kendrick lamar - mr. morale & the big steppers (2022)

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed
Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (285 of them)

i probably am setting the bar too low. i mean, "allyship" too, i set that bar really fucking low. i don't really view "ally" as a compliment. three years watching my straight friends try and find a man who doesn't treat them like shit, watching lesbians talking on their dating profiles about all of the people who "go to the front of the line", seeing how far that shit actually gets any of us. this old dude saying, what the fuck is he saying, that white girls like me should get n-word privileges because he did a song where he says "faggot faggot faggot" like he's michael richards or some shit? honestly that is classic Allyship with a capital fucking a. and that doesn't interest me, but the differences he shows off in how trans men and trans women get treated? to me that's way more interesting than most of the shit cis people say about us.

Kate (rushomancy), Saturday, 14 May 2022 04:44 (one year ago) link

my read was he was saying that the comparison to the white fan n-word incident helped him understand that faggot is bad, not that everyone should be able to say whatever slurs they want

ufo, Saturday, 14 May 2022 06:56 (one year ago) link

It's really funny to me that the big Kendrick discourse for this album cycle is basically the Louie poker episode discourse from 12 years ago

Whiney G. Weingarten, Saturday, 14 May 2022 07:08 (one year ago) link

One of the more popular and respected left trans twitter people has a perspective that has some similarities with Kate’s

So I’m just gonna say Auntie Diaries goes

— Autogyniphiles_Anonymous (@autogyniphiles) May 13, 2022

we need outrage! we need dicks!! (the table is the table), Saturday, 14 May 2022 10:48 (one year ago) link

musically this album is very convincing, and obv there's almost nothing kendrick can't do technically (but then he was almost fully formed from the get go, the incredible cadence in rigamortis is what immediately got me interested when he was coming up)

not sure what to make of the whiny voice he applies at times - do some people love it?

in the end too self-important for me, and the casual misogyny, however confessional, is off-putting ("first time I fucked a white bitch" could really have used some editing)

but a bold statement for sure

corrs unplugged, Saturday, 14 May 2022 11:20 (one year ago) link

my read was he was saying that the comparison to the white fan n-word incident helped him understand that faggot is bad, not that everyone should be able to say whatever slurs they want

― ufo

you're probably right! and in some ways i think lamar kind of sells himself short by making that his conclusion. like, if that was all he was saying, i'd be pissed about the song too. "saying faggot is bad" is a pretty weaksauce conclusion - a swede once told me there's a Swedish word for it, "pekoral". like "war is bad" or the classic ilx punching bag "i just shot john lennon" by the cranberries.

so i got a brother, right, and ever since i came out to him he's been supportive of me, in the sense that it's been kate, she/her, no problems, no slip-ups, not like my mom. but like that's all it is to him. i'm the same person to him that i was at 21, like he just does a global search and replace on my name and pronouns in his brain and that's it. i start telling him about the house music i'm into and he says that just because i'm trans doesn't mean i have to start listening to that stuff. i start complaining about frank zappa's misogyny and he talks about how obsessed i was with zappa in my 20s. i love my brother, i care about him, but i told him a couple weeks ago that i just couldn't be talking to him right now. i don't think i could explain to him why in a way that he would understand.

shit _changed_ for me when i transitioned. when i say i've always been a woman, i'm not making some universal axiomatic statement - that's not what i _do_ as a queer person. i'm responding to a specific prevalent variety of cis bullshit, the way cis people will say that i "used to be a man". it doesn't mean that i'm the same person now.

to me, i hear that song, and i hear someone who _gets it_ in a way that the brother i can't bear to talk to doesn't. i hear someone who's aware of all the bullshit cis people say about us and doesn't buy it. the stuff about how mary-ann played with barbies as a child, for instance. you can see that as a superficial and hackneyed view of gender roles, you can see that in terms of "wait, i played with he-man as a child, does that mean i'm _not_ really a woman?"

