Dissect - MX1E2 - "Nosetalgia" by Pusha T & Kendrick Lamar

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

Our "Lyrical Masters" mixtape continues with a line-by-line analysis of Pusha T's 2013 track "Nosetalgia" featuring Kendrick Lamar. For clues on what artist and song we're dissecting next week, follow @dissectpodcast on Instagram. Host, writer: Cole Cuchna Producer: Justin Sayles Audio Editing: Kevin Pooler Theme Music: Birocratic Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So usually these episodes begin with a hook, some backstory about the song that's going to be dissected, a few compelling facts that grab your attention and get you interested enough to stick around after the ad break. And I had one of those intros written for Pusha T and Kendrick Lamar's nostalgia. I talked about how back in 2013 both artists were still hungry to prove themselves, how Push was cementing himself as a solo artist after his duo clips went on hiatus, how Kendrick was coming off 2012's Good Kid Mad City and chasing the best rapper alive heavyweight belt. But I ended up scrapping that intro, because after analyzing every reference, entendre, and punchline and nostalgia, I can't help but to begin this episode by simply saying

that I now believe nostalgia is one of the best rap songs of all time, is one of the best songs across all genres of the past decade, and contains one of the single greatest lyrical moments in music history. And I hope by the end of this episode, you'll understand why. From Spotify, this is Dissect, long-form musical analysis broken into short digestible episodes. For the second track in our lyrical master's mixtape, we're dissecting Pusha T's 2013 track Nostalgia, featuring Kendrick Lamar. I'm your host, Cole Kushner. Nostalgia appears on Pusha T's debut solo album, 2013's My Name is My Name, a title that references a scene from HBO's The Wire.

Let him no model step to any motherfucker, Omar, Barksdale, whoever. My name is my name. A microcosm of America's so-called War on Drugs. The Wire portrays the Baltimore drug scene from two different perspectives, the drug dealers and law enforcement. Similarly, nostalgia also portrays the war on drugs from two different perspectives, the drug dealer and the drug users. In verse one, Pusha T details his time as a dealer in the streets of Virginia, while verse two finds Kendrick Lamar describing the drug users and his family he witnessed as a child in Compton, California. Regarding the track's concept, Push told hip-hop DX, quote, I speak about the harsh realities of street life, but there's a lot of glitz and glamour that comes along with it. If you just look at it at

face value, you might think it sounds a bit like he's glorifying street life, but when you get tuned into the record, you realize that you get both sides of it. We gave two perspectives on the song. Kendrick was looking from the inside of his home and how his family's crusade through the drug epidemic affected him. I was giving you the junior high high school start, showing you what it was and where I was at, unquote. This focus on America's crack epidemic through the eyes of two young boys is reflected in the track's title, Nostalgia, a hybrid of the word nose, an allusion to snorting cocaine and nostalgia, the sentimental longing or memory of the past. The track begins establishing its sample-based instrumental, produced by Knott's and Kanye West.

The main sample used for this beat comes from the opening moments of Bobby Blan's 1973 song, I Don't Want to Be Right. The opening guitar string bend is pitched up and sped up to create this loop. While this loop is the song's musical centerpiece, bass is added to provide some low end and sparse percussion elements add some rhythmic interest. are selling Johnson and Johnson I started out as a baby face monster No wonder is diaper rash on my conscience

My teeth and ring was numb by that nonsense Push begins his verse immediately establishing The song's central theme, rapping 20 plus years of selling Johnson and Johnson In the same way the title, Nostalgia bonds drugs with childhood memories Push cleverly references baby powder made by Johnson and Johnson to evoke youth while doubling as an illusion

to powder cocaine, which resembles white baby powder. Baby powder is also a talcum-based product, and talcum powder can be used as a cutting agent when making crack cocaine. About this opening line, Push said, quote, I'm talking about my time being in the streets, starting in the seventh grade. This gives us context around his 20 plus years of selling dope. At the time of writing nostalgia in 2013, Push was 36 years old. If he began selling drugs at age 13 and never stopped, that would put him at 23 or 20 plus years of selling. At first, this might seem like a fabrication of the length of time Push sold drugs, but that would be underestimating the complexity of his bars, because Push is almost

certainly alluding to the fact that he now sells a different kind of dope, dope rhymes. By associating cocaine with Johnson and Johnson, Push might also be drawing a parallel to street drug dealers and pharmaceutical corporations. Both industries are driven by profit, prioritizing their own bottom line over their consumers. In other words, corporate America is a drug dealer too. Push continues his verse, I started out as a baby-faced monster, no wonder there's diaper rash on my conscience. Both baby-faced and diaper rash continue the motif of infancy and youth being juxtaposed with the darker images of a monster and a damaged psyche. The progression from starting out a baby-faced monster or drug dealer, and then relating that to his now inflamed conscious, alludes to remorse he now feels about selling drugs that harmed his community.

On his 2011 song Changing of the Guards, Push expressed this kind of remorse much more transparently. God in heaven knows what I feel inside Responsible for all this inner city genocide Push here raps God in heaven knows what I feel inside Responsible for all this inner city genocide These kinds of remorseful sentiments Call back to Push's comments about listeners

Confusing his raps as exclusively glorifying street life Backing up his claim that he offers both sides of it The bravado of the hustler But also the guilt over the harm his product's cause In nostalgia, Pusha contextualizes this remorseful sentiment with the following line, my teething ring was numb by that nonsense. Continuing the infancy motif, he describes himself as a baby gnawing on a teething on a teething ring laced with cocaine, playing on the fact that cocaine is a topical anesthetic. But the line also implies his numbness to his environment as a child

and the communal consequences of his teenage drug dealing. In reference to this line, Push said, quote, everything that I was around, my influences and my peers, everything that I had seen, from house to outside the house family, I was numb. At a young age, you don't even have that feeling of like, oh, this is super wrong or that you're hurting people. I would think that everybody is like that at 13 years old. My teething ring was numb by that nonsense. Jim star, razor and a dinner plate.

