A Review of Kendrick Lamar’s “GNX”

A matching black and white car, like the cover art for "GNX." Photo by George Sultan via Pexels

Grammy-winning rapper Kendrick Lamar dropped his seventh studio album, “GNX,” at noon on Nov. 22, without any previous announcement. Usually, Lamar releases a song titled “The Heart pt. X” around a week before the album releases. While this song would have been “The Heart pt. 6,” this song title was used by Drake during the last released song as part of the Lamar versus Drake beef — despite this, a song titled “Heart pt. 6” does appear on the album.

Lamar’s past three albums, “To Pimp A Butterfly,” “DAMN.” and “Mr. Morale and The Big Steppers” were all highly praised albums. While the first two focused on world issues, such as U.S. politics, race and religion, his last album focused more on his internal struggles. 

More recently, he was in the previously mentioned beef with Canadian rapper Drake, culminating in his Grammy-nominated song “Not Like Us,” and the announcement of his upcoming Super Bowl halftime show performance. The last song released before this point was given the title “Watch The Party Die” by fans, which focused on his disdain for the party culture popular artists like Drake try to sell and how their attempts at cash hurt the people that follow in their steps.

“GNX” starts with “wacced out murals.” This track is about a mural someone painted of Lamar in his hometown of Compton, California that was vandalized following the beef between him and Drake. The most notable aspect of this track, along with most other tracks on this album, is the heavy use of darker-sounding electric and trap elements, a stark shift away from the piano and step-dancing of “Mr. Morale and The Big Steppers.”

This track makes a lot of references to his current situation post-beef, including his further separation from the party culture he argued against on “Watch The Party Die.” Lamar reacts to being chosen for the Super Bowl halftime show over New Orleans’ Lil Wayne, Snoop Dogg reposting a song that uses his AI voice in the Drake beef, “Taylor Made” and ending the song with reinforcing his importance within rap. Compared to previous albums, this version of Lamar appears more ruthless and unforgiving.

The second track, “squabble up,” was teased at the beginning of the music video for “Not Like Us,” and that point being named by fans as “Broccoli.” This track continues on Lamar’s success and calling out bad actors, while over a catchy pop beat. Also featured within the song is a call-and-response section extremely reminiscent of the call-and-response section at the end of “Not Like Us.”
“luther” is a massive shift for the album, introducing more organic string and guitar elements throughout. This song, featuring SZA, is a love song about loving and trusting in a relationship despite being so angry with other people. The “luther” of the title comes from the sampled artist, whose vocals are featured throughout the song.

“man at the garden” keeps a relatively simple beat throughout the song, with a growing piano and strings backing. While the first two verses are about Lamar’s wanting everything for himself for his own greatness, the final verse delves into his continued want to fight for his family and how that keeps him in check when dealing with doubters.

“hey now” talks about the peace he feels with being stable in life and how his stability makes him more confident about dealing with people he dislikes. The second half of the song includes a feature by Los Angeles rapper Dody6, continuing the bragging from Lamar’s verse.

“reincarnated” is a tribute to an artist Lamar regularly references, 2Pac. Besides sampling one of 2Pac’s songs, the drums and the way Lamar changes his vocals are also reminiscent of 2Pac’s style. The song tells the story of a different artist through a first-person perspective, including songwriter Al Green, performer Billie Holiday and finally himself, with the ending promise to not let the contributions of Green and Holiday’s music on his life not go to waste, carrying on their legacy through being their reincarnation.

“tv off” continues his critique of Drake, how his music promotes an extremely toxic culture and how Drake didn’t live in the same environment as the music and messages he claims to push. The TV in the title refers to the way he only watches the culture he attempts to imitate. The biggest reference to this beef, and the most meme-able moment of the album comes during a beat switch produced by DJ Mustard, producer of “Not Like Us,” when Lamar yells the word “mustard” for around eight seconds. 

“dodger blue” continues Lamar’s pride around his L.A. heritage both in his verse, and by features by Roddy Rich, Wallie the Sensi and Siete7x, all three of which are from L.A. “peekaboo” continues features from Dody6 and fellow L.A. rapper AzChike. The chorus of the song features the repeated phrases of “What are they talking about/They’re talking about nothing.” With more L.A.-only features on this song, this seems to be a continuation of Lamar’s L.A. pride.

“heart pt. 6” features a brighter instrumental and reflects on Lamar’s history with Dave Free, who is a frequent creative collaborator, and with his old rap group “Black Hippy,” featuring fellow L.A. artists Ab-Soul, ScHoolboyQ and Jay Rock. While he admits that Black Hippy wasn’t as successful as he wanted it to be, he wants to make sure he doesn’t repeat those mistakes moving forward with his self-owned label, pgLang.

“gnx” is another heavy L.A. feature song, featuring Peysoh and Hitta J3, while also featuring Washington rapper YoungThreat. The final track, “gloria,” once again features SZA. Lamar talks about how no matter how much it enables him to be a great or horrible person, no matter where he is emotionally, writing will always be one of the most important things to him.

Overall, this album is a shift from most of Lamar’s previous works. While previous albums saw him playing some sort of character learning and growing, this album acts more like a promise that even after the last few years, he wants to keep pushing boundaries in music and business, reforming the culture he sees as poisoned by artists like Drake into a new force for good. The uplifting of smaller L.A.-rappers shows Lamar’s promise to always stay loyal to where he’s from, no matter how famous he gets.