Mar 19, 2015

How Much a Dollar Cost is incredible. Really great verses,hook & beat.

 

Mar 19, 2015

I need dat sloppy

 

Mar 19, 2015

Institutionalized finally grew on me

 

Mar 19, 2015

@WPG in the entire album, Kendrick airs pretty comfortably on the side of institutionalized racism and oppression. Just look at Hood Politics or i. Just because he doesn't write off ALL the problems of the black community by pointing to racism, doesn't mean he's playing "respectability politics."

Most on the left, whether it's Obama and his wife, or Al Sharpton or Cornel West, have criticized what goes on in the black community. That's not new.

And in the interview with Billboard, it's not like Kendrick was singing the praises of Darren Willson.

Kendrick has a nuanced take on race in America, which is what's missing from the conversation of race and racism. You simply calling it "respectability politics" is precisely what's wrong in our political discourse. It's more than that (and far from that), and shouldn't be written off as such.

 

Mar 19, 2015

Anybody else get a picture of Consuela half way through u?

"Hello, housekeeping"

 

Mar 19, 2015

I don't think it really fits in this case.
Respectability politics comes into play when someone claiming to speak for the African American community (or, more often, granted that status by the majority population) places both the blame for the situation AND the responsibility to for making changes to avoid similar situations solely on the black community. In addition, it completely fails to acknowledge the institutional racism and systematic oppression and socioeconomic disadvantage that gives rise to many of these problems.
Not everything that acknowledges problems in the black community or gives suggestions on how those problems could be solved is respectability politics.
Respectability politics looks like telling black women that they should just straighten their hair and then they could get a job. It is telling black parents that naming their children with "black sounding" names is irresponsible because it will make it harder for them to get a job.
In other words, it is essentially a justification and perpetuation of the institutional racism itself- because racism is a reality, it is the responsibility of black people to submit and accept that. It equates black culture with something that is fundamentally lesser and something that should be suppressed in order to get by in the world.
The other form that it often takes is reductive arguments that try to explain away the effects of institutional racism with simple suggestions that don't address the root of the problem.

I don't see Kendrick falling into this by acknowledging that, for instance, it is difficult to reconcile his anger about police killings of black men with the fact that g--- violence kills many black men, too. He's not saying that black on black crime justifies police killings or should be a distraction from the larger issue. The racist Republican response to these killings has generally boiled down to- "Why aren't 'these people' protesting all the killings in Chicago instead of this one?" ignoring the fact that there are entire organizations dedicated to combating violence in the black community and the fact that protesting a killing by the government makes sense while organized protests against crime do not.

Bottom line- Kendrick is essentially talking about an internal conflict, acknowledging the institutional racism while trying to come to grips with the damage that he (or the character in the song) has done to his own community through g--- violence. It's kind of like a more violent version of All Falls Down, talking about the reality of the black experience and internal struggle without trying to place the blame for that situation solely on the black community

EDIT- A more interesting contemporary discussion of respectability politics might be talking about Common's recent comments that racism could be ended if black people reach out with a hand of love to whites

 

Mar 19, 2015

"Uneducated but I got a million dollar check like that"

 

Mar 19, 2015

Well said

 

Mar 19, 2015

Wesley's theory such a b-----r

 

Mar 19, 2015

d---, wish it would grow on me, fifteen listens in and its still my least fav track :/

 

Mar 19, 2015

Honestly wish he had more storytelling tracks like this on the album

 

Mar 19, 2015

Alright guys, Amazon finally managed to ship me that physical copy.

Reading the reactions here and not having the possibility to listen to the album got me like


Hopefully this album will be as great as the reviews. Cheers

 

Mar 19, 2015

it's Outkast. in some ways this reminds me of the more experimental Outkast (particularly Love Below).

couldn't place it before, it was bothering me.

 

Mar 19, 2015

You bouta be blessed bro, post your reactions

 

Mar 19, 2015

Kendrick been influenced by the low key goats on this album, outkast, miles davis, george clinton etc

 

Mar 19, 2015

It's andre 3000
I'd bet everything on it

 

Mar 19, 2015

I will post my reactions after fully listening to it bruh, that's for sure

 

Mar 19, 2015

Yo every that housekeeping skit comes on I get chills

 

Mar 19, 2015

theneedledrops review of kendrick was really in depth and covered a lot, respect to that man

 

Mar 19, 2015

Don't always agree with his reviews but he always goes well in-depth and articulates his opinions well,
Totally agree with his tpab review though