Release
Kendrick Lamar’s 2024 release of GNX happened with little to almost no rollout. The only piece of promotion was a singular minute long trailer released only 30 minutes before the album was put out on all streaming services. The teaser, being the snippet not included in the album, immediately lays out key themes, ideas, and aesthetics for the album. Long, moving shots of the contrasting dark and light indoors beckon you into the album. The music lays out a lot of the production themes and the soundscape for most of the album.
Like many people, I didn’t know anything about the album until it was fully released, which I think is not only intended but one of the major reasons to release the album in this fairly unconventional way. I had the entirety of the media released seconds after not knowing that he had an album he was working on at all. It gives a very different feel almost immediately. The entirety of the release process was very focused and very direct. There was almost an absence of a release process. All you had to go off of was the album cover, which includes exclusively the album title’s namesake, the GNX car, and Kendrick.
I feel like at first glance there is not a lot to say about the car that has not been said a thousand times (I will talk about it when the car is included in the lyrics of songs); however, the GNX fits what Kendrick is trying to accomplish on this record fairly well. It is held up as your only introduction before sitting down and clicking play.
Track 1
Track one is titled “wacced out murals.” It begins with the first common theme throughout the album, singing from Deyra Barrera. She is a Spanish singer songwriter who shows up 3 times in GNX, singing in spanish. According to Genius she “performed a tribute for Dodgers legend Fernando Valenzuela during Game One of the World Series… A performance that would ultimately lead to Kendrick Lamar recruiting her to collaborate.” This immediately starts off the theme of this album being heavily invested in the city of Los Angeles. It’s culture, art, and most importantly it’s artists. This is the first example of showcasing an LA artist, finding her at an event for the local team.
It introduces layered vocals that lead into stringed instruments. There is a lot of production like this throughout the album, having a lot of violins and guitars composed to make a sound that is very distinct even on some of the more old school LA beats. I’m kind of biased, but I really like string sections in any piece of music. It fits very well with the stripped back vocals and lyrical content of this song. As the song progresses the intent and content of this album is layed out.
Kendrick is very directly talking about a mural of his in Compton, his home city. This is of course an incredibly important city for any conversation about Kendrick throughout any point in his career. The mural was vandalized, which to Kendrick does not seem that harmful, but instead an introduction and metaphor to talk about honor, history, the hiphop industry.
He talks about both himself and the listener about putting in work and respect for your craft. He repeatedly brings descriptions of people who do not like him or who might not like you. It’s more than like, its people he fundamentally disagrees with. He weaves in descriptions of his childhood and family, how he’s lost relatives and friends.
A few lines read “You ever have Cap’n Crunch and proceeded to put water in it?…Then make it to be a star, bare your soul and put your heart up in it? Well, I did. Wacced the murals out, but it ain’t no legend if my legend ends.”
This is possibly commentary on not only people in the industry that do not understand his upbringing and his love for the craft of music, but on what people think of him in general. A few specific people in the industry are brought up by name such as Lil Wayne, Snoop Dogg, and Nas.
Lil Wayne is brought up because Kendrick was picked over him to perform at the Super Bowl, even though the game is in Lil Wayne’s hometown. Kendrick says he used to be a big fan of Wayne and feels his “hard work let Lil Wayne down.” Snoop Dogg, another legend in the hiphop space especially on the West Coast was brought up because of “Taylor made freestyle,” a song from Drake that had an AI generated verse from both Tupac and Snoop Dogg, which Snoop Dogg had reposted. The song, in my opinion, was incredibly disrespectful to Tupac and overall should be seen as a very negative and shameless thing to do on a song. It’s a strange thing for Snoop to be on board with. Finally Kendrick says “Won the Super Bowl, and Nas the only one congratulate me, “which is in reference to Nas (an incredibly accomplished, respected, and important legend in hip hop) who has been in fairly vocal support of Kendrick, on top of referencing the lack of much other support. Nas’s Illmatic is one of the most influential rap albums ever made.
He also turns his attention onto the state of hip hop as a whole, saying some artists are outdated or not fully invested into the culture. He talks about the “party dying” which is in reference to some of the major figures from hiphop being never good to begin with. He talks about staying away from the “dying party” and sobering up. He goes on to say one of the more important lines from this record.
