Dissect - S1E1 – Compton, K Dot, and Kendrick Lamar

Episode Date: August 23, 2016

We begin our season-long examination of Kendrick Lamar‘s To Pimp a Butterfly with the history of Compton, California and Kendrick’s transformation from K Dot, a young mixtape rapper, to Kendrick Lamar, a true artist. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Dysect, long-form musical analysis broken into short, digestible episodes. I'm your host, Cole Kushna. Our first season of Dysect is dedicated entirely to Kendrick Lamar's 2015 masterpiece to Pippa Butterfly. Over the course of nearly 20 episodes, we're going to dive deep into this incredibly rich record. We'll break down both the musical and lyrical content while also analyzing the album's overall narrative arc. There's a lot to unpack on this record. from the thematically rich narrative of the album's opening track Wesley's series to the striking introspection and honesty of you

To the reason why mama and I'm leaving Selfish, you deny you can't open your trials And tribulations are burdened everyone felt it To the complexities of race, class, and identity On Blacker the Barry I'm the biggest hypocrite in 2015 Once I finish this witness is real covege is what I mean I mean it's evidence that I'm irrelevant to society

That's what you're telling me penitiary with only hired me, curse me till I'm dead, church me with your fit prophesizing that I'm gonna be just another slave in my head. Institutional lies, manipulation and lies, reciprocation of freedom only live in your eyes. And of course, the dramatic conclusion in which Kendrick speaks to Tupac from beyond the grave. Do you see yourself as somebody that's rich or somebody that made the best of their own opportunities? I see myself as a natural-born hustler, a true hustler in every sense of the word.

I took nothing. I took the opportunities. I worked at the most menial and degrading job and built myself up so I can get it to where I owned it. I went from having somebody managed me to me hiring a person that works my management company. I changed everything. I realized my destiny in a matter of five years.

You know what I'm saying? It made myself a millionaire. As evident in these excerpts, to pimp a butterfly is bursting at the scenes with thematic content. It's a true narrative, a carefully crafted concept album that spans Kendrick's journey from Caterpillar to Butterfly, from Prostute to Pimp. It's rich with complex layers, double and triple meanings, and examines themes of race, class,

identity, consumerism, fame, and self-doubt, not to mention the exceptional funk influence musical landscape on which it all rests. While the majority of episodes this season will focus entirely on a single track from to Pimp a Butterfly, we're going to preface our examination with two brief introductory episodes. Today, we'll dive into the tumultuous world with Compton, California, and his transformation from an agricultural city to an urban battleground. We'll also explore Lamar's upbringing in Compton and his transformation from KDOT, the adolescent mixtape rapper, to Kendrick Lamar,

the fully mature artist. Our next episode will focus entirely on dissecting Good Kid Mad City, Lamar's major label debut. This of course will provide context, a solid foundation on which will house our exploration of to pimp a butterfly, a deeply personal record that reconciles the conflict between Lamar's Compton upbringing and his newfound status as global icon. A few last bits of housekeeping before we dig in. First, if you don't own or have never listened to Lamar's to Pimp a Butterfly, that's okay. This podcast will make sense, and I'm excited to introduce it to you. Also, this podcast will inevitably contain lyrics with explicit content, so consider yourself

warned. Finally, if you like what you hear, consider rating dissect on iTunes. There's no team behind this podcast. It's just me. And ratings help, a lot. Without further ado, let's dissect. In 1867, Griffith Dickinson Compton led a group of 30 or so pioneers from Stockton, South to the area now known as Compton. They were seeking ways to earn a living other than gold fields, which were rapidly becoming exhausted.

In 1889, Griffith donated his land to officially create the city of Compton, with its own city council and local government. It was rooted in agriculture, and by 19. 30 had just one black resident. It wasn't until the 1950s and 1960s that Compton saw an influx of black families migrating from the South to California and the Second Great Migration. Looking for work in education and to escape harsh discrimination, Jim Crow laws, violence and racial bigotry of the South, many of these migrants traveled to California and

settled in the west side of Compton, whose neighboring city Watts already had an established black community. At the same time, the Great Migration yielded a phenomenon known. as white flight across the United States. Middle-class Caucasian families fled from cities with this new influx of African Americans. With them, they took a healthy portion of the city's tax base. The federal government also assisted white flight by withholding tax dollars for maintenance of urban cities like Compton and instead invested in propping up new middle-class suburban infrastructures, mostly inhabited by whites and made off limits to blacks through redlining and residential segregation.

