Kendrick Lamar: "untitled 05 | 09.21.2014"
When Kendrick debuted fragments of “untitled 5” during his performance at this year’s Grammys, it was as an epilogue to his raucous, survivalist anthem “Alright.” And it was also the exclamation point capping a series of live performances featuring unreleased songs. “See I’m living with anxiety, ducking sobriety/ Fucking up the system, I ain’t fucking with society/ Justice ain’t free, therefore justice ain’t me,” he barked at a Staples Center crowd, shackled and surrounded by black men in prison jumpsuits.
Following “Alright,” it read like a glimpse of momentary doubt, a little concession to the overwhelming odds faced. Why do you want to see a good man with a broken heart? Maybe we won’t be alright after all. His dead-eyed stare and his snarling raps sold this dark alternative. “Once upon a time I used to go to church and talk to God/ Now I’m thinkin’ to myself, hollow tips is all I got,” he spit. Maybe there’s really only one way out.
The complete “untitled 5” is found on untitled unmastered., a collection of To Pimp A Butterfly demos released just last night. This version is untethered to the hopeful exuberance of “Alright.” It fully explores how power disparities create street violence, and how that violence impacts the psyche, shaping one’s sense of normality. It grapples with sanity in the context of a human framework that doesn’t make sense. It wonders if the prerequisites for lucidity are skewed in the hood, if it’s even possible to think rationally trapped in a loaded reality. Kendrick, along with TDE cohorts Punch and Jay Rock, tackle how classism feeds the prison-industrial complex, and in turn, commodifies black violence.
“untitled 5” is driven by this internal conversation, and Kendrick jackhammers through, as a lurching bass line swells around him. He and Rock rap in tandem—just before an eight-second Eric Dolphy sample closes “5” out—voicing the impact of prisons, both literal and figurative: “Professional dream killers reason why I’m awake,” he says. The same cycle that ravages black communities across America pushed Kendrick Lamar to speak for them.
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