the army of flows at Kendrick’s disposal. The rapper’s branching out, too, exploding into spastic slam poetry on "For Free?", switching from shouty gymnastics to drunken sobs on "u" and even effecting the lilt of a caring mother on "You Ain’t Gotta Lie (Momma Said)". It turns out Kendrick’s new direction was every direction at once.

NEW / Released in 2015 / Reissue

Tracklist:

A1 Wesley's Theory

A2 For Free? (Interlude)

A3 King Kunta

A4 Institutionalized

A5 These Walls

B1 U

B2 Alright

B3 For Sale? (Interlude)

B4 Momma

C1 Hood Politics

C2 How Much A Dollar Cost

C3 Complexion (A Zulu Love)

C4 The Blacker The Berry

D1 You Aint Gotta Lie (Momma Said)

D2 I

D3 Mortal Man