This kind of institutional racism severely limited minorities from equal education and economic opportunities. Cities eroded, crime and poverty increased, causing frustration within the Compton and Watts community. That frustration peaked in the Watts riots of 1965, incited by the police's abusive treatment of Marquette Fry and Reno Price. Over 30,000 adults participated in the riots that targeted the police and the destruction of white-owned businesses. Over six days, there were 34 deaths, 1,032 injuries, 3,438 arrests, and over 40 million in property damage. By 1970, the once white-owned agricultural city of Compton was now over 90% African American. Poverty and crime levels continue to rise until peaking in the 1980s and early 90s, ushered in by the introduction of crack cocaine and increased gang activity.

It should be noted that the U.S. government supported the influx of crack cocaine into early. urban LA communities by propping up and in some cases paying Nicaraguan drug dealers who distributed the drug to local gangs and individual dealers in L.A. Of course, the solicitation of this cheap, highly addictive drug into poverty-stricken communities had an awful degenerating effect. Homicide rates increased due to conflicts between dealers, addiction led to increased robbery in broken homes, incarceration rates skyrocketed due to the government's war on drugs and strict drug offense sentences that many feel targeted blacks and browns. For example, the sentence disparity between crack cocaine, a primarily black drug, and powder

cocaine, a primarily white drug, was 100 to 1. It was into this world of drugs and gang violence that Kendrick Lamar Duckworth was born in 1987. Kenny Duckworth and Paula Oliver, Kendrick's parents, moved to Compton from Chicago in 1984 to escape Mr. Duckworth's involvement in the Southside gangsters' disciples. With $500 in their pockets, they stuffed their belongings into two black garbage bags and boarded a train to California. The two slept in cars, motels, and on park benches until they had enough money to afford an apartment,

at which point they had Kendrick, the oldest of four children. Supplemented on welfare and food stamps, Paula cut hair, and Kenny worked at KFC when he wasn't in the streets. Kendrick witnessed his first murder at the age of five when a drug dealer was shot in front of his apartment building. He recalls at age six, witnessing his uncles, some of his whom are Compton Crips, playing with shotguns and selling dope. Two of his uncles were incarcerated and one was murdered in front of a burger stand when Kendrick was still a boy.

Violence was a part of everyday life, and Kendrick grew, in his own words, immune to it. Still, Kendrick was a bright student in school, a quiet, observant boy who loved basketball and dreamed of being in the NBA. At age seven, Kendrick caught an unknowing glimpse into his own future. Tupac and Dr. Dre shooting the original California love video, were riding through the streets of Compton and stopped in the middle of the road near Kendrick's house. His dad propped Little Kendrick on his shoulders and Kendrick watched the two larger-than-life figures before him. The event made a lasting impression on Kendrick, and as fate would have it, he would eventually sign to Dr. Dre's label and feature Tupac posthumously onto Pippa Butterfly.

It wasn't until middle school that Kendrick tried his hand at writing his own rhymes. Kendrick credits his seventh-grade English teacher, Mr. Inge, for turning him on to poetry, which attracted the introverted Kendrick as a form of self-expression. He would continue to write through high school, and it was during this time that Kendrick got caught up in the wrong crowd. Although he rarely gives specific details about the exploits of this time, Kendrick's mom recalls once finding Kendrick rolling on the ground in tears in front of their house after getting shot at. Another time, she found a bloody hospital gown Kendrick wore when accompanying his friend who'd been shot to the hospital. Kendrick was even kicked out of the house for a few days after the police showed up to his parents' door, involved in an

unnamed incident. One day, Kendrick's dad set him down and told him he didn't want to see Kendrick grow up to be like him. He told Kendrick, quote, things I've done, mistakes I've made, I never wanted you to make those mistakes. You can wind up out on the corner. Kendrick said out of respect, he gathered himself together. Music would be the vessel Kendrick would use to escape a tragic destiny that he seemed to be heading towards. At the age of 16, Kendrick put out his first mixed tape called Hub City Threat, minor of the year, under the moniker K-DOT. The tape is full of young bravado, and though it's stylistically a long way from the Kendrick we know today, the young rapper was clearly gifted.