if a trans person hears "auntie diaries" and that's their reaction, that's how they read the song, i think that's a valid read. if a trans person is pissed at lamar for saying that, i'm not going to police that, call them a "tenderqueer" or say they're secretly racist or any of that shit. that's just not my personal read.

my personal read is that, again, he's responding to a specific variety of cis bullshit, the "there were no signs" denial response so many of us get from cis relatives, this idea that we have this obligation to be visibly trans to them in certain culturally approved ways, that we have to _prove_ to them that we're _really trans_. which is a big part of why, as best i can tell, every single goddamn one of us has imposter syndrome, every single goddamn one of us struggles with the idea that we're somehow not _really_ trans. i read that as lamar saying "fuck you, 'there were no signs', you saw what you fucking wanted to see, that's all".

Kate (rushomancy), Saturday, 14 May 2022 11:52 (one year ago) link

What's the whiny/weird vocals ratio on this album?

bonus donut (rizzx), Saturday, 14 May 2022 12:04 (one year ago) link

From my first listen and also from what I’ve been reading, Kate’s points also seems to relate to the way that Blackness itself is treated on the record— that is, not as an easily consumable and legible identity without contradictions and internal dissonances. Obviously I think Kendrick’s work has been doing this kind of thing to some degree since the beginning, but this record seems to bring that to the fore in a way.

we need outrage! we need dicks!! (the table is the table), Saturday, 14 May 2022 12:29 (one year ago) link

i don't really get a strong sense that he does fully 'get it' from the song, especially with stuff like deadnaming caitlyn jenner which isn't even really relevant to the storytelling & the very inconsistent pronouns for his uncle - there's not the same past/present distinction that mary-ann gets, it just feels muddled to me. he's well-meaning and clearly trying to be supportive and i do appreciate that he is trying but that doesn't mean i have to be grateful for the end result or think it's good art, i'm not really a huge fan of someone cis weighing in in this muddled way. in terms of impact i think it's pretty mixed - sure i hope the message reaches people but you also see a bunch of cis/straight people totally baffled that anyone queer could not love it and getting extremely defensive, bc he's well-meaning you see.

& idk that's reading a lot into that one line about him seeing the signs with his cousin. if anything to me it's still reinforcing the 'signs'/'proof' narrative bc his cousin's transition made sense to him because he did see signs even if others didn't - i'd personally reject the whole idea of of there needing to be signs at all.

ufo, Saturday, 14 May 2022 13:03 (one year ago) link

booming posts, all.

Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 14 May 2022 13:17 (one year ago) link

Just going to note that this album came out the day after Ethel Cain's (very ambitious and imo very good) album, which feels like it's from a world that "Auntie's Diaries" can only dimly perceive. There are more edifying voices than Kendrick's out there, certainly in this instance.

Ethel Cain album is great!

✖✖✖ (Moka), Saturday, 14 May 2022 15:08 (one year ago) link

to me, i hear that song, and i hear someone who _gets it_ in a way that the brother i can't bear to talk to doesn't. i hear someone who's aware of all the bullshit cis people say about us and doesn't buy it.

otm.

strong example in "auntie diaries" of tolerate vs accept in action.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 14 May 2022 15:13 (one year ago) link

Yep, some really great posts above, thanks all and especially Kate and UFO.

I processed “Auntie Diaries” as ultimately being about the realisation of not having a monopoly on righteousness - the realisation that you’ve been protesting against others punching down while participating in a culture of punching down yourself. For me the closing lines are more powerful than just “the use of these terms is functionality equivalent” - they’re trying to capture the difficulty of seeing that, of realising that your own struggle and someone else’s struggle are intertwined, at the level if loved experience - especially and in particular when you are not part of a community which prioritises the drawing of particular connections.

I’m reminded of the Upton Sinclair quote, “ It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” That insight could be extended to culture - it’s difficult to get a person to understand something when their membership within a community depends on their not understanding it.” This terrain is what I think the song grapples with: the ethical demand “don’t punch down” will tend to founder on our cultural blindspots, which in turn we are reluctant to confront. IDK maybe I am overthinking it.