Armand hammer and a mason jar, that's my dinner day. Then crack the window in the kitchen, let it ventilate. Because I let it sizzle on the stove like a minute steak. Nigra, I was crack in the school zone. Two beeples on me start a jacket. Two-tone. Four lockers, four different bitches got their mule on. Black Ferris Bueller cutting school with his juice on. Couldn't do wrong with a chest full of chains and an arm full of watches. The vivid imagery of Push's childhood continues, Gemstar, Razor, and a dinner plate, Armandhammer and a Mason jar. That's my dinner date.

Here Push is siding some of the fundamental tools used to convert cocaine into crack. The first step is heating powder cocaine, water, and baking soda, hence the reference to Armandhammer brand baking soda. This results in freebase cocaine, which is often transferred from a spoon onto a ceramic plate, explaining Push's dinner plate reference. At this point, a non-cerated knife is run back and forth over the freebase, converting it from an oily, yellowish gold clump into a white rock. Then one uses a sharp razor blade to scrape up the white freebase into a pile, which explains Push's reference to a Gem Blue Star brand razor blade.

Next, the freebase pile is poured into a drinking glass or mason jar with fresh cold water and stirred to dissolve impurities, hence the Mason jar nod. Given all the infant and childhood references that come before these two lines, Push is playing with the idea that these drug-making tools were his toys growing up as a baby-faced monster. At the same time, by saying, That's My Dinner Date, Push concocks an image of himself as a teenager cooking crack at the dinner table rather than taking a girl out on a dinner date. Either that, or he's playing with the idea that selling drugs was how he ate, how he made his

money. He continues the analogy, then crack the window in the kitchen, let it ventilate because I let it sizzle on the stove like a minute steak. First we notice the clever wordplay in using crack to refer to opening a window while cooking crack, presumably to air out the potent fumes accumulated during the process. Cooking a minute steak on the stove is used as a simile for cooking crack on the stove. As contrary to what its name implies, crack does not crackle when cooking, it sizzles. Push also said he specifically used this reference because he used to eat cheap Murray's box

steaks as an after-school snack, which maintains the nostalgia motif. Push continues, I was crack in the school zone, two beepers-a-me, starter jacket that was two-toned. This describes push in junior high in high school, once again playing with the word crack, this time to refer to himself as cool while also implying that he was literally selling crack in a school zone, which carries with it heavier penalties if caught. As a drug dealer walking the halls of a high school, there's also the possibility he's calling himself a crack or blemish in the system. He then makes a reference to the nostalgia-rich starter brand sports jackets that were extremely trendy in the early 90s. Specifically, Push wore a New York giant starter jacket, which he made it a point to

clarify on Genius.com. The reference to beepers or pagers continues the 90s era nostalgia, and having multiple beepers was common for drug dealers at this time. In fact, in 1986, an LA district attorney said, quote, beepers are the single most common tool of the drug trade, as it allowed drug dealers to stay mobile using public telephones, keeping them a step ahead of police or rivals who might be hunting them. We also recognize Push says two twos in this line, two beepers and a two-tone jacket. Push plays with the sum of these twos in the next line, wrapping, four lockers, four different bitches got their mule on. Black Ferris Bueller cutting school with his jewels on. Couldn't do wrong with a chest full of chains and an armful of watches. We get the feeling Push felt invincible

walking the hallways of his high school, flaunting excessive amounts of jewelry bought with drug money. The reference to 1986's Ferris Bueller's Day Off, adds to the descriptive late 80s, early 90s time capsule while also playing with the fact that the movie centers on its main character skipping school for a day, which pushed it to sell drugs. It used to be times where I would lie to my parents and be like, yo, I got detention after school. And I really had detention. And really going, you know, to the next neighborhood and doing my thing. Oh, man, I'm probably 9th grade 15.

But this is, you know, this is just where I was at. And therefore I wouldn't go back home from school. I would go straight from school, which means I had to come to school, loaded. You know what I'm saying? Loaded and ready to do whatever I got to do. For example, if my, you know, fourth period was in Brown Hall, but my locker was in the Green Hall. I probably had a locker in Brown Hall just for when I came over that way,

hit the locker, get that book out, so I'm got to keep lugging. But, you know, in a street sense, four different lockers was, you know, you would keep and stash everything, so I wouldn't be walking around all day with it. What I sell for pain in the hood, I'm a doctor. Chevalgo, tried to fight the urge like Ivan. Drago. If he dies, he dies, like dough boy the tray.

If he rides, he rides, throwing punches in his room. If he cries, he cries. We don't drink away the pain. When a nigga die, we add a link to the chain. And scribe a nigger name in your flesh. We playing on a higher game of chess. Once you delegate his bills, we're gonna fuck his bitch the best. A million megapixels

Of the... Push continues, What I sell for pain in the hood, I'm a doctor. He once again offers a dualistic premise here. On one hand, Push naming himself the esteemed title of doctor is a boast about his drug dealing.

But rather than dealing prescription drugs like an actual doctor, he's dealing street drugs. On the other hand, Push is acknowledging the suffering in drug and poverty-ridden neighborhoods where cheap street drugs like crack cocaine offer attempting escape.

He then starts the next line saying, Zavago, which combined with the previous line, creates Dr. Zavago, referring to the 1965 hit film by the same name. Dr. Savago was both a poet and a physician that treated frontline soldiers in World War I. Like Savago, Push is a poet and a doctor, except his poetry is rap, and he treats those suffering on the front line of the streets. In this way, Push is continuing the 20-plus years of selling motif of the opening line, as he once treated his patients with dope or drugs, and now he treats them with his dope poetry, his raps. But the reference

cuts even deeper when we realize that the film Dr. Zabago is infamously long, with the running time of over three hours. It's for this reason that in the film True Romance, written by Quentin Tarantino, an incredibly large stash of cocaine is referred to by the codename Dr. Sabago. And so do you realize what Pushjust did here? He found a single reference, Dr. Sabago, that represents his wrapping, his hood doctor status, and his association with cocaine. The kicker is that true romance was released in 1993, continuing the mid-80s, early 90s nostalgia motif. Also, Dr. Zavago is a Soviet-Russian character, which links to the next line, tried to fight the urge like Ivan Drago, who was a Soviet-Russian boxer portrayed in the film