“This is not for lyricists, I swear that’s not the sentiment. F*** a double entendre I want you to feel this.”
Kendrick has often been known as a rapper who has been seen as conscious, and people read into his lyrics and word play far too much sometimes. He does not want your main takeaway to be a specific bar or any type of word play. He wants to be saying something and he wants you to feel it.
Track 2
Track two is titled “squabble up.” This shows up as a snippet in the “Not Like Us” music video and is the only song on the album to have its own music video. This song has a lot of things that have become synonymous with his music. Odd vocal inflections along with horns and interesting noises in the back of the production. The drums are set up for dancing. The lyrics are fairly straightforward and confident, including a sample from a Debbie Deb song, “When I hear music, it makes me dance.”
The entirety of the music video takes place in a singular green room, with tons of references that are often not entirely important, but very interesting to learn about if you want to. His artistic vision really comes through in not only the songs he makes but every media that he releases. His videos recently have a very similar feel.
A majority of the references are of LA or Compton. The video can be seen as a celebration of local art and culture, along with a lot of insights to Kendrick’s mindset. It was directed by Calmatic and if you have not seen it I would definitely recommend it.
Track 3
Track three is titled “Luther.” This song features SZA and is the most popular song on the album so far. I am a fairly big fan of SZA, (you should listen to her album ctrl), who appears twice on this album. The beat starts out with a guitar before switching to a more synth and drum oriented beat. The string section for this song might be my favorite part. It makes this song one of the best songs on the album, my second favorite. The track has alternating and intertwining lyrics from both SZA and Kendrick throughout, which when their vocals do mix are some of the more beautiful parts of the album. It also has an incredible sample from the legend and song’s namesake, Luther Vandross, whose line “If this world were mine” is brought in along with lyrics of poetic descriptions of love, taking away pain, and overarching ideas of the world.
This song brings back some production and vocal ideas from one of Kendrick’s past album, D***, which is my favorite album from him. However, this time it’s mixed in with more tender instruments and vocals. It’s just really nice to listen to.
Track 4
Track four is titled “man at the garden.” This is my favorite song on GNX. The refrain throughout is “I deserve it all.” The start of the song sets the tone with the drums mixed with gentle rain. It slowly builds with synths that flip back and forth from warm and cold. It’s fairly reminiscent of “Mr.Morale and the Big Steppers” with its production and backing vocals. This song takes its time. It’s deceptively simple at first, and it builds. Kendrick is a really good song writer and a really good story teller, and it really shows through with the lyrics for this song.
Each line tells the story of how he got to where he is and why it’s important that this is the way that he reached it. Every line is a case for why he deserves what he has. There’s a few ways you could go about interpreting it, with his history of lyrics about staying focused on his art, not seeking validation, and even commentary on his savior complex. He builds a case throughout the song and ends it with some of the lines that hit the hardest on the album.
“I deserve it all because it’s mine, Tell me why you think you deserve the greatest of all time.”
He fights with contradictions throughout the song of fame, power, money, and integrity and how he has handled it. The steady build and payoff is what makes it worth it. It’s just my favorite soundscape on the album.
Track 5
Track five is titled “hey now.” This song focuses in on incredibly West Coast song and features a West Coast rapper, dody6. The beat is my favorite part of this song, having also been rapped over by Tyler, The Creator in “That Guy.” Both songs are so much fun to listen to, the bridge of this song is my favorite part. The lyrics and flow feel like I’m walking around a cold, early morning LA street. Dody6’s verse fits perfectly and is everything I could want for a feature on that song. If you like this song, you’ll really like both this style of West Coast rap, and Tyler’s version of this song.
Track 6
Track six is titled “reincarnated.” It starts out with more vocals from Deyra Barrera, a maybe continuation of the lines from the very start of the album. It’s a dense story throughout history of several different famous figures told through the lens of reincarnation of artists. The flow Kendrick has brings you back to older days of hiphop. He samples Tupac and talks about his (Kendrick’s) personal childhood before quickly switching to some old blues star’s childhood and career. He talks about several artists throughout the years as if he was them in a past life, who died with sin, gluttony, and drugs. He then brings the focus back to him and comments on his mortality. One line that I think shows us how reincarnation and the ideas at play are pulled together is “Every individual is only a version of you.”
