Drake’s honest review of Kendrick Lamar’s ‘good kid, m.A.A.d city’
With all the vicious insults and accusations that have been slung over these past few years, it can be difficult to recall that Drake and Kendrick Lamar once were on good terms. They hung out, they worked together on projects—they actually seemed to like each other’s music. Drake is even on record speaking favourably about his nemesis’ second album.
Drake and Kendrick first worked together on ‘Buried Alive Interlude,’ which featured on the former’s second album Take Care. In the track, Kendrick expresses his fears for what fame might do to his life, which, in light of the beef that would later emerge, is quite interesting.
Kendrick wasn’t yet quite so well-known by this point, but Drake had already become a superstar. Looking back now, it’s almost as if Drake, who clearly relishes his fame and life of luxury, had become the antithesis of Kendrick, or, at least, of the person that Kendrick aspired to be, and the track was working through that tension.
That may be overdoing the armchair psychology a touch, and, in any case, Drake and Kendrick’s relationship around this period was perfectly amicable. In an interview Kendrick gave to XXL in 2011, he reflected on his first meeting with Drake—and he was jarringly complimentary about him.
“We met up, chilled out, got to vibe, see where each other was at and shit,” Kendrick said. “Sometimes you like a person’s music but you definitely don’t like the actual artist when you sit down and you talk to them. That’s a real good dude. He got a real genuine soul. We clicked immediately.”
With people responding well to ‘Buried Alive Interlude,’ Drake brought Kendrick along on tour in 2012, which was around the time that Kendrick signed to Interscope Records. He released his second album, Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City, in October that same year, and, sure enough, it featured a friendly voice, with Drake appearing on ‘Poetic Justice.’ Each of them also appeared on A$AP Rocky’s ‘Fuckin’ Problems,’ which was released at the end of the year.
Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City arrived shortly before tensions started to flare between Drake and Kendrick, but there was a short period of grace. It was during this calm period that Drake gave an interview in which he offered up his real thoughts about the album. Speaking to Vibe about how his own songwriting is rooted in his real life, Drake admitted that he would struggle to write a conceptual album. But he knows someone who most certainly can.
“The last great concept album was good kid, m.A.A.d city—still obviously true to his life but very conceptual,” Drake said of Kendrick’s record. “Very specific stories that need to be told. I always say hats off to that album. That album’s incredible, what an undertaking. For me, I would never want to be restricted to that.”
Not long after Drake said that, the Big Sean track ‘Control’ came out. Featuring Kendrick’s now infamous verse that called out Drake and many of their peers, this is widely believed to be the spark that started the nasty feud that reached its zenith over the last few years. It’s strange to think, from our current standpoint, that things had once been so friendly between Drake and Kendrick, but times change.