Rocky 4 from 1985, again continuing the nostalgia motif. Push then saying, if he dies, he dies, is a direct quote of Ivan Drago after he brutally defeats Apollo Creed in a match, resulting in Apollo's death. If he dies, he dies. Push embodies this remorseless attitude when dealing in the streets, feigning indifference to the harm his drug's cause. He then continues by linking the phrasing, If He Dies He Dies, to another movie reference rapping, like Do Boy to Trey, if he rides, he rides. This cites yet another early 90s movie, Boys in the Hood. Specifically, it refers to a scene in which the characters Doe Boy and

Trey are riding in a car on their way to avenge their brother Ricky's murder. But Trey backs out at the last minute, asking to be let out of the car, signaling his discomfort with truly living the street life. Meanwhile, Doe Boy goes on to murder Ricky's killer, and as a result, Doe Boy is murdered two weeks later while Trey goes on to college. The next line, throwing punches in his room, if he cries, he cries, extends the boys in the hood reference. This time it cites the scene in which Trey is harassed by a police officer, who holds a gun to Trey's neck while tears fall from Trey's eyes. He then goes to his girlfriend's house and shadow boxes, or his push says, throws punches in the room, while talking about what he would have done to the

police officer. He then breaks down crying when he realized he he's powerless against the police. Like nostalgia as a whole, these scenes from Boys in the Hood offer two contrasting perspectives on street life. Doboy embraces the life to the fullest, while Trey, having the benefit of a father figure, finds a way out. And pushes portrayal of his young drug-dealing persona, he likens himself to Do-Boy,

someone who is loyal to the game and follows the codes of the street, while he almost mocks Trey in the tears he cries. But anyone who's seen boys in the hood understands that, in the end, Doboy dies tragically young, an all too common fate for those entrapped in street life. And Trey's character offers a more transparent view of the pain, stress, and anxiety endured by those living this life, even when survival demands that one doesn't always show their emotions. This idea gets us into the next few lines, We Don't Drink Away the Pain,

when an N-word die, we add a link to the chain, inscribe a N-word name in your flesh. The phrase, We Don't Drink Away the Pain is likely a reference to the Mobb Deep song, Drink Away the Pain. Drink away the pain. I think the whole world's going insane. I feel my mind up with a girl and drink away the pain. Drink away the pain was released in 1995, adding to the growing list of 80s and 90s references. Push would have been a senior in high school when the song dropped, which aligns with his time as a dealer. But beyond this reference, it appears these lines mirror doughboy's mindset, as Push doesn't look to drown his sorrows with alcohol when someone dies.

Rather he adds a link to his chain or gets a tattoo in honor of them, as the the streets demand that you stay on point and keep moving. While at first we might assume inscribing someone's name in your flesh is referring to a tattoo, the wording of the line has us suspecting that he might mean something else, as he specifically says, we add a link to the chain and inscribe an inward name on your flesh. This could be implying a revenge murder, with the name of the person he murdered inscribed in his flesh to indicate the reason he was killed. This interpretation would make sense given the plot of Boys in the Hood, which is of course referenced just before these lines. Push closes

out this rhyme scheme with, we playing on a higher game of chess, once you delegate his bills, who go and fuck his bitch the best. He uses a chess analogy to describe how the order of affairs are strategically adjusted after the death of someone in the operation, like a chess piece that gets eliminated off the board. Given Push's aforementioned reference to HBO's The Wire for his album title, this chess analogy is likely a nod to one of the show's more well-known scenes that compares street life with a game of chess. See this? It's the king pen. All right? And he's the man.

You get the other dude's king, you got the game. You're trying to get your king too, so you got protected. You see this? This the queen. She's smart, she fares. She moved any way she won, as far as she won. And she is the go-get-shed-shed-one piece. Push also gave a direct explanation of these bars in conversation with hip-hop DX.

You know, that's just another brutally honest truth. truth about the culture. I see it happen all the time. Guys go to jail. Somebody dies, you know, everybody's mourning. You make sure that, okay, you know, the kids are looked after, or the girlfriend or the wife, or whatever, she may need some money.

You make sure she gets it, whatever. But once we delegate the bills, all right, now who's going to fuck her? You know, which is, it's just real. Push his bitch the best A million megapix Of the Pyrex Started on the scale Did you tell my only time X?

Nicker this is timeless Simply because it's honest Pure as the fumes They'd be fucking with my sinus Nicker this is Simon Says Simon Red Blood on your diamond

Till you dying dead Yeah Push continues A million megapix Of the Pyrex Pirex is a brand of Borough Silicate OvenSafe glassware

That could withstand drastic temperature increases without shattering. Glass Pyrex measuring cups thus became a popular tool for cooking crack. In this way, a million megapixels seems to play on the measurement of milliliters. But megapixels refers to graphic resolution, so Push is saying that his cocaine is pure, its top quality, extremely clear. He could also be referring to his wraps as he vividly portrays his crack dealing days with picture perfect clarity. He then says, started on the scale, digital, my only time X. This refers to a digital scale used to weigh cocaine, which continues the digital motif of the previous megapixel reference. With Timex being a non-luxy brand, Push implies his wristful of watches doesn't include the

inferior brands like Timex. He could also be playing with the idea of not having time, or not being confined by it, as he continues, this is timeless, simply because it's honest, pure as the fumes I'd be fucking with my sinus. In a single bar, Push cuts to the heart of what makes infallible art. One's individual story or perspective told honestly and transparently. He relates this kind of pure storytelling to the purity of his cocaine, as he once again equates his dope to his dope wraps. We also recognize that he's still using vernacular that relates to childhood, time, and nostalgia. As we think of the purity of childhood and realize that Push's adolescence contain a secondary definition of pure, referring to the dope

he cooked as an underage high schooler. Finally, Push closes out his verse, This is Simon says, Simon Red, Blood on your diamonds till you dying dead. First we have to acknowledge the type rhyme schemes here, as Says rhymes with red, while Simon rhymes with diamond and dying. The kicker is that the following punctuation, dead rhymes with red and says, while also taking dying from the active present tense state to the final state, as it pushes watching over someone as they take their last breath, witnessing the change from dying to dead. Thematically, Simon Says refers to the children's game in which one player assumes the role of Simon and issues commands to the rest of the players, who must follow the commands or be