He not only talks about his own shortcomings throughout his childhood, but realises he could have made the very same mistakes that people throughout all of time make. He pulls together people through their shared mistakes and shared humanity.
In this song he begins to have a conversation with his “father.” While this is probably related to his relationship with his own father (whose relationship with Kendrick is talked about a lot on Mr.Moral and the Big Steppers), this father is more of a metaphor for god, or morality as a whole. First Kendrick says “I’m yelling, “Father, did I finally get it right?” Everything I did was selfless, I spoke freely, when the people needed me, I helped them.” but God replies, “Son, you do well, but your heart is closed, I can tell residue that linger from your past creates itself, How can they forgive when there’s no forgiveness in your heart?”
He questions his own power and his own molarity, and fears he has misused his influence, just as millions of artists throughout time. He accepts that at a base level is just like every one who he hates, but through actions and careful good morals is trying to be as good as he can. He has a conversation with his own morality and walks away by saying “I vow my life just to live one in harmony now.”
Track 7
Track seven is titled “tv off.” As the second most popular song from this album, it has my favorite beat of the album. It features lefty gunplay, a fairly good LA rapper. His verse only is very short and a great end to the song. The production of this song is filled with horns and one of the best synth lines I have ever heard. I’m a big fan of songs with production like that, especially with horns. This song is another one to dance to and has a lot of incredibly interesting flow, lyrics, and structure. The song starts off with naming the car, the black grand national (also known as a gnx), before continuing with lyrics about there not being that many good people left around him and descriptions of growing up in compton.
The GNX was an incredibly fast, anomaly car that was only made for a short time. It’s a very clear and direct stand in for what Kendrick values, being very good at your art or what you were made to do, quality. It mostly just provides the exact aesthetic he wanted for this album.
He makes a reference to one of my favorite songs on this track, “the revolution will not be televised.” That song is an older jazz song about how the revolution won’t be brought to you on a screen where you can watch replays, resistance happens by doing something. This same theme is reflected by the chorus of “tv off” which is a repetition of “turn this tv off.” Some interpretations could be urging the audience not to stay where the old jazz song warned you not to be, on the sidelines. He is saying plainly to get involved and make change. You can find people who share your values and then turn off the television.
Track 8
Track eight is titled “dodger blue.” This song features the most people on the album including wallie the sensei, siete7x, and roddy rich, who are all from Kendrick’s hometown of Compton, California. Unfortunately, this is my least favorite song on the album, however it’s still pretty good and I have listened to it quite a bit. I think the reason I’m not as sold on this song are the flows and the lyrics throughout the song. It does have a pretty good production and I would still recommend listening to it.
Track 9
Track nine is titled “peekaboo.” It features azchike (yet another smaller LA artist) and starts with a really cool sample before entering into the main incredibly west coast beat. I think that this song is a commentary on artists who lie or say filler for all their lyrics. This song has a lot of repetitive bars and lines throughout the song. The main one is “What they talkin’ ’bout? They ain’t talkin’ ’bout nothin’.” I don’t think that a song really has to say anything, it just has to bring something to make me want to listen to it. Some of my favorite songs don’t have very important lyrics and then some song’s lyrics are the reason they are my favorite. Even with repeating lines fairly frequently the song still comes out sounding pretty good and something that I listen to frequently. They really aren’t saying anything on this song and they don’t need to, it sounds great.
There are a few lines that I would point to on this track that are the worst lines on the entire album. At one point Kendrick says “Bing-bap-boom-boom-boom-bap-bam, The type of s*** I’m on, you wouldn’t understand,” which, while funny, is my least favorite line and just one I genuinely do not like. Then following it up with “The type of skits I’m on, you wouldn’t understand,” Which I just think are simply bad lines. It’s often not a very serious song, which again, a song does not need to be serious to be good. I just don’t think it pulled off what it was going for.
However some of the goofy lines on this song I still like and think it pulls off, mostly azchike’s lines. Ironically if azchike was the only artist on this song I would like it more. “Heard what happened to your mans, not sorry for your loss,” is one example of a funny line that I like mostly because of the delivery. Kendrick’s bars on this song fall flat for me a lot more than azchike’s. The beat on this song is incredible, and it is overall a fairly interesting song that I’ve still listened to a lot.