Look, homie, I'm not your crick boy, your blood, homie, I'm just Kendrick. See me other than him? My plead the Fifth Amendment. Hard-headed knicker, shit, all it takes is an instant. Shot for having a scar just as soft as an infant. You say you bush your guns, but never toting it. You say your man is dope. The tape caught it homie, why you provoking it?

Don't mean to boast a bit, but you can call me a fly because your boy be on some shit. The tape caught the attention of Anthony Top Tiffith, a local record producer. Legend has it, Tiffith brought Kendrick to a studio where the Young MC freestyle for two hours until Tiffith signed him to Top Dog Records, the newly formed indie label based in Carson, California. Over the next few years, KDOT would release a series of mixtapes that would prove to be a training ground for a young MC finding his voice. Through these mixtapes, including Training Day of 2005 and C4 of 2009, you can hear him developing his pen and solidifying his voice. While still heavy in young Braggie bravado,

Kendrick begins to introduce themes of Compton Street Living and self-reflection. Good morning America, a new day, we got a heck this schedule ahead of us. The letter K, DOT, had a space like a Microsoft keypad. You can't see me, invisible ski mats, poke the eyes out my beanie, ghetto's over, on the headlines, I leave feces, shit, Kendrick, still performing as K-DOT, also began touring at this time with Labelmate J-Rock, an opening for the likes of fellow Compton native the game. Later in 2009, he dropped the name K-DOT in favor of Kendrick Lamar, his first and middle name.

K-Dat, the nickname that's been inquired since I was a kid just being in the neighborhood. You know, something given to me by just my homeboys growing up in Compton. So that name might always be there. I go back to the city now, they don't call me Ken. I just felt like it was a time for me to grow, not only as an artist, but as a person. I want the world to know me for who I am. And I just sat back and reflect on why Tupac is one of the greatest,

why Biggs, one of the greatest Y's, because the people felt like they had a connection. It wasn't just a facade that you've seen on stage or on TV. People actually felt like, you know, there was a part of what you was going through and, you know, your worries and just life in general. You know, I said, you know, what better way to start that rather than, you know, giving them my real name?

You never know why I am as a present. Kendrick soon released a self-titled extended play under his new moniker. With this release and name change, it was clear that Kendrick had a new vision for his music and himself as an artist. Let's listen to I Am from the Kendrick Lamar EP, a manifesto of sorts for an artist coming of age. See y'all don't understand me.

My plan B is to win your hearts before I win a Grammy. Kendrick Lamar. Words like a sword in the hands of a spart marching on Rosecrans and Compton. You can't cause conflict or corrupt my spirits. I'm on point like period. I've been there and gone before you get near it. Ooh, wait. That poor remind me of a young Martin Luther the way he pieced up troopers and routed up shooters.

Like Malcolm X dead, I stand for what I believe in. Family God and honor from Chicago, my daddy and my mama. Came to Compton to accomplish one thing. Raise a king, reigns supreme named Kendrick. I ain't lying and stand for king and I am one. and grandson will live royal from the Coochee to the soil The meek shal it her and the earth well I had this world since birth Feel the good kids hunger the Crips make strong the pie rules make stronger

Muscle in my heart staring the eyes of Mozart and tell him I'm the genius Do my ducky and grab my penis cause I means this with all my soul and you can't control greatness Lest you hatein with the heart of Satan but even that can't stop it Nika get out my wallet and put passion in your logic passion in your life the passion of my crisis in me And if you said ain't you may offend me damn that boy good brightest time is Edison but Gucci manhood he still With a more acute focus on self-reflection and purpose, Kendrick continued to record the mixtape overly dedicated in 2010, while touring extensively with Tech 9 and J-Rock. Upon its release in September of 2010, overly dedicated entered the Billboard Top 100, peaking at number 72.

