Since Kendrick’s decision to headline the halftime show at Super Bowl LIX, the meaning of his politics has only become more slippery, just as his artistic output has become less polemical.
Photo: pgLang
The enthusiastic response to Kendrick Lamar’s music over the past 12 years has been driven in part by the perception that he’s a political vessel. He’s not just the most lyrically gifted MC of his generation but the griot of the Obama era and its discontents, whose songs have galvanized street protests against police brutality as seamlessly as they have filled concert arenas and inspired academic books. But what exactly are his politics? Kendrick is provocative without being didactic, and his views often have to be inferred…
