“No Make-Up” is the first time we are introduced to an ongoing figure in Kendrick’s music, Keisha who is detailed as a prostitute from Compton. The themes carried out in “A.D.H.D.” are the driving force behind Section.80’s core messages, how the children of the Ronald Reagan era in low-income communities were widely affected by policies leading to drug & alcohol abuse, financial disparity, and racial injustice. Homing in specifically on the 80’s generation of babies prevalent drug abuse. “A.D.H.D.” is a widely important song to Kendrick Lamar’s career that merges his ability to make both digestible and socially conscious music. Where we are taken next as listeners is to a Compton house-party over a Jet Age of Tomorrow sample that sounds as close as you can get to floating in orbit.
Over Sounwave production, we find K.Dot gifting us a light (but nonetheless important) lyrical exercise right before take-off.
The blurring of lines between good & evil is what Kendrick battles with internally throughout this LP. Kendrick states that he is “Wicked as 80 reverends in a pool a fire with devils holding hands/From a distance don’t know which one is a Christian damn”. On Track 2 an important sentiment that carries throughout Section.80 is put forth. Kendrick boasts through this track that the art that is soon to follow will transcend both race and ethnicity…but not just yet. A pitched-down Kendrick Lamar enters the space preaching of unity on “F*ck Your Ethnicity”. On the opening track of Section.80, we already are experiencing a refined, matured sound that differs from O.verly D.edicated. On July 2nd, 2011 Kendrick Lamar releases Section.80. What we are given in the summer of 2011 is a project so powerfully nuanced, conscious, and yet free-flowing that it may as well have been a chrome-plated spaceship blasting from Compton to Planet X. So where does this put Kendrick Lamar? Coming off his well-received 2010 O.verly D.edicated and slowly but surely solidifying his crowning as the new king of the west coast, this next release needed to be BIG, and it needed to stand out enough to separate himself from the pack of new-school hip-hop artists. The big three we know today (Drake, J.Cole, and Kendrick Lamar) are preparing their Sophomore releases ( Take Care/Cole World ) and slowly transitioning to becoming the front-runners in hip-hop as the new decade unfolds.
Rewind 10 years and you will find yourself in the height of the 2010-blog era. How Kendrick Lamar has achieved the artistic ability he currently holds today, and what was the zeitgeist? While we can speculate all day about Kendrick Lamar’s next release date similar to the Ancient Aliens cast speculating about otherworldly beings, we are here to understand the origin. This method has led to Kendrick being propped up as a sort of extra-terrestrial among his hip-hop peers, visiting Earth once every 4-5 years to spread the information he has gathered peering from the outside looking in (or rather the inside looking out). Kendrick Lamar has carefully crafted his career to allow himself to patiently sit back and let inspiration wash over him like a wave. Nearly 4 years have passed since the Compton-rapper released his Grammy-award-winning DAMN, but this is to no surprise. While hip-hop fans have received a lump-sum of new music to digest, there is still one lingering concern that bubbles to the top upon every release. Fresh off a global pandemic as the outside world begins to enter a societal groove once again. It is currently July 2nd, 2021, the dominating forces in hip-hop music today such as J.Cole, Young Thug, Tyler, The Creator, Migos, Lil Baby and the Griselda collective have suddenly ramped up album releases.