The song Ignorance is Bliss, along with its dramatic video that portrays Kendrick shooting a gangbanger in retaliation of a dead friend, would find its way to Megastar and Compton native Dr. Dre. The two would develop a working relationship with Kendrick helping on Dre's unreleased detox album. Just 10 months after releasing overly dedicated, Kendrick released Section 80, a collection of songs, some label a mixtape while others claim in an album. In truth, the release feels like both,

an artist whose vision cannot be contained by the disposable constraints of a mixtape, but whose background in mixtapes is clearly evident. Regardless, Section 80 was an ambitious release. The album's title refers to both government-funded low-income housing known as Section 8 Housing and the 1980s, the crack-ridden decade in which Kendrick was born. The tracks are clearly connected thematically

and loosely held together with a reoccurring skit that features an unnamed leader preaching to an audience around an intimate campfire. Gather around. I'm glad everybody came out tonight as we stand on our neighborhood corner. Know that this fire that's burning represents the passion you have. Listen. In this way, the tracks come off as sermons, with Kendrick speaking directly to his community.

Though the album is heavily themed in drug, sex, and violence, rather than flaunting and glorifying these issues, Kendrick provides insights to why his community commonly falls victim to these vices. Sectionation, dread that like a Haitian, while you motherfuckers waiting, I'll be off the slave ship, building pyramids, right in my own Harold Glitz. Just calling shit, high power. Nick, nothing less than high power. Section 80 clearly displays Kendrick's new vision as an artist,

and his desire to elevate hip-hop, himself, and his community to new heights through self-analysis, self-empowerment, cultural criticism, leadership, and unmatched lyrical prowess. The album concludes with Absol, Lamar's label mate, asking Kendrick and perhaps the world at large, a question. Kendrick replies with a proclamation of purpose, warning critics to not mistake him for another half-truth rapper talking about hose, clothes, and money. But as someone thoroughly examining these vices,

their history, their purpose, their pitfalls, let's hear it. Can you repeat that for me, soul? What's your life about enlighten me? Is you going to live on your knees and down your feet? Would you going to plead the fifth or sound the horn of time, Now, my child, come on. See, a lot of y'all don't understand Kendrick Lamar

because you wonder how I can talk about money, holes, clothes, God, and history all in the same sentence. You know what all the things have in common? Only half for the truth, if you tell it. See, I spent 23 years on this earth searching for asses. Till one day I realized I had to come up with my own. I'm not on the outside looking in. I'm not on the inside looking out.

I'm in a dead fucking sinner looking around. You ever seen a newborn baby killer grown man? That's an analogy for the way the world make me react. My innocence been dead. So the next time I talk about money holes, God and history all in the same sentence, just know I meant it, and you felt it, because you too are searching for asses.

I'm not the next pop star, I'm not the next socially aware rapper. I am assuming motherfucking being of a dope-ass instrumentation. Kemp's me off. At just 23 years of age, Kendrick still seems set on proving himself as an MC, and for that reason, Section 80, at least by comparison to his later works, feels slightly unpolished. Still, Section 80 is a triumph,

and garnered high praise within the hip-hop community and remains an underground classic. Just a month after its release, Kendrick was named the new king of the West Coast by Dr. Dre, Snoop Dog, and the game at a concert in L.A. Within six months, Kendrick had signed to Aftermath Dr. Dre's branch at the major label Interscope. He also leveraged his demand to ensure TDE, the label that signed him when he was 16, received a joint venture deal with Introscope. It would seem the national stage was now prime for Kendrick Lamar, with backing by Dre, major label funding, national distribution, a strong sense of purpose, and years spent in the studio perfecting his craft, Kendrick could go to work on his pivotal major label debut Good Kid Mad City.

I think at this point it's important to recognize that with the hype and backing, Kendrick could have easily chosen a formulated, commercialized path. He had his choice of top producers, songwriters, and collaborators to make any type of album he'd like. But as we'll discuss some more detail later, Kendrick's actions and decision-making aligns with his messaging on record. He would choose a path of artistry and storytelling over a traditional commercial album. Those geniuses reveal when you realize he obtains both through carefully calculated maneuvers. Good Kid Mad City is a concept album that spans one pivotal day in Kendrick's teenage upbringing in the streets of Compton. It's a coming-of-age story that displays Kendrick's transformation from KDOT to Kendrick Lamar.

The album is widely deemed a classic, which in hip-hop circles is equivalent to masterpiece. And I can't wait to explore it with you next time on Dysette. Dysect is written and produced by me. If you enjoy Dysect, remember to rate and review on iTunes. It really helps. For additional content, including a Tipipa Butterfly album map, follow us at Dysect Podcast on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, or visit Dysectpodcast.com.

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