Tim F, Saturday, 14 May 2022 16:37 (one year ago) link

I’m still stuck on Rich Spirit. Bumps like a Too Short song

Heez, Saturday, 14 May 2022 16:45 (one year ago) link

i don't really get a strong sense that he does fully 'get it' from the song, especially with stuff like deadnaming caitlyn jenner which isn't even really relevant to the storytelling & the very inconsistent pronouns for his uncle - there's not the same past/present distinction that mary-ann gets, it just feels muddled to me. he's well-meaning and clearly trying to be supportive and i do appreciate that he is trying but that doesn't mean i have to be grateful for the end result or think it's good art, i'm not really a huge fan of someone cis weighing in in this muddled way. in terms of impact i think it's pretty mixed - sure i hope the message reaches people but you also see a bunch of cis/straight people totally baffled that anyone queer could not love it and getting extremely defensive, bc he's well-meaning you see.

& idk that's reading a lot into that one line about him seeing the signs with his cousin. if anything to me it's still reinforcing the 'signs'/'proof' narrative bc his cousin's transition made sense to him because he did see signs even if others didn't - i'd personally reject the whole idea of of there needing to be signs at all.

― ufo

that's one of the things that's most interesting to me about "auntie diaries", yeah, i don't know for sure that he "gets it". it is messy, it is ambiguous, it is inconsistent, and it's all these things in a way that feels true to the way cis people experience my gender transition, the way in some senses i have experienced my own gender. he's inconsistent in a way that people are in _person_ with me, but he's not freestyling this, he _wrote_ these lyrics. the sense i get from _mr. morale_ is that it's a _meticulous_ album, a _deliberate_ album.

one of the things i struggle with is the question of how _much_ to show my own ass, talking about this stuff. because of the hyper-judgemental climate around these things. becuse it's normal and typical for popular and respected left trans twitter people to just blithely say that trans people who are offended by lamar saying "faggot faggot faggot" are "tenderqueers" and probably racist. because whenever the Discourse starts up around trans people somehow trans folks wind up being carrying the most hot allostatic load. something is really wrong here, something is really fucking wrong, and it's not any of _us_.

i think i will, in fact, show my ass here. this isn't the Dearborn Birdsite, it's a message board for a smattering of middle-aged trauma-informed mostly queer music nerds, and this week i'm really leaning into the "poor life decisions" thing.

i was driving a few weeks ago down a busy suburban thoroughfare near my home and some jerk cut me off. I muttered "fucking faggot" under my breath - i think the car had all kinds of rainbow shit and furry trash on the back. it took a couple seconds and i remembered that i had a trans flag sticker on my own bumper, and i remember literally saying aloud "wait a second, _i'm_ a fucking faggot!" and laughing. the idea hadn't occurred to me before. like lamar says about his "auntie", he wasn't gay, he ate pussy. growing up i fucking wished i could be gay, i wished it could be that easy. we, not he, we didn't know any better.

this cis people want me to justify it, want me to say "oh i always knew", but i didn't, a lot of us didn't. i gotta pretend like i don't still wonder, sometimes, "yeah, but am i _really_ trans?", can't be vulnerable, can't be weak, can't be a fucking _tenderqueer_ even though, like a lot of us, i'm basically a big fucking wad of trauma, because if i do, the assholes who made me this way, the assholes who, like my friend just wrote to her (should i mention that i wrote "his" and backspaced over it?) mom, "wield a dagger and name it love", will fucking eat us alive.

one of the most important experiences of my coming out, of my coming to understand myself, was seeing my own experiences reflected in others. of hearing people talk about things i'd been too ashamed to tell anybody, hearing them talk about it openly and being amazed, because i thought it was just me. that's what i get from hearing lamar say "faggot faggot faggot". are you going to learn anything about being trans from kendrick lamar? hell no. lamar doesn't know shit about being trans. he grieves _different_ from us. that's fine, we all got our own voices. maybe you hear it from ethel cain, maybe you hear it from tami t, maybe you hear it from... you know. there's a lot of us.

