The legendary rapper that became “all we knew” for Kendrick Lamar
Kendrick Lamar was raised around various genres, which shaped him and the way he approached hip-hop later in life. Like the greats, Lamar listened to music from far and wide and, with curiosity, expanded his musical knowledge dramatically. That said, the Compton native, of course, listened to a lot of rap during his childhood and unsurprisingly gravitated towards West Coast MCs.
The Section.80 creator has opened up about his formative years before and has always paid tribute to the likes of Dr Dre, E-40, Snoop Dogg and many of the California lyricists who paved the way for the likes of him, Jay Rock, and his other longtime TDE collaborators.
However, aside from the LA and Oakland legends that were at the forefront of rap during Lamar’s childhood, he also named some Dirty South music from Louisiana that he revealed was a huge hit in the inner-city projects of Los Angeles. From Lil Wayne to Juvenile and Silkk the Shocker, these were some of the people Lamar heard.
Unsurprisingly, although Dirty South MCs were popular in Compton, they were far less influential than one of the most impactful West Coast artists of all time, Death Row superstar 2Pac. In an interview with Complex magazine, Lamar detailed how integral 2Pac was to the pride of his community and family life.
Opening up about 2Pac’s various chart-topping projects, the DAMN creator shared, “You know what’s crazy about these Tupac albums? These three records, Me Against The World, All Eyez On Me, and Makaveli [The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory], was played so much that you start mixing up what songs was on what album because there was so much in heavy rotation.”
He continued, “With the older songs and the newer songs, they were played so much in the household. All I can remember is just my pops always constantly just playing that album. Just playing it, playing it, playing it. All of them really were in heavy rotation. That’s all we knew in the house.”
2Pac was the soundtrack of Lamar’s childhood, and in 2011, following the release of his debut body of work, Section.80, Lamar admitted on LA’s Homegrown Radio he had a spiritual experience involving the All Eyez On Me emcee, disclosing, “It’s a crazy true story, actually. You know, one of them things when you really delirious in your sleep? It’s a real situation where I was sleeping one night and a silhouette [came], and he said, ‘Keep doing what you doing, don’t let my music die.’”
He added, “The shit scared the shit out of me! Just off the fact that prior to that, a day before, my mom bringing up, ‘You know, you and Tupac, y’all like days apart, y’all birthdays.’ I never knew that shit, that’s some wild shit. Once she said that shit – and I’m really big on shit like that – somebody comes in your dreams and relays a message.”
K. Dot could never have foreseen that he would end up signing with Death Row’s founder, Dr Dre. In 2017, 2Pac was still inspiring Lamar and shaping his music. While he was crafting his fourth studio album, DAMN, the emcee revealed to Variety how the ‘California Love’ musician shaped him, detailing, “Tupac inspired me just the simple way of how he put his words together. You really felt them, you felt the passion behind them.”
He concluded, “They meant something, not only to him, but when you heard it, you actually got a full experience rather than just words. You actually felt his words. That’s something that I was inspired to put in my music.”