eliminated. Of course, this game punctuates the consistent childhood nostalgia motif, and we assume Push is proclaiming himself Simon, the one strategically orchestrating the higher game of chess in the streets. The following Simon Red is clever on a number of levels. First, Push uses red to play on the electronic version of Simon says that was a cultural staple beginning in the early 80s. In this version of the game, one must repeat a sequence of colors using four electronic buttons, one of those colors being red. We also recognize that we can hear the red as an R-E-A-D, which motivically ties to SES. But more importantly, Simon is the nickname of West Coast rap mogul Shug Knight, the former CEO of Death Row Records that define much of hip-hop

in the mid-90s. The addition of red alludes to the fact Shug Knight was associated with L.A.'s Pyruh Blood Gang, whose color is red. Knight is currently in prison after pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter, and is thought by some to have been involved in orchestrating the murder of Biggie Smalls. His alleged tactics of violence and intimidation have made him one of hip-hop's most notorious figures, which leads to the concluding phrase, Blood on your diamonds till you dying dead. This plays on the idea of blood diamonds, the name for diamonds mined in a war zone by workers who may be abused, raped, enslaved, or even murdered. It also plays on the fact Shug Knight was affiliated with the Blood Gang and has been

suspected of orchestrating violent crimes. When we take these last two bars as a whole, we find that push is continuing to develop the game motif that began with his chess reference. In this case, when Simon says Red, or the Kingpin's, commands a killing, the order is followed. Push or one of his associates will stand over you as you bleed out onto your rocks of crack cocaine, your now bloody diamonds. In this way, push is likening the streets to those blood diamond war zones, where a different kind of diamond, crack rocks are the centerpiece of a corrupt system of profit, territorial violence, and murder. Finally, seeing how this is Push's last bar, the reference to Compton native Shug Knight makes for the perfect pass to the Compton native

Kendrick Lamar and his verse. A verse will dissect right after the break. Welcome back to Dissect. Before the break we heard Push-A-T's extended verse that fused the nostalgia of his youth with his memories of his time as a drug dealer. While nostalgia doesn't contain a hook, we do get a four-bar instrumental break, where we hear two new samples introduced. The first sample we hear during this passage is taken from Boogie Down Productions' 1987 track The Bridge is over with KRS 1. We also hear a second sample from The Bridges Over, pulled from the first line of KRS1's second verse. The Bridge Is Over is a classic diss song, part of a larger hip-hop rivalry known as the Bridge Wars during the late 80s and early 90s. The conflict was centered on a dispute over the true birthplace of hip-hop and originally involved South Bronx's Boogie Down Productions, headed by KRS 1, who beefed with Marley Marl's juice crew from Queensbridge. The Bridge Wars is regarded as one of the most important and influential

events in hip-hop, laying the foundation for battle-rap feuds to play out publicly through an exchange of diss songs. Following Push's verse, the inclusion of one of hip-hop's most iconic songs amplifies the nostalgia-heavy theme of the track. Not only are we getting mental images provided by Push's vivid descriptions of the 80s and 90s, we're now hearing the actual sounds of that era as well. The words we hear, better change what comes out your speakers, is a command to listen to dope or music, specifically this dope track you're currently listening to. Beyond this, we might wonder if the implicit bridge theme was motivically appealing to Push and producers Knott's and Kanye. With Push being from Virginia and Kendrick hailing from Compton, the two together on the track

represent a bridge between the east and west coasts. Meanwhile, their 10-year difference in age represents a bridge from one generation to the next. Something Push highlighted when asked why he chose Kendrick to feature on the track. Kendrick is somebody that I admire in a sense of, you know, new school, new era, but rhymes from an old school. perspective and plays by old school rules of rhyme, not a bar goes wasted. I was like, well, if I'm gonna have features on my album, I want them to be rhymers. I wanted to be rhymers or people who I feel like the fans want to hear me with. You wanna see a dead body?

Instrumentals from my mama's Christmas party. Troubles on my mind. I still smell crime. My little brother crying. Smokers repeatedly bind my sake of Genesis. Either that her my auntie was stealing it. Hit the pipe and start filling it. With the beat me some slack, we never did that.

This was different. Geez, Louise, please help me relax. Quantum physics could never show me. With the beat suddenly cut off, Kendrick enters the track with a hauntingly grim tone, rapping, You want to see a dead body. Just as Push's final line passed the track to Kendrick

with a Compton reference, Kendrick accepts the past with his own reference to Push his final line about watching someone bleed out until they're dead, a dead body. The line also calls back to Push's Boys in the Hood reference, citing an early scene in the film where the young elementary school versions of Trey, Doughboy, and Ricky are walking on train tracks with their friend Chris.

Y'all want to see a dead body? Yeah. Try his daddy blasted as somebody last night. Really? What kind of gun your daddy got? I think it's a 357 magnet. Really? I got a douche, deuce.

My brother gave it to me before he went in a county jail. Got it run in my bed. You want to see? It's loaded, too. As we just heard, these 10-year-old boys are already familiar with the make and model of guns, and one boy even has a loaded gun under his bed. The dead body they end up observing is a black man with a gunshot wound in his chest lying near some bushes next to the train tracks.

The young boys are disgusted at the sight and smell, but are soon distracted by a group of teenagers who approach them to steal their football. These teenagers are not concerned or affected by the dead body at all, symbolizing the regularity of death in their neighborhood, and the numbness they have developed as a result. It would seem it's only a matter of time until the young 10-year-old boys also develop a similar numbness or even end up a dead body lying in the streets themselves. Now Kendrick's opening quote of this scene is brilliant in a few ways.

Recall that Push's Boys in the Hood reference was to the high school version of the boys, which aligned with his recollections as a high school drug dealer. He also identified with Doe Boy, the more rugged boy who embraced street life. By citing the younger 10-year-old versions of the boys, Kendrick immediately establishes the age difference between him and Push, as Kendrick will be taking on a prepubescent perspective like those younger versions of Trey, Doboy, and Ricky. In fact, later in the verse, Kendrick will specifically describe himself being 10 years old, aligning precisely with the age of the kids in the scene. Also, where Push makes

clear his innocence had been far from lost by the time he was in high school, Kendrick will be sharing the time in which his innocence was actively being eroded by the things he witnessed around him, just like the kids seeing a dead body and getting their friends. football stolen. Indeed, the similarities between young Kendrick and these kids are plentiful. Kendrick witnessed his second murder at the age of 8, and he also grew up around guns, telling the guardian, quote, it was normal to me, guns in the house. My parents kept them away from me, though. They were smart enough to do that, but I've seen it, unquote. Kendrick taking the opportunity to explore childhood memories isn't uncommon for him.

