Kendrick Lamar likes to compare himself to Tupac Shakur. But Tupac wasn\u2019t from Los Angeles and didn\u2019t know his father growing up. By the time Tupac was 23, he had already been shot multiple times and begun serving a prison sentence. Lamar, on the other hand, was born and raised in Compton. His parents are still married. He\u2019s 23, and so far he has dodged the almost inescapable bullets that dart through what he calls his \u201cmad city.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even so, Lamar seems to share Tupac\u2019s soul; better still, he seems an evolution of it. The line between \u201cPac the Playboy\u201d and \u201cTupac the Tortured Poet\u201d was drawn with an indelible marker, but the sides of Lamar\u2019s personality bleed into one another. The chorus of \u201cP&P\u201d (an ode to \u201cPussy and Patron\u201d punctuated by a girl pouting, \u201cHey, what\u2019s up, daddy\u201d), for example, is cookie-cutter braggadocio. Its first verse, however, stacks a precarious tower of thoughts almost tipped over into rage by an incident at a gas station \u2014 and leaves him searching through his phone for a comfort he admits is temporary.<\/p>\n
Candid vulnerability and a voice that sounds as though he\u2019s just inhaled great mouthfuls of smoke (even though he abstains from weed) are why Lamar is on everybody\u2019s lips. Last November, Dr. Dre (who was led to Lamar by Eminem\u2019s manager) said out of the blue on Power 106\u2032s popular morning show Big Boy\u2019s Neighborhood that he wanted to work with the rapper.<\/p>\n
By now, Lamar has not only worked with Snoop Dogg and Dre, he was snapped, paparazzi-style, sitting courtside at a Lakers game with the legendary producer. His buzz has ratcheted to such a roar that he\u2019s considered a shoo-in for XXL magazine\u2019s \u201cFreshman 2011\u2033 cover.<\/p>\n
But he doesn\u2019t want to hear that he\u2019s the next in line to wear hip-hop\u2019s crown. No wonder, considering that honor can be as sturdy as the ones you can get from a box at Burger King. Lamar says he still wants to be making albums when he\u2019s 45.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe hardest thing for me to do is to get you to know me within 16 bars,\u201d the rapper says on a track from last fall\u2019s O(verly) D(edicated), \u201cAverage Joe,\u201d in which he relates a story of being shot at by a gang, even though he\u2019s not affiliated. The problem isn\u2019t that Kendrick Lamar can\u2019t reveal himself. It\u2019s that there\u2019s too much he wants to reveal. His thoughts tumble furiously; words swarm so frantically that in one song he eventually chokes on them.<\/p>\n
\u201cGoin\u2019 crazy in your head is wanting to say so much, but you can\u2019t. I think it comes from my struggling relationship with God \u2014 my whole life, I go to sleep every night and just think about God,\u201d he says, faltering for a moment. \u201cIs that a trip? That\u2019s me trying to find myself in a relationship with Him. Righteous, but at the same time being so [caught up] in the vanities of the world \u2026 it messes me up inside.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lamar\u2019s parents moved from Chicago to Compton in 1984 with all of $500 in their pockets. \u201cMy mom\u2019s one of 13 siblings, and they all got six kids, and till I was 13 everybody was in Compton,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m 6 years old, seein\u2019 my uncles playing with shotguns, sellin\u2019 dope in front of the apartment. My moms and pops never said nothing, \u2019cause they were young and living wild, too. I got about 15 stories like \u2018Average Joe.\u2019\u2009\u201d<\/p>\n
In school, Lamar was a quiet, observant kid who made good grades. \u201cThis is always in my head: There was a math question that I knew the answer to, but I was so scared to say it. Then this little chick said the answer and it was the right answer, my answer. That bothers me still to this day, bein\u2019 scared of failure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maybe the memory of that missed opportunity is what landed 16-year-old Lamar in front of the \u201cdude to get your music to\u201d in Compton, DudeDawg, chief financial officer of TopDawg Entertainment. \u201cHe threw me in the booth. I freestyled for, like, an hour. He said I got raw talent.\u201d He\u2019s been with the company, along with one of last year\u2019s XXL Freshmen, Jay Rock, ever since.<\/p>\n
When Kendrick Lamar was growing up, his father used to cheat while playing basketball with him. A few days ago, standing in the middle of a court in a park not far from a sign welcoming you to Compton, Lamar looked up at a hoop and shrugged. \u201cHe wanted me to know that was what was gonna happen in life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lamar ends sentences with smiles. He\u2019s friendly and funny, offering to share the lunch he eventually lets go cold and teasing that he wants to switch interview roles. Yet there are a few instances when he retreats, suddenly looking harder, older.<\/p>\n
At the park, he\u2019s laughing as he bounces onto the basketball court. He calls a friend who lives a couple of houses down to bring over a ball.<\/p>\n
But shortly thereafter, sitting on the back of a bench, he stares up at a rare overcast sky. \u201cI wish it was like this every day. Not raining, \u2019cause I hate the rain, but cloudy like this,\u201d he says. The slight gloom seems to have seeped into his mood; the shift is abrupt and barely perceptible, but definite.<\/p>\n
When Tupac pleaded, \u201cPeace,\u201d he sounded like he\u2019d already lost hope. Lamar struggles, too. But when he interjects that same refrain between strings of gang names in \u201cCompton State of Mind,\u201d he first sounds insistent, then imperative.<\/p>\n
These Compton streets was built not to win \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Kendrick Lamar Biography: Kendrick Lamar likes to compare himself to Tupac Shakur. But Tupac wasn\u2019t from Los Angeles and didn\u2019t know his father growing up. By the time Tupac was 23, he had already been shot multiple times and begun serving a prison sentence. Lamar, on the other hand, was born and raised in Compton. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2266,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,7,6259],"tags":[260,4102],"class_list":["post-2265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","category-urban-hip-hop-rap-rnb-trap","category-west-coast","tag-kendrick-lamar","tag-tde"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n