March Madness Day 3: Kendrick Lamar - untitled unmastered

Cover art for Kendrick Lamar's "untitled unmastered" (obviously edited by me, Joseph Sanker II)

The following is a review I've written on a now defunct website that I (thank goodness) saved before the whole site shutdown for good. Back in 2016, I wasn't the most to-the-point writer. I pretty much wrote in huge sum paragraphs most of the time, and on top of that I had a hard time summarizing my points in as few words as possible, but everyone starts somewhere.

Anyway, enjoy my throwback review for Kendrick's "untitled unmastered" compilation album. I notice I didn't post yesterday, so I'm going to try to throw something extra in one of the coming days so I can 31 published posts, one everyday for the month of March. Anyway, here's the review... 

We are now going back in time to 2016 Joseph S...

Kendrick Lamar. You may have heard of him. He’s the still growing sensation that’s sweeping the rap world by its feet and making it his bitch. Kendrick Lamar (AKA Cornrow Kenny) is a Compton born MC who first rose to prominence from a mixtape he released called “Overly Dedicated” (Stylized as O(verly) D(edicated) to emphasize the the “OD” part, get it? Cause Kenny go so hard in his raps he might die like how a person who does a lot of drugs [AKA “going hard on drugs”] may fuck around and overdose, the circle of life man). And since releasing that mixtape Kendrick went from just your run-of-the-mill, internet struggle rapper, to being the next big thing in Hip Hop and boy did he not disappoint.

After releasing his critically acclaimed debut album “Section.80” independently, Kendrick signed with Interscope records and more specifically, Aftermath Entertainment (A record label within Interscope headed by Rapper/Producer Dr. Dre), who have signed many notable artists in the rap game and in music in general. Some of these acts include: worldwide, iconic rapper Eminem, Hook making machine, 50 Cent, and Wu Tang legend, Raekwon (the Chef)  to name a few. Since signing to Interscope and Aftermath, Kendrick has dropped 2 EXTREMELY prominent projects atop the said rap game’s head. The first one being his 1st commercial debut album (and second overall studio album for those keeping track) “good kid, m.A.A.d city” which, received critical acclaim all across the board, from reviewers who regularly review Hip Hop to reviewers who wouldn’t even touch Hip Hop with a 10 foot poll unless they absolutely have to cover it (Looking at you, rolling stone). Anyway, since releasing “good kid, m.A.A.d city” there were doubts about whether or not Cornrow McKenneth could follow up such an impressive album with an album that’s even more impressive, more experimental and more groundbreaking. The doubts were high, but then Kendrick came back and delivered 10 fold and then some. I’m talking about Kendrick’s 2nd full length commercial album (And 3rd studio album overall) “To Pimp a Butterfly”.

Upon release, “To Pimp a Butterfly” received universal acclaim from people all across the board, from the fans, to the critics, to the people who don’t even fuck with rap music in any sort of capacity. They were all giving Kendrick praises for his bold, groundbreaking album. Upon release of this album, Kendrick had officially become a hot commodity in the rap game and one of the official leaders of the “new school” of Hip Hop. Along with rapper J. Cole, Kendrick is at the forefront of socially conscious Hip Hop music with a positive message that doesn’t come across as preachy church music. Kendrick’s “To Pimp a Butterfly” was made for those who aren’t from the street but rather those who come from oppressed backgrounds, specifically, Black people. To say “To Pimp a Butterfly” was for everyone was a flat out fucking lie as I (this reviewer) thinks that “To Pimp a Butterfly” was made specifically for Black people and other similarly oppressed minority groups (such as Latinos) who can relate to the struggle.

In lieu of all this potent success, as well as effectively getting an extremely powerful, socially conscious message out in the public, Cornrow McKenneth the 3rd, decided to bless us again in 2016 with another project. Not a whole other album mind you BUT a compilation album filled with B sides from the recording sessions that took place during the making of “To Pimp a Butterfly”. Kenny is essentially giving us the leftovers. The snacks that originated from the full 3 course meal. Like having Thanksgiving Turkey and eating most of the Turkey and then taking the remaining meat and grinding it up to make delicious Turkey sandwiches (Can you tell I really like my fucking Turkey sandwiches?). With this being a compilation album, as well as being a last minute thought and not much time going into the project,  Kendrick and his team didn’t even bother to title this compilation or its track listing for that matter. All of the tracks are simply “untitled (then insert the number of the track here) then “|” followed up with a date or some sort of timestamp of when this throw away “To Pimp a Butterfly” track was recorded.

