Kendrick Lamar releases surprise new album GNX

7 hours ago
Kendrick Lamar

Surprise! Kendrick Lamar has released a new album called GNX.

The 12-track record follows his acclaimed 2022 album Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers and his high-profile feud with Drake, which many hip hop fans believed Lamar won, culminating with his chart-topping smash Not Like Us.

GNX bears a similarly tough sound, referencing the Drake beef and his upcoming Super Bowl half-time show performance on opening track Wacced Out Murals. Tracks like TV Off and Peekaboo continue the sonic aesthetic with parallel rap flows and production.

The second track, Squabble Up, was previewed in the music video for Not Like Us. And it seems the 17-time Grammy Award winner is already pulling a similar trick.

A video teaser for GNX — released moments before the album hit streaming services early Saturday morning — contains a one-minute snippet of music that does not appear on the album.

Named after a car (the 1987 rear-wheel-drive coupe Buick, in fact) GNX is Lamar's sixth studio album, running a 12 tracks over 44 minutes, and features neo-soul luminary SZA, Lamar's former Top Dawg Entertainment labelmate, singing on Luther and later, Gloria.

A-list pop producer Jack Antonoff (Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, Lorde) has credits on every track, save one, alongside Lamar's long-time producer Sounwave and Sam Dew.

Other notable co-producers include Mustard (who was behind Not Like Us), jazz virtuoso Kamasi Washington (who featured on Lamar's esteemed 2015 album To Pimp A Butterfly), as well as Terrace Martin and Dahi.

The record includes a track called Heart Pt. 6, the latest instalment in a long-running series of tracks Lamar began in 2010, and the same title as one of the diss tracks Drake released in May.

The song sees the revered Compton rapper reflecting on his career, name-checking Black Hippy, his former rap group with ScHoolboy Q, Ab-Soul and Jay Rock that briefly united at the Pop Out concert in Inglewood, California earlier this year.

"I jog my memory, knowing Black Hippy didn't work 'cause of me/Creatively, I moved on, with new concepts in reach," he raps. "I guess my motivation was the yearnin' for independence / Now it's about Kendrick, I wanna evolve, place my skill set as a black exec."

There were rumours of Kendrick Lamar working on an album amid his feud with Drake, which saw Lamar releasing four new tracks: Euphoria, 6.16 In LA, Meet The Grahams and Not Like Us. 

Earlier this month, Lamar earned seven Grammy Award nominations, with Not Like Us recognised in five major categories: Song of the Year, Best Rap Performance, Best Rap Song, Record of the Year, and Best Music Video.

Lamar's feature on Future and Metro Boomin's Like That — the verse that reignited the Drake feud to begin with — is nominated for Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song.

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