Track 10
Track ten is titled “heart pt. 6.” This is a really important song for this album. For me it really brings a lot of the stories together, this is another really good song writing story. It’s another incredible beat, but in a different way this time. This song is pretty different. An important and repeated line is “Free your thoughts and watch them fly,Use your heart and not your eyes.” It deals with passion and music throughout Kendrick’s life.
The story told through this song is Kendrick before fame and throughout fame. It begins with his original hip hop group, black hippie. This was a rap collective of Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q, and Jay Rock, all of which are incredible artists in their own right. Kendrick tells the story of before they were all big, back when they were all trying to help each other get a record deal and all making music together. He states that “That was back when the only goal was to get Jay Rock through the door…It was simple math, if he made it, that mean I made it.”
He also name drops Ab-soul and Top, both incredibly influential people in Kendrick’s life. It really shows you the story of how Kendrick got to where he is and everyone around him. Over one of the most sonically interesting instrumentals of the album Kendrick lays out his passion for music and his own history, using love and heart as something to strive towards.
Track 11
Track eleven is the title track, “gnx.” It features peysoh, youngthreat, and hitta j3. This to me is one of the more underrated songs on this album. It has a charm to it that I really like and I think every one of the features bring something new to the song. It’s another very modern west coast beat with lots of more underground west coast rappers. It might be the memories I’ve already made listening to this song, but this song has a certain cinematic quality to it for me that you wouldn’t really expect when listening to it the first time.
One repeated line I really like is the different variations of, for example, “Tell them Kendrick did it,” which each artist on this song says with their own name. I just think it really works with this type of song structure and each artist having their own verse. The different flows throughout this song are probably my favorite part. Peysoh’s vocal inflections and vocal style fit this song perfectly. Hitta’s flow is probably my favorite on this song and brings a completely new angle on the instrumental. Youngthreat’s verse closes out the song at a lower register and more relaxed instrumental and flow. It all works really well for me.
Track 12
Track twelve is titled “gloria.” This is the final track of the album and has another feature from SZA and another inclusion of vocals from Deyra Barrera. My interpretation of the song is as a love letter. Again this is one of the more beautiful songs on this album and is a pretty perfect end to the album. It definitely feels like an end.
This song starts with a reference in spanish to Anita Baker, who was mentioned a few times on this record and seems to be an inspiration to Kendrick. She was a musical artist from the 1970s and 1980s who is 66 years old now. I have not listened to her music but both Kendrick and Andre 3000 have mentioned her as someone they admire. I think this ties into the story of this song being a love letter to music, or his pen.
The song intertwines descriptions of a relationship with a person and his relationship with his art and the art process. Or even using either the person he is in love with as a metaphor for his writing or his writing as a metaphor for a person he is in love with.
On top of Kendrick’s story and lyrics is SZA’s chorus for this song. It has a lot of devices, like the type of melody and lyrics, that are very much a signature for her. She also has an incredibly cool interlude in the middle of the song.
This song does exactly what it’s intended to do very well. Even on first listen this song gives the feelings of closing a chapter.
End / Commentary
2024 was an amazing year for music, for my discovery of so much new music, but also in almost every genre there were big new things happening. This album is one of my favorites from 2024 in a year of so many impactful albums that came out for me. Kendrick’s discography is one of my favorites but it was a very new experience to be a fan of him when he dropped a new album since he hasn’t released one since 2022 and I became a fan of his in 2023.
Kendrick’s albums have such a cinematic feel to them. I really think he’s dedicated to his artform and making good art. This album has a lot of passion in it. I think some of the reasons why it’s so special is Kendrick has gone through decades of his craft and now gets to reflect on everything, now that he has paved the way and reached the top of where he can go. He pushes the same values and the same philosophy that he has always had. Self dedication and self reflection are vitally important to this album and most of his discography. It incorporates themes and styles from every one of his past albums but brings his influences back to their roots.
You rarely get an album like this from artists that are giants in their own right. People at the top of artforms rarely get to be content and reflect after they have laid down influential, groundbreaking work. He’s made his own way and now gets to make an album like GNX.
This album is something that I love that it had the chance to exist at all, and I think it’s something I will be able to come back to at any point in my life.