This project was VERY unexpected as it was thought that these unreleased songs would never get released. In fact, it was told to MTV news  that a track on here titled (or maybe untitled ⊙_ʘ) “untitled 03” would never see the light of day. But apparently that was a lie as it is now out and in CD quality too! There was also, what fans dubbed the “Untitled” series where people would catalogue all the unreleased songs that Kendrick would perform live for television shows (Only 3 entries, however, were actually in this unofficial series that the fans named these performances as. This included Kendrick’s performance on Stephen Colbert’s former political humor show “The Colbert Report” and another performance on “The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon” as well as spitting parts of a verse of another “untitled” track while he performed at the 2016 Grammys). These performances were titled “Untitled”, “Untitled 2” and “Untitled 3” respectively, however after much speculation (and a alleged push from NBA star Lebron James to also release the leftovers) Kendrick Lamar’s “untitled unmastered.” compilation was finally released to the public and well…how did he do? Did he deliver quality leftovers, or was Kendrick better off keeping these unreleased songs in the vault? Let’s see…

1. untitled 01 | 08.19.2014.

Starts off with some creepy ass vocals from singer and frequent Kendrick Lamar collaborator Bilal (his voice sounds like the fucking devil on here) talking to what I assume to be a girl that he’s fucking. Kendrick then comes straight out the gate with chaotic & apocalyptic imagery. Saying shit like

“The tallest building plummet, cracking, and crumbling”

“The smell is disgusting, the heat is unbearable”

“Rapists and murderers hurdle alleys”

“Atheists for suicide, planes falling out the sky”

“Trains jumping off the track, mothers yelling “he’s alive”

“Ocean water dried out, fire burning more tires out”

“Tabernacle and city capital turned inside out”

and whole bunch of other world ending imagery, like the rapture or the 2nd coming of Christ is happening. Kendrick then talks to God directly and basically asks “Why the fuck are you doing this? I gave the world ‘To Pimp a Butterfly’ and tried to save the human world but yet you STILL fucked ALL of us, why?” Then Kendrick comes to the realization that no matter how good in a moral sense a person may be they STILL can be damned to hell. Which is such a fucking powerful thought, it moved me the first time I thought about it. Like, how can a child or a baby go to hell when it had no say in the matter? God is a fucking prick sometimes. I didn’t like the production on here, mind you, the production is FAR from trash but there’s something about the beat on here that turns me off from this track completely from a production standpoint. I can’t quite identify what exactly it is. You know what? I don’t like the panic’d feeling the beat gives me, I don’t like getting that feeling from my music and that’s why I’m not fucking with this beat. It’s a good beat, but I’m not going to be listening to this song, even a month from now. However, it is a good track to get things started off on this project, not bad, but not for my personal use. Also there’s a nice little outro at the end of the song that I thought was a nice touch.

2. untitled 02 | 06.23.2014.

Starts off with a chant that’s sure to get stuck in your head by the end of this project, I’m talking about the line

“Pimp-Pimp…Hooray!”

After a cool, jazzy intro, Kendrick drops into full modern day Hip Hop mode. This beat is nice, like as soon as I hear the beat, I picture riding through the streets at night in my car with my shooters, just vibin’, about to hit a lick, it makes me feel cool as shit. After singing for the first half of the song, Kendrick breaks into a monotone, yet smooth-gangster-serial-killer flow. Kendrick threatens the listener that if you “fuck with him [Top Dawg] you get killed” and Top Dawg (Kendrick’s manager and close friend) will kill you himself if you fuck with Kendrick, this shit is about as gangster as it gets. Kendrick’s hook is both catchy and clever as fuck as he’s subtly calling out lean glorifying rappers when he says

“I see jiggaboos, I see Styrofoams”

Now, for those who are unfamiliar with lean, it’s a liquid that consists of Sprite (or some other caffeine free soda) and cough syrup (like Robitussin, liquid Tylenol etc.) that, when mixed together, can give the user a certain high. Not a high like say, cocaine gives you, where you’re a fucking jackrabbit hopping all over the god damn place. This high is more of a slowed down, mellow high. Now, lean has been seen as responsible for the deaths or decline of many rappers (most notably, the death of legendary Houston rapper, Pimp C) but despite that, certain rappers continue to glorify this drug. The most popular rapper, who openly talks about lean and sipping lean, would be Atlanta artist Future. Some people feel that rappers should stop glorifying lean as it can encourage the youth to take up drinking lean themselves and since it’s easy to overdose on lean it can result in more deaths. But, I think lean is not that big of a deal compared to other, more widely available drugs. When Kendrick references “Styrofoams” that is referencing the common type of cup that lean is commonly put in.