His debut studio album, Good Kid Mad City, famously tells the story of one pivotal day in his life as a high school kid in Compton. He's also said recollecting on his adolescence is something he does often, telling MTV, quote, I always try to go back to how I used to feel when I was seven years old, or six years old. For me, it was like the wonder years. I always try to go back to them days. As a kid, I was always just looking at adults and trying to figure them out. A lot of my memories come from trying to figure out what adults were doing, unquote. We observe this quality in Kendrick's following line, instrumentals for my mama's Christmas party. Here we get a brief to description of Kendrick's memories of his parents' house parties, which seemed like a common

occurrence during his youth. Kendrick's mom told Rolling Stone that Kendrick would often sneak into the living room during their house parties, saying, quote, I'd catch him in the middle of the dance floor with his shirt off, like, what the, get back in that room. Along with this image of Kendrick's childhood, we also recognize the wordplay of the line. Instrumentals allude to the music being played at these parties, but they're also what rappers rhyme over. So when taken in tandem with the first line about a dead body, Kendrick is saying he bodies or kills the track. Kendrick then continues by saying, Troubles on my mind. On first blush, this seems to be a nod to push a T song of the same name from 2011. On one level, Kendrick quoting Push pays homage to the fact

he's sharing the track with him, while also describing the mind of the classic rebellious child getting into trouble, like Kendrick sneaking into his mom's parties. But the reference cuts deeper in two ways. First, we recognize that Kendrick blurs his pronunciation of trouble to also sound like treble, the word that describes the upper half of the instrumental tonal range, linking back to the previous line about hearing instrumentals in his house. In other words, he's had music on his mind since he was young. And this connection clues us into the deeper layer of the line, which is a nod to the source material that Pusha T was quoting with trouble on my mind. The iconic opening line of Public Enemy's 1990 track, Welcome to the Terror Dog.

According to rapper Chuck D., Welcome to the Terror D., was, quote, A black male correspondence view of how we looked at 1989. He also said, quote, Welcome to the Terror Dome means the 1990s are coming. If we as a people do the right thing, we'll be all right. If we do the wrong thing, the black situation is out of here at the end of the decade. The Terror Dome is the 1990s, unquote.

With this in mind, Kendrick's quote of the iconic opening line of Welcome to the Terradome aligns perfectly with his portrait of Compton in the 1990s as seen through the eyes of a child. And with public enemy being one of the biggest hip-hop acts during this time, Welcome to the Terodome is the kind of song he'd hear playing at his parents' house parties in the 1990s. So let's just recap what Kendrick just accomplished in a single line here. He somehow found a reference that described the troubled mind of a youth in Compton, contained treble wordplay with his previous line, nodded to push a tea on his own track, nodded to a classic 90s hip-hop track that portrays the Black experience during the very time he's

describing in his verse, while also being the exact kind of song that would be playing at his parents' house parties. And this is just the third line of the verse. Next, Kendrick says, I still smell crime. The still in this line implies present tense, that today he can still smell the crime he witnessed during his childhood. On one hand, this plays with the song's title, Nostalgia. as Kendrick intertwines memory with smells, which of course are scents through the nose. This makes sense given that numerous studies have shown how odors and powerful memories are closely linked. But like we observed throughout Push's verse,

Kendrick's reference is tinged with tragedy, as we hope a vivid childhood memory triggered by a smell would be a pleasant one, but for Kendrick, it's witnessing crime. The next line, My Little Brother Crying, continues the portrait of his household. Kendrick was an only child until he was seven, so hearing a baby crying aligns with the timeline of the story. song. The vivid imagery continues, Smoker is repeatedly buying my Sega Genesis, either that or my auntie was stealing it. The game console Sega Genesis was released in 1989 and was

a cultural staple throughout the 1990s, so the reference continues the nostalgia motif. But rather than fond memories of actually playing the console as a child, Kendrick remembers the cycle of theft and repurching his Genesis underwent. His aunt was stealing it to sell for crack money, while smokers repeatedly buying the genesis seems to imply that someone was re-buying it with money made through selling drugs. This likely points to Kendrick's father, who Kendrick suspected to be working in the streets. He then describes his drug-addicted aunt smoking crack, saying, hit the pipe and start feeling it. Ooh, we, cut me some slack. Weed never did that. This was different. Geez Louise, please help me relax. This seems to relate the exponential high of hitting a crack pipe as compared to the more mellow high of smoking weed.

because crack is rapidly absorbed into the bloodstream, the effects are instantaneous, an intense rush of euphoria, but the effect wears off quickly, which can lead to a dangerous cycle of addiction. The phrases, cut me some slack and please help me relax, subtly implies the motives behind such drug use and escape from the stresses and anxieties of living in environments like Compton. And in the same way, Pusha said, Crack the window to allude to him cooking crack, we also recognize that, Cut Me Some Slack plays on the idea of cutting cocaine, which is essential to making crack.

Kendrick then continues his verse by comparing the complexities of his upbringing to the complexities of quantum physics, kicking off a numbers-based sequence of lines. Louise, please help me relax. Quantum physics could never show you the world I was in when I was 10. Back when I announced his had got you 10 and nine times out of 10, niggas don't pay attention and when there's tension in the air, nines come with extensions. My daddy turned a quarter piece to a four and a half. Took a L, started selling So fiends bubble bath.

Kendrick continues rapping, Quantum physics could never show you the world I was in. Quantum physics is the study of the behavior of matter and energy, an attempt to explain nature, how everything works. It involves complex theories and equations developed by some of the most intelligent minds in human history. So Kendrick's saying that even this centuries-long study of the natural world could not show or explain the environment he was raised in.

