In this brave new world of corrosive alterna-facts and neo-nuclear heebie-jeebies, let us give thanks for Kendrick Lamar, a rapper brave enough to mop up America’s most pungent funk and blast it back in verbal laser light, sea to shining sea.
On his extrasensory new album, “DAMN.,” our hero outlines the ills of the nation — “It’s murder on my street, your street, back streets, Wall Street, corporate offices, banks, employees and bosses with homicidal thoughts”—then points his finger at a really bad dude: “Donald Trump is in office.” He’s spraying red-hot invective, but his voice is a minty cool spritz. As the world grows more disordered, his vision clears.
And who better to trust than a California dreamer who can see beyond the madness of the moment while his Reeboks are still planted in it? For all of the introspection and self-doubt that makes Lamar’s body of work feel so exceptional, “DAMN.” radiates certitude from the tracklist outward. The album’s song titles are one word apiece, rendered in capital letters and stamped with a period. So yes, he’s still expressing the complexity of his humanity—“Watch my soul speak,” he instructs during the staccato chest-puffs of “HUMBLE.”—but, this time, with machinelike mettle.
People are also reading…
Also new: The music surrounding his voice feels uncluttered, giving Lamar the opportunity to clear a few things up, including the fact that his politics — which earned him a reputation as one of popular music’s premiere zeitgeist-wranglers — were never a pose. “Last LP, I tried to lift the black artists,” he raps during the climax of “ELEMENT.,” citing “To Pimp a Butterfly,” his 2015 opus which became the unofficial soundtrack of the Black Lives Matter movement, “but it’s a difference between black artists and wack artists.”
Lyrically, the album establishes an old-school, shuffle-resistant continuity that connects one song to the next.
As a lyricist, Lamar’s gift remains extraordinary. You know it, I know it, and he knows it, too. “I don’t love people enough to put my faith in men,” he confesses on “PRIDE.,” a song addressing morality, mortality, God and craft. “I put my faith in these lyrics.” To believe in his words is to be dazzled by them.
He deploys different tones across “DAMN.,” establishing varying degrees of intimacy along the way, but Lamar’s default timbre remains that raspy half-shout, where his throat sounds dry and his mouth sounds wet. You can hear wisdom and desire in that voice, regardless of the words he’s forming. He’s hoarse from rebuking the universe, but still salivating, eager to tell you more.