So yeah, basically, fuck lean, it’s bad for you, don’t drink that shit instead, you should listen to this track “untitled 02 | 06.23.2014” and vibe the fuck out cause this track is fucking nice. Oh, and I forgot to mention that part of the 3rd verse that Kendrick spit in this song was used in his live “Untitled 2” performance on the Jimmy Fallon show.

3. untitled 03 | 05.28.2013.

Before you listen to this song, listen to the live performance of this “untitled 03” song first (The actual performance of the song is at the 4 Minute and 8 second mark of the video, but Colbert has a funny interview with Kendrick Lamar, so watch the whole video) and then, after you do that, prepare to be disappointed in this rendition of the song. I understand that they were obviously going for a different vibe on this CD quality version, but fuck that, after listening to the more powerful and emotional version that was performed during the last episode of “The Colbert Report”, this version ain’t shit.

This version isn’t trash, it just lacks the fucking intensity and true passion that was present when Kendrick performed this song live for the first time on “The Colbert Report”. Like, this shit is fucking lounge music compared to what I linked above. But then again, I realize that this is just an album of B sides and leftovers from the main dish that was “To Pimp a Butterfly”. The song itself is about different races of people and what their “fruits of labor” are. For Asians, according to this song, it’s enlightenment & health, for Native American Indians, it’s about acquiring land, for the Blacks, it’s all about getting the girl and getting her to give you the pussy and for the Whites, it’s all about acquiring money and power through siphoning it from others. Kendrick comes through with yet another thought provoking concept of a song, but the lack of intensity, power and pure musical fire that was present in his live rendition of this song was noticeably absent. It’s like test driving a brand new Ferrari on your birthday, but your actual birthday present is a used, beat up, old Mitsubishi. That’s what this track feels like, the used Mitsubishi that I actually got instead of the brand new Ferrari that I thought I was gonna get with the live version performed on Colbert’s show. The song is good in its own right but when you know a much better version of something exists it’s hard to ignore it.

4. untitled 04 | 08.14.2014.

This track is more of an interlude than anything else. Kendrick and the TDE affliated, Soul/R&B singer SZA give us the answer. And that answer is “Head” as in

“Head is the answer, head is the future”

“Don’t second guess yourself”

“Head” in this context, being a double entendre. In one way, “Head” can refer to oral sex (either fellatio or cunnilingus ) where “Head” is referring to what typically takes place before reproductive (vaginal) sex where a child is conceived and hence the “Future” is created from “Head”. Therefore, “Head” is the future in that sense. The other way “Head” can be interpreted is “Head” as in, the mind, more specifically, the mind of a young person, who, is also the “Future” because the children will be here when the grown ups die, only when the grown ups die, the children willalso be grown ups with children of their own, and the cycle goes on and on and on until the human race dies for some external factor like a giant ass meteor hits the Earth or the sun explodes. Cause humans definitely aren’t dying out any time soon under the current conditions we are in. Oh…you want to know what I thought about this track?

 I thought it was forgettable, but it’s too short to have really been anything memorable, you have Kendrick & SZA singing “head is the answer, head is the future” and before you know it, you’re off to the next track. I don’t hate it, I don’t favor it either, but it is a good interlude that I can listen to over and over again so long as it’s in the context of the album and not just for my individual shuffle playlists, so, it’s an okay song in my book, although, I won’t be coming back to it UNLESS I’m listening to the full project front to back.

5. untitled 05 | 09.21.2014.

I’ve been listening to this track ALOT lately. Like, I’m talking hours with this one song on repeat, it’s no secret that I fucking love this track and it’s funny cause this is the definition of a track that grew on me. At first, I thought it was just okay, but for some reason, when I put it on now, I really fucking like it. I don’t know, but what I do know is, this shit goes in. But not in the typical, Waka Flocka Flame, turn up, trap way. No no no…about as hard as a Jazz rap song can go. A Jazz rap banger if you will lol. Yeah, a Jazz Rap Banger son! Anna Wise’s vocals are fucking haunting, but in a good way (Not in a fucking creepy way like Bilal was on the 1st track). Wise’s vocals are like this song I heard during my childhood, around Christmas time. The song was about wanting to see Santa Claus and not being able to wait for Christmas. I remember the song went something along the lines of

“I…I can’t wait…for Christmassss…”