The only way to truly understand is to have to have. have lived it. Playing off the complex math equations involved in quantum physics, Kendrick then gives us a math equation to solve about his upbringing, stating first, when I was 10, back when 9 ounces had got you 10. He confirms the age of 10 is the perspective taken on the verse, which would make it the year 1997. He then states this was a time in which possession of 9 ounces of cocaine would land you a 10-year prison sentence. Kendrick here seems to be alluding to the consequences of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, part of the U.S.'s War on drugs. A response to the explosion of crack cocaine in the early to mid-80s, this act enforced harsh

minimum prison sentences for possession of cocaine, which included the infamous 100 to 1 sentence disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine. For example, there was a five-year mandatory minimum sentence for possession of 5 grams of crack cocaine, which is the equivalent to just a few rocks. Meanwhile, it would take possession of 500 grams or over a pound of powder cocaine to trigger the same mandatory 5-year sentence. This anti-drug abuse act had definitely. This anti-drug abuse act had devastating effects on the black community. Because crack cocaine was cheaper, easier to produce, and mostly sold in small quantities, it became widely accessible in poor urban communities like Compton. After the Anti-Drug Abuse Act, the number of black people sent to federal prisons skyrocketed,

increasing by a staggering 400%. During that same period, there was almost no change in the number of white people incarcerated. The prison sentencing is actually harsher than the figures Kendrick provides. While he states nine ounces would land you 10 years, it actually only took less than two ounces of crack cocaine to trigger a mandatory 10-year sentence. Meanwhile, it would take 176 ounces of powder cocaine to land 10 years. Kendrick continues the 9-10 wordplay wrapping, and 9 times out of 10, N-words don't pay attention. In other words, the majority of the time, the drug dealers and users he observed in Compton didn't seem to pay attention to potential consequences like prison sentences.

Dealers were more concerned with getting money to survive, and users were more concerned with escaping the pressures of survival. He then caps off the numbers wordplay with, and when it's tension in the air, nines come with extensions. Like a tension before it, notice how both tension and extensions cleverly contain the number 10.

Nines here refer to 9mm guns, which can accommodate extended clips when more ammunition is needed to violently solve a conflict or release the tension in the air. Now, there's a lot more to this sequence of number-based bars, but we'll have to return to them later,

as the remainder of the verse contains the necessary context that reveals the incredible depth of Kendrick's equation. And trust me, it'll be well worth the weight. Kendrick then continues the verse, my daddy turned a quarter piece to a four and a half, took an L started selling soap fiends bubble bath, broke his nails misusing his pinky to treat his nose. Kendrick portrays his father as both a drug dealer and a user in the scenario.

A quarter piece is a quarter of a 36-ounce brick, equivalent to nine ounces, a more subtle continuation of the nine-and-ten wordplay. This nine ounces diminished to four and a half ounces because his father was getting high on his own supply, as implied by his long pinky nail used to treat his nose or snort a bump of cocaine. To make up for this L or loss of product, he started selling soap fiends bubble bath. Kendrick is playing on the fact that crack rocks resemble soap, but bubble bath specifically implies bath salts,

which have been used in place of cocaine when making fake crack rocks. So the implication is that in order to make up for the cocaine he snorted, Kendrick's father started selling fake crack made with bath salts. Following the line about using his pinky to treat his nose, Kendrick wraps shirt button open, taco meat laying on his gold. Taco meat is slaying for chest hair, so we get an image of his father sitting down wearing an unbuttoned shirt exposing his gold necklaces draped over his chest hair.

Given the reference to snorting cocaine just before this line, it seems his dad is inebriated, enjoying the high of cocaine while exhibiting one of its side effects, increased body temperature and sweating. One day I'm gonna get you right with 36 sips. One thousand grams of cocaine, then your name will be rich. Now you can rock it up or sell it soft as leather interior. Drop some ice cubes in it.

Deep O'Hopperimidus. He said, son, how come you think you be my connect? I said, pop's your ass is washed up with all due respect. He said, well, nigger, then show me how it all makes sense. Go figure, motherfucker. Every verse is a brick. Your son, don't, nigger. Kendrick begins a conversation between him and his father rapping.

I said, Daddy, one day, I'm going to get you right with 36 zips. 1,000 grams of cocaine, then your name will be rich. Calling him a daddy implies Kendrick is still a boy in this scenario, promising to get him right with 36 zips, which refers to 36 ounces or a kilo of cocaine, otherwise known as a brick. This is confirmed by Kendrick then saying 1,000 grams of cocaine, as 1,000 grams is equal to 1 kilo.

He then continues, Now you can rock it up or sell it soft as leather interior, drop some ice cubes in it, Debo on perimeter. With these lines, we understand that Kendrick is implying that he'll one day become his father's drug connection or supplier, providing him the coke he sells on the streets. He gives him the option to rock it up or make crack or sell it soft as powder cocaine. Dropping ice cubes in it refers to using ice to expedite the cooling process after crack cocaine is heated. At the same time, Kendrick is also nodding to West Coast rapper and actor Ice Cube,

as confirmed by Debo on perimeter. A reference to the character Debo in the 1995 classic film Friday starring Ice Cube. Oh shit. Here come Debo, give me your stuff. Oh shit. No on for Jack and a Nick, that's all he do. Damn. Like Boys in the Hood, Friday takes place in Kendrick's hometown of Los Angeles

and continues the nostalgia motif of the 90s. Debo is the film's villain, an extremely tough character that uses his size and strength to intimidate others. In other words, he's hard, slang for tough. In this way, Kendrick uses Debo to cleverly described the hard substance that builds up around the perimeter of the glass once ice cubes are dropped into the crack mixture. And if that weren't a clever enough in Tondra, there's actually an even more impressive third layer here. NBA basketball star Demar DeRosen's nickname is Debo, likely due to

the two prominent D's that begin his first and last name. Demar de Rosen's specialty is his elite shooting from midrange, also called the perimeter, hence Debo on perimeter. The kicker is that like Kendrick, DeRosen is from Compton. The two knew each other growing up and remained friends to this day. And can you guess what number De Rosen wore for the majority of his career, including the year nostalgia was written? Number 10. Adding to the ongoing nine and ten numbers motif. Kendrick follows this elite triple entendre by continuing the conversation between him and his father, rapping, he said, son, how come you think you'll be my connect? I said, Pops, your ass is washed up, with all due respect. He said, well, N-word, then show me how it all makes sense.