maybe i'm hearing what i want to hear in "auntie diaries", just like the people who tell us "there were no signs" are seeing what they want to see. i just... i need to hear that so fucking much right now, you know? if i have to pretend lamar _gets it_, if i have to lie to myself to get through the rest of this week, you know, i'll fucking do that. i made my peace with that hears ago. whatever i need to do to survive. no guilt. no shame.

Kate (rushomancy), Saturday, 14 May 2022 17:04 (one year ago) link

My new favorite thread. Thanks, Kate.

Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 14 May 2022 17:16 (one year ago) link

more i read kate's posts, more i like the song.

obviously identify with it from one of the other sides. i knew i wasn't gay but i definitely wasn't sure i liked girls either. i liked slow jams, not all that rah rah shit. but the word still got used growing up. a lot. an ongoing theme in kendrick's music: you did it to fit in, not because you wanted to. i'm not ashamed to admit that because of my mental health issues, i have voices that use extremely offensive language in my head, constantly. at some point, it stops becoming about attacking someone because of who they might be and starts to become a form of establishing dominance.

(reminded here of the outstanding byron hurt doc hiphop: beyond beats and rhymes from maybe late 2000s? he talks about how it became more of a casual thing by using it / other lgbtq+ slurs interchangeably with "bitch." that becomes "bitch n___" and "bitch ass n___" and yeah. breaks it tf down. busta rhymes walks out of his interview. talks to gay rappers. interviews trans woman at a hiphop festival. makes a lot of people uncomfortable. highly recommended.)

was outside last night, doing the most middle aged white man thing to do on a friday evening: smoking a bowl and watching the sunset while listening to the new album. a group of teenage boys drove past, blaring "united in grief" and they were into it; waving their arms around, bobbing their heads out the window, being kids. i laughed and waved peace to them and my mind immediately went to that moment when they would hear that song.

i wish i had someone like kendrick at that age. instead i had common talkin`bout "in a circle of f___s yo name is mentioned!" just repeating the cycle.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 14 May 2022 18:42 (one year ago) link

i wish i had someone like kendrick at that age. instead i had common talkin`bout "in a circle of f___s yo name is mentioned!" just repeating the cycle.

Remember when there was repeated/constant discussion in the hip-hop press about The Gay Rapper? Like, there was a rumor there was one? I can't even remember who all was suspected of being The Gay Rapper (Q-Tip was mentioned for sure).

It's very interesting to observe the simultaneous "this is so much better than it was when I was a teenager" and "NOT GOOD ENOUGH" discourse taking place in so many different areas these days.

but also fuck you (unperson), Saturday, 14 May 2022 18:49 (one year ago) link

oh god the gay rapper! i just remember thinking "who cares i wanna hear the gay rapper's response record you he got dirty laundry on everybody"

byron hurt doc was 2006 watch it.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 14 May 2022 18:51 (one year ago) link

I wanted to wait a week for the fervor to die down, but my son insists I hear this now, so -

Legalize Suburban Benches (Raymond Cummings), Saturday, 14 May 2022 19:48 (one year ago) link

also thank you everyone for answering my initial question. this is exactly why i asked. i need to hear all perspectives. just because i am more in step with the narrator's pov in this scenario doesn't mean it's the most productive.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 14 May 2022 20:35 (one year ago) link

I’ve read some people justifying the improper pronouns he uses throughout the song as something usual in his style, where he writes from different povs and different timelines, and as he starts growing and learning his modern perspective starts using proper pronouns and understanding the f-word is not for him to use.

It’s still very messy and inconsistent, reading Kate’s and ufo’s pov is very enlightening for me.