 FOUND IT! The song was called “I can’t wait for Christmas” by Mindi Abair, check it out. Song still sounds as great as I remember it as a child and THIS song, specifically Anna’s vocals, remind me a lot of that song that I really liked as a kid. Anyway, Kendrick comes through with a really vivid verse from the perspective of a disgruntled person who is jealous of another person who has a more successful (or what Kendrick’s character perceives as) a more successful life than him/her. The verse ends with Kendrick’s character planning to kill this person. This shit is powerful to me because I can totally relate to that feeling of just wanting to erase someone cause my life is so shit and I can’t figure out how to change it, so, I figure I take others down with me. Especially those who I think have an objectively better life than me. Idefinitely wanna take those fuckers down. Just to make myself feel good. After Kendrick’s verse ends, rapper and TDE affiliate Punch comes through with a really nice verse, hell he almost upstaged Kendrick on his own (unfinished) song. Kendrick then comes back with a couple of rap lines until motherfuckin’ JAY ROCK comes through and masterfully delivers a few rap lines before trading bars back and forth with Kendrick for a brief period of time. I wanted this song to be longer because I really liked the ideas that were being rapped about in this song. This song had concepts that were fucking begging to be explored more in depth with additional verses. But overall, this track is fucking excellent. Do make sure to check out this track. Hands down, my absolute favorite track on this compilation album.

Side-note: This “untitled” track contains part of the verses that Kendrick performed at the 2016 Grammys.

06. untitled 06 | 06.30.2014.

Remember I mentioned lounge music earlier? Well, Kendrick heard me loud and clear and delivered some more lounge music lol. This track sounds like a Hip Hop infused, easy listening song. CeeLo Green comes through with a nice, catchy ass bridge. Kendrick and CeeLo need to work together more frequently cause I think they sound great together. This song could’ve easily developed into being a fully fledged track for “To Pimp a Butterfly”. Chill beat, chill raps, chill hook, chill singing, and overall chill song. I rate this song chill/10…no but it’s a nice song, although not that memorable.

07. untitled 07 | 2014 – 2016

Clocking in at just over 8 minutes, we get the longest track on this entire project. “untitled 07” is really 2 songs and a long ass outro combined into one big track. The first part of the song is a trap influenced song about shit not getting you as “high as this” and it works for the most part. Except, Kendrick’s flow is lazy but I think that’s on purpose to go along with the off kilter trap beat that Kendrick is rhyming over. I  like the lazy flow though. It reminds me of a drunk person, like if I took my drunk Dad and put him in a music studio recording booth and said “rap to this beat” then this would be the result, which is Kendrick’s flow on here lol. And I love when Kendrick goes

” Levitate, levitate, levitate, levitate”

The shit is catchy and in a good way too! It’s not like one of those shitty pop songs on the radio that I find myself repeating all day in my head at school.

Anyway, at the 2 minute and 32 second mark, the beat shifts into a slower tempo, horn induced coma type beat and the following words are sung in a child’s voice

“Compton is where I’m from”

“Is where I’m from, where is I’m from”

Which, I really like for some strange reason, I think it’s because it reminds me of this song by another rapper called Macklemore (Who you may or may not be familiar with, and if you are familiar with him but don’t like him, I really don’t give a fuck) who made a song called “Wing$” about the obsession over material items in today’s youth culture, specifically in the United States. It’s actually a really good song and you need to listen to it, check it out here.  Anyway, the beat changes up into a much slower, much more quiet beat. This beat is not nearly as attention grabbing as the last beat. However, this is because this particular beat was allegedly produced bySwizz Beatz’s 5 year old son nicknamed “Young Egypt” (I don’t really believe a 5 year old produced that beat, I think Swizz Beatz made some basic ass beat while his kid was in the studio one day and was like “Let me tell all these dumb motherfuckers that my son did this shit, yeah, I’ll look like the man, make it look like my talent is genectic or some shit, yeah.” that’s how I picture it going down in my head. Swizz Beatz, you lyin’ motherfucker! Fuck you! Lol no but for real, I really don’t know). But yeah, this is the flow I really like from Kendrick, a clear, sharp flow. People want to say that the line

