How Ghostface Killah collaborated with Kendrick Lamar: “It was an honour”
Ghostface Killah is a hip-hop veteran. Since the early ’90s, the Staten Island rapper has released classic albums, including Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) alongside Wu-Tang Clan and his solo album, Supreme Clientele.
Despite being a legend of the genre, he’s not afraid to admit his appreciation for newer artists who show him love. In 2022, he made one of his biggest appearances yet with a feature on a Kendrick Lamar album.
Ghost and Kendrick teamed up on the song ‘Purple Hearts’, which appeared as the final track on the first disc of Mr Morale and the Big Steppers. Produced by DJ Khalil and J LBS, the song also featured Summer Walker. The title nodded to the Purple Heart, a military decoration by the US armed forces.
In the third verse, Ghost comes through with an impressive performance. The track’s origins were pretty simple, with Kendrick revealing he was a fan of Ghostface and striking a connection from there. “[Kendrick Lamar and his team] hit my manager Mike,” he told Billboard. “He was like, ‘Yo, I want you to do this record.’”
From there, they showed mutual respect. Ghost credited him for being one of the best lyricists and Kendrick responded by telling him one of his favourite Toney Starks projects. “I gave him his praises, his flowers, like, ‘Yo, listen bro. It’s an honour to be with the future, to be on the joint with you,'” he recalled. “For a lot these [fans] in the younger generation, [their favourite], it’s either Kendrick or J Cole. I gave him his praises, and he boomeranged that shit back; ‘Supreme Clientele, I loved that shit.’”
Ghostface’s first taste of ‘Purple Hearts’ was a reference track without Summer Walker’s contribution, believing she joined the song relatively late in the recording process. “He sent me a reference on how he wanted me to glide on [the track] too,” he said. “Summer Walker wasn’t on it yet. I guess she came in the ninth inning.”
He raps in his verse, “Telekinesis, I’m purifying these D speeches/ While I’m crying, I clean the feet of the sweet Jesus/ Dreams, visions get blurry of the Elohim, it’s light/ It’s known to tear retinas in a single gleam/ Shut the fuck up when you hear/ His love talkin’/ To the mind, it’s God’s cypher divine in a small portion.”
Ghost explained more about what Kendrick wanted from his lyrics. “It was like, the beat brings you [to a place],” he said about his bars. “When he texted me, he said, ‘Throw ‘the Elohim’ [in your rap].’ I said, ‘Well, the Elohim is the most high.’ And Kendrick was like, ‘Exactly.’ I heard him say in the hook, ‘Shut the fuck up when you hear love talking.’ The most high is love. It was an honour for me to get the call from him. It’s like, ‘I’m doing something.’”
The week Mr Morale and the Big Steppers was released, ‘Purple Hearts’ reached number 22 on the Billboard Hot 100, giving him the Wu-Tang MC a welcome return to the charts. It’s also Ghostface’s biggest song on Spotify, having over 116 million streams.