✖✖✖ (Moka), Saturday, 14 May 2022 21:07 (one year ago) link

yes, thanks for these insights, much better here than the kneejerk shit I read on twitter

akm, Saturday, 14 May 2022 21:19 (one year ago) link

thats kind of how i hear the pronouns thing, him speaking in character as someone who is having a series of realizations, not speaking with wisdom from the present but as an imperfect character within the story in the past. but idk, i could be being overly generous so i dont have to be bummed about it.

nobody like my rap (One Eye Open), Saturday, 14 May 2022 21:23 (one year ago) link

I agree with OEO’s take on it.

Legalize Suburban Benches (Raymond Cummings), Saturday, 14 May 2022 21:56 (one year ago) link

"n95" video.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 14 May 2022 22:05 (one year ago) link

Popping in to say “Crown” is quietly stunning

sctttnnnt (pgwp), Saturday, 14 May 2022 22:07 (one year ago) link

thats a wow video

clouds (peanutbuttereverysingleday), Saturday, 14 May 2022 22:15 (one year ago) link

Quality video as usual with him.

✖✖✖ (Moka), Saturday, 14 May 2022 23:26 (one year ago) link

I think someone upthread (or was it an article?) mentioned there’s no discernable radio singles but “Rich Spirit” is super addictive.

✖✖✖ (Moka), Saturday, 14 May 2022 23:57 (one year ago) link

“rich spirit” is probably the song on here that most resembles/is most influenced by current sounds in l.a. street rap

it's the album highlight for me.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Sunday, 15 May 2022 00:21 (one year ago) link

X2

✖✖✖ (Moka), Sunday, 15 May 2022 06:01 (one year ago) link

rhetorical question: is this what we meant when we used to say "keep it real"?

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Monday, 16 May 2022 03:10 (one year ago) link

Heard it, still processing the words, but the production and beats are probably my favorite so far. This run he's on is pretty incredible - I am already on the side of this being a career highlight, but that just puts it on similar terrain as everything post Section.80

Duval Timothy is to MMATBS as Thundercat was on TPAB, right?

octobeard, Monday, 16 May 2022 07:53 (one year ago) link

Can we have a version of "Purple Hearts" with only Ghostface

Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 16:19 (one year ago) link

i think "purple hearts" as a whole is one of the highlights

in places all over the world, real stuff be happening (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 17:09 (one year ago) link

otm. i was so happy when ghostface showed up

nobody like my rap (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 17:22 (one year ago) link

Summer Walker softens the track way too much for my taste.

Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 17:24 (one year ago) link

"purple hearts" is good. feels like a classic "chipmunk soul" beat. definitely caters to vintage ghostface / wu-tang aesthetic.

also it can be added to everyone's favorite new playlist: songs that mention anilingus.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 18:13 (one year ago) link

and Elohim.

Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 May 2022 18:15 (one year ago) link

Ok “Die Hard” also has hit single potential.

✖✖✖ (Moka), Wednesday, 18 May 2022 18:31 (one year ago) link

yep if there's any mainstream hits from this album, it's that or "mirror."

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Wednesday, 18 May 2022 18:34 (one year ago) link

“n95” will likely have the highest chart peak, considering that video just came out

in places all over the world, real stuff be happening (voodoo chili), Wednesday, 18 May 2022 18:35 (one year ago) link

bizarro world chart action.

Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Wednesday, 18 May 2022 18:36 (one year ago) link

I feel like that song has a lot of antecedents in hip-hop but most reviews have acted like it's a skit

erasingclouds, Thursday, 19 May 2022 11:53 (one year ago) link

If this album had been the first three tracks, We Cry Together and the last four tracks it would have been so good. Maybe throw in one or two of the others from the middle. The big event tracks stand out so much from the others though imo

imago, Thursday, 19 May 2022 12:38 (one year ago) link

Both in terms of compelling lyrics and production

imago, Thursday, 19 May 2022 12:38 (one year ago) link


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.