In many ways, 2024 has been Kendrick Lamar’s year. From his high-profile beef with Drake and the slew of accompanying (some might say career-defining) diss tracks he gave us, to being announced for this season’s Super Bowl halftime show, it’s been impossible to avoid him. It only makes sense, then, that he’s closing it out with ‘GNX’, a surprise album that’s also one of the best things released in the past 12 months.
Wacced Out Murals opens with the same hunger and energy displayed on Euphoria earlier in the year, as tense strings and synths stab menacingly while Lamar takes shots at, well, everybody. “Snoop posted Taylor Made, I prayed it was the edibles,” he says in reference to Drake’s contentious diss track. “Irony, I think my hard work let Lil Wayne down,” he then spits, referencing the rap scene’s insistence that the NOLA rapper should have got the hometown Super Bowl gig instead. “Won the Super Bowl and Nas the only one congratulate me.”
Squabble Up turns out to be the track that was teased in the Not Like Us video, and it’s a funk-filled West Coast party that will light up many a playlist. The same can be said for the SZA-featuring Luther, which is the poppiest track on the album, with both artists riffing off of each other with gorgeous R&B melodies.
Man At The Garden and Hey Now turn things down a notch with minimalistic beats, before Reincarnated and TV Off flip right back the other way as two of the record’s most bold, brash and abrasive entries. It may be Kendrick’s name on the album but producer Sounwave also deserves recognition — across 12 cuts he has assembled here, he simply does not miss, providing everything needed to stoke Kendrick’s flame.
The closing run of Heart Pt. 6, GNX and Gloria are a trip through Kendrick’s repertoire, with silky smoothness, dangerous anger and deep emotion all pouring forth. ‘GNX’ is the sound of a rapper close to the peak of his powers, hot on the tail of the apparently unattainable benchmark he set with ‘To Pimp a Butterfly’. All the experiments have been cool, but it’s hard to touch King Kenny when he’s just straight rapping.
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