“I can never end a career if it never start”

is a shot toward fellow rapper Jay Electronica, however, that is not possible as Terrace Martin, frequent collaborator of Kendrick Lamar and a fucking fantastic all around musician himself, (seriously Terrace Martin is fucking awesome, he sings, plays the saxophone, produces, raps, anything you can think of doing when it comes to making music, Terrace Martin has fucking done and has done exceptionally well. In fact, check out his debut album “3ChordFold” here.) confirmed in an interview with complex magazine that these tracks were recorded way before the Jay Electronica drama even existed. So, to the people who want to start drama over misinterpreted lyrics. Shut the fuck up and put a sock in it. Although, I will admit, it is funny how these tracks, that were never meant to be released in the first place, were released right around the time that a rumored Jay Electronica and Kendrick Lamar beef was brewing cause Jay Electronica is notoriously known for not having put out an album even though everyone and their mother wants a fucking Jay Electronica album (I know I do). Timing is fucking amazing sometimes, is that God working in mysterious ways? Lol I’m not sure honestly, part of me says “yes” and the other part says “shut up you dummy it’s a fucking coincidence” I really don’t know which part to believe. Anyway, this was a cool, short, second part of the track.

Finally, we get to the last 3rd of the track which is basically an outro of Kendrick and his band fucking around and trying to record the “Head is the future interlude” (untitled 04) we heard from earlier in the project. There’s something about the strumming of that one guitar string that’s so fucking calming to me. I think it’s because it reminds me of sleep, like sometimes I would fall asleep to R&B singer Miguel’s song “Pussy is mine” which you can check out here. (Phenomenal song by the way) and it had that same type of one note guitar strumming. This last part of “untitled 07” is pretty calming and relaxing, it puts me in a lazy, chill state of mind. I don’t have any more to say about this outro though, Kendrick attempts to record “untitled 04” and cracks a few jokes and laughs with his band. And in essence, this outro represents what this project is all about, a place to look at the extras, the leftovers from the epic album that was “To Pimp a Butterfly”. This project is similar to the behind-the-scenes extras on DVDs, just a way to explore more in depth, the making of such an astounding piece of work, and in this case it would be the album “To Pimp a Butterfly”. I think it’s really fascinating when you compare the “To Pimp a Butterfly” album to a movie and this “untitled unmastered” compilation to the DVD extras and deleted scenes. Anyway, this outro was a solid way to end the track.

8. untitled 08 | 09.06.2014.

Oh hell yeah! Kendrick gets funky on this last track! This track sounds like it could’ve replaced the song “King Kunta” on “To Pimp a Butterfly”. This shit is really nice, like this song makes me feel like I’m in a 1970s discothèque doing The Disco Finger dance move lol. None of the lyrics stand out like they did in the live TV performance of this song on Jimmy Fallon’s Show, which you can watchhere. (Which is something I seriously need YOU, yes YOU reading this sentence to go check out RIGHT NOW. This is basically another situation like the “untitled 03” track where the live version blows the CD quality version out of the fucking water! Seriously, check out the live performance of this song, there’s also lyrics from “untitled 02” in that performance as well)

Overall, what did I think of Kendrick Lamar’s untitled unmastered compilation album of B sides from the “To Pimp a Butterfly” sessions? Well, that’s just it, these are unfinished songs, “unmastered” songs, songs that didn’t get to bake in the oven. It would be unfair of me to really scrutinize these track on a level that a fully fleshed out project would be scrutinized. However, that is NOT an excuse for garbage sounding music, throw away, b-side songs or not, if it sounds bad, it will get treated as such and therefore be rated accordingly. If it’s garbage sounding music to me, I will declare it as such, regardless of the context behind the music (even though context is very important, it isn’t in the event of just listening to music and judging how it sounds to you). But for this project? It succeeds even without the “oh it’s just leftovers” excuse. This project is solid all the way through, it’s short and doesn’t overstay its welcome (the project is only 8 tracks and only runs for 35 minutes total)  and there isn’t any song I truly dislike, just songs that I wouldn’t come back to for individual track listening. If I were just listening to this project all the way through however, I wouldn’t skip A SINGLE track. These throwaway’s are THAT good, I recommend this shit to anyone who wasn’t a huge fan of the sound of “To Pimp a Butterfly” and would like something a little closer to today’s 808 and high hat influenced sound (specifically the tracks “untitled 02” and “untitled 07”) Cornrow Kenny, did it A FUCKING GAIN MAYNE. He, as Anthony Fantano of The Needle Drop put it “has the best batting average in rap right now” and I have to say, I agree. Good job, Kenny.

Favorite Tracks: untitled 02, untitled 05, untitled 07, untitled 08

Least Favorite Track: untitled 03

I give “untitled unmastered.” an 8/10

Listen to “untitled unmastered.” here.

written by Joseph Sanker II in 2016.

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Until next time! Peace out! One.

Written by Joseph Sanker II