Kendrick's dad is confused about his son's bold claim to be his future connect or drug supplier. Washed up, of course, refers to someone past their prime, but also calls back to the soap, bath salts motif a few lines back. There's also wordplay with the word sense and how it all makes sense. On one hand, Kendrick's dad is asking him to clarify what he means, but given that Kendrick's claiming that he'll make his father rich, we can also hear sense as in coins, meaning how are you going to make us all this money if you're not actually selling drugs? How is this adding up?

The play then continues in the following line where Kendrick responds, Go-Figger motherfucker. We recognize the joke in Kendrick calling his dad a motherfucker, as it's literally true. His dad does have sex with his mom. Go-figure is a phrase used to express surprise or disbelief, but like sense, it also alludes to money, as in the figures of a sum or salary.

Thus, go-figure motherfucker is a command to his father to check the figures he presented throughout the verse, sending up the grand punchline, Every verse is a brick, your son dope. Like push in his verse, Kendrick calls himself a dope MC, equating the amount he gets paid per verse to the amount he'd make selling a brick or kilo of cocaine. In other words, Kendrick is the product, and he's moving serious weight with his dope music. This twist ending like punchline is impeccably executed and incredibly effective,

a vivid, cinematic musical moment that represents the unique way rap lyricism can be utilized to tell an impactful story. But for me, what makes this punchline even more spectacular is what it represents, because despite all the bravado and aggressiveness in Kendrick's voice, the underlying sentiment is endearing. Kendrick is essentially telling his father that he's made it, that he now makes enough money from rap to support the family, that he's transcended the circumstances of the very environment he describes in the verse. For Kendrick in 2013, this represents the fulfillment of a decades-long goal. Why you standing in line, can you relate to my story? Can you follow my dreams in admiration that I had ever since I was 13?

My mama put leaving me. She let me use her fan to go to the studio Even though she know her tank is empty That's who I do it for My pop's got a different approach Yeah he believed But he always questioned when I'm gonna drop my debut CD How long is go take, nigga

You still have an eight nigger At 22 I had two cars in my own place, nigga It's a sacrifice I try to tell him That's when he turned to BET And tell me that he jealous Of all these niggas getting money And they shit don't sound like shit I ain't trying to kill your confidence

Of forcing you to quit I just want to hear you heard This song titled Wanna Be Heard is from 2009, when Kendrick was still an unknown mixtape rapper. He describes his father being impatient about his pursuit of rap stardom, which Kendrick first interpreted as being unsupportive of his dream, but later realized his father was just frustrated that Kendrick's voice wasn't being heard. Two years later, on the 2011 mixtape Section 80, Kendrick revisits the topic,

envisioning a near future in which he makes enough money from music that his dad can quit his job. But anyway, this for my pops On his lunch break, eating in that parking lot I want to be heard, probably thought he worked my nerves But really he was stressing me getting what I deserve Somebody said my name on a radio He ain't know I was ready for the world that minute So the next time he rolled up and drop grams in it

He probably beat out of work, lay back while he Smoke good, eat good, live good Just a year after this song was released Kendrick would drop his debut major label album 2012's Good Kid Mad City a massively successful record that began his reign as global rap star. Thus, by 2013's nostalgia, Kendrick had accomplished his decade-long goal of uplifting his family out of poverty,

which is emphatically symbolized through the hypothetical conversation between him and his father. And as the final lines of Kendrick's verse imply, this goal wasn't just personal, it was generational. It was generational. Go figure, motherfucker, every verse is a brick. Your son, dope, nigger. Now read what you sold, nigger. Please read what you sold.

I was born in 87, my granddaddy your legend. Now the same shit that y'all was smoking is my profession. Let's get it. After proclaiming his success as a rapper, Kendrick tells his father to, Now reap what you sowed. This well-known biblical phrase is now a common idiom to mean you get what you give,

or that your actions dictate your consequences. Kendrick's use of the phrase is clever in that, like his motherfucker pun, telling his own father to reap what he sowed is literal. He sowed the seed in his mother to birth Kendrick, and now he gets to reap the rewards of Kendrick's success. Again, the underlying sentiment here is sweet. Kendrick is essentially crediting his father for his success.

Not unlike Trey and Boys in the Hood, the fact that Kendrick had a father figure growing up when so many of his peers did not, helped him to avoid certain lifestyle choices that may have been detrimental, even fatal. I was the only one in America, if I was the actual actor father in his life. I don't know.

Well, at least in Compton. It was like Boys in the Hood. You remember Boys in Hood, Trey? his pops. Yeah. Trey and his pot. That was my pop. But my pops wasn't as righteous.

My pops was still, you know what I mean? Bumping his head too. But at the same time, he always had so much of a love for me. He gave me the wisdom in the game to say, you know what, I did that, don't do that. Sometimes he can stop it. Sometimes he couldn't because I still had

my friends surrounding me in the community. And each block in Compton is a gang. You know what I'm saying? So these the people I grew up with, these are people that I loved. for. And when you're around them, you have peer pressure. Of course, that's a kid. So I bumped my head a few times. But what they didn't have, what I had was somebody say, all right, you bumped your head. Now you see what happened? You in the back of a police car. See what happened? You at the

station. Nobody was telling them that. So they'll keep doing it over and over again. While Pusha T plays a different role on nostalgia, we might attribute the fact that he too was able to transcend the circumstances of his environment due in part to having both his father and mother present in the house. When his father passed away in 2020, Push wrote a touching tribute about his influence, saying, quote, You taught me to remain poised, to always be calculated, to be prideful, and to respect the hustle and hard work, but to know the difference between the two. I am who I am because of you, and I've always been proud to be your son, unquote.

Kendra continues the familial motif as he closes out the verse. I was born in 87, my granddaddy, a legend. Now the same shit that y'all were smoking is my profession. He reiterates the generational transformation of smoking dope to making dope music. He also shouts out his father's father, who he both praises as legendary, while also implicating that he too was a drug user. With legend being someone who achieves lasting fame or recognition, it's possible Kendrick could be subtly referencing the opening line of his song, Swimming Pools.

At the time of writing nostalgia, Swimming Pools was Kendrick's biggest hit song, a song that will outlive Kendrick and his entire family, making swimming pools one of his dope tracks that not only made him many bricks worth of money, but also ensured that his grandfather would be remembered forever, cementing his legendary status. Thus, as we reach the conclusion of nostalgia, we find the track appropriately ends with a generational celebration. While Kendrick's father and grandfather were hustlers that never fully transcended the streets, Kendrick's success is a transformative achievement not only for himself, but his entire bloodline, representing a seismic shift for the future generations of his family's lineage. Meanwhile, Push-a-T represents the generation in-between

Kendrick and his father, in age, but also in the in-betweenness of being an actual drug dealer turned rap star. Where Kendrick's father was a dealer and not a rapper, and Kendrick was a rapper and never a dealer. Push was both. A dope dealer turned a dope rhyme dealer. Both Push and Kendrick provide their on-the-ground perspectives and memories of one of the more damaging periods of American history, the 80s and 90s War on Drugs. As implied by the song's, title, their nostalgia cannot be separated from the darker things they were exposed to as a child in the environments they were raised in, a tragic contrast to the standard definition of nostalgia, which is typically defined by warm memories of one's adolescence. Thus, the song's celebratory

final note is an incredibly fitting way to end nostalgia, as Pushing Kendrick's transcendence of their environment ensures their children and their children's children will not experience the same kind of tainted childhood they did. Rather, their nostalgia will be as pure as the cocaine once cooked and sold by Pusha Tea. Oh, but there is just one more thing. That thing about all those numbers Kendrick laid out in the middle of his verse. Yeah, I didn't forget about those. And now that we've heard the song in its entirety,

we can now revisit Kendrick's claim that quantum physics could never show us the world he was in. Quantum physics could never show you the world I was in when I was 10. Back when I announced this had got you 10 and nine times out of 10, niggas don't pay attention. And when there's tension in the air, nine's come with extension. As we already discussed, this sequence of lines plays with the numbers 9 and 10. Specifically, if we count how many of each number Kendrick used, we find there are 3-9s and 6-10s,

which includes the 10s heard in the words, attention, tension, and extensions. Given that Kendrick prefaced these numbers with a reference to the complex equations associated with quantum physics, which is suspect that he chose them for a reason. So let's find the sum of these numbers by adding them together. 3-9s equals 27, while 6-10s equals 16. Add 27 and 60 together and we get 87.

The very birth year, Kendrick shouts out directly after revealing the verse's dramatic twist. So this dramatic end of the verse is actually even more dramatic when we realize that Kendrick's birth year pays off on the equation set up near the beginning of the verse while also tying in perfectly with the song's nostalgia motif. With this in mind, let's continue to look at those 9s and 10s. Because out of all the numbers he could have used, Kendrick's specifically. specifically chose nines and tens to add up to 87. Why? Well, it might have to do with the fact that 9 plus 10 is 19, which when combined with the sum of the numbers we just calculated,

completes the birth year in full, 1987. With this connection, Kendrick has perhaps reached an algebraic level of mathematics, but he claimed quantum physics, so let's keep digging. Because let's think about the number of numbers he used, 3-9s and 6-10s, 3-and-6, or 36, And why is this significant? Kendrick's claim to be his father's drug connection began with these lines, as 36 zips is slaying for 36 ounces, the equivalent to a brick or kilo of cocaine. Thus by using 3-9s and 6-10s,

Kendrick found a set of numbers that contains his full birth year and an allusion to a brick of cocaine. So we've now reached an advanced calculus level of mathematics, but let's go even deeper. because 36 was also the age of Push a T at the time of My Name is My Name's release, the album that Nostalgia appears on. This relates to the age and birth year motif of the song Anne Kendrick's Equation, and it's clear that Push and its creative team understood this numerical relationship

between his age and a brick of cocaine. The album's minimal cover art simply features a black barcode centered on a plain white background. As is the standard for barcodes, printed along its base are the numbers represented by the barcode. There are 12 numbers in total, and if you add these numbers up, you get 36. Along with Push's age, the implication is that the album itself is a brick, packaged and sold by a dope rhyme dealer. Wow, okay, so 36 also connects beyond Kendrick to incorporate Pusha himself too. But what if I told you this was only the beginning of this connection?

Because let's take a look at nostalgia's overall structure. The song is 3 minutes and 36 seconds long. Catch that? 3 minutes and 36 seconds. Structurally, the song contains no hook. Rather, it's divided into two halves with the first half containing pushes extended verse and the second half containing Kendrick's extended verse. And the thing is, the song's two halves are exactly the same length.

Kendrick enters the song exactly halfway through the track. And when I say exactly, I mean exactly. We hear his voice precisely at one minute and 48 seconds, the two-the-second halfway point of the three-minute and 36-second song. What is it? What is it? See a dead body Instrumentals from my mom's twist.

Okay, so the song is divided perfectly in half. So what? Why is this significant? Well, if you count the measures or bars in each half, you realize that pushes half of the song contains exactly 36 bars. And Kendrick's half also contains exactly 36 bars, with 36 being the same number of ounces equivalent

to a kilo of cocaine. Literally, every verse is a brick. Go figure, motherfucker. Every verse is a brick. Your son, dope, nigga. After checking the figures like Kendrick Acidas to, we now fully understand the monumental impact of this closing punchline, elevating Kendrick's verse into the territory of quantum physics level complexity and dimension. For my money, with all things considered, it's one of the most impressive moments in hip-hop history.

Now, no doubt some of you are wondering, is this all purposeful? Is it just a coincidence? Or is it all a part of a carefully calculated quantum physics level equation to show us the world Push-A-T and Kendrick Lamar grew up in? That's of course for you to decide. But for me, it doesn't really matter. It is there. And it's just the final stroke of brilliance on the masterpiece that is nostalgia, a certifiably dope track.

This episode was written and produced by me, Cole Kushna. If you enjoyed today's episode, please tell a friend about it or share it on social media and tag at Dysect Podcast. It would mean a lot. Audio editing by Kevin Pooler. Theme music by Birocratic.