Kendrick Breaks Down To Pimp A Butterfly MTV News

00:00 Host: Kedrick, man. New York, it's been a long time, brother.00:02 Kendrick Lamar: Man, real talk. How you been?00:04 Host: I've been good. How about you?00:05 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, man. Working, man.00:06 Host: Okay, I already see it, man.00:07 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, that. Yeah, that.00:08 Host: I mean, yo, I feel like we do these, we don't do them often, but we do it when it's important.00:12 Host: I feel like every album, we spoke for OD.00:17 Host: I think we did the freshman cover around OD.00:18 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, man. Some years back, some work.00:21 Host: Oh, Section 80, we got to sit down and talk.00:24 Kendrick Lamar: Every album.00:25 Host: Yeah.00:25 Kendrick Lamar: Every process.00:26 Host: I think the last time I interviewed you was about three days before Good Kid, Mad City came out, and it was leaking all over the place.00:32 Kendrick Lamar: It was leaking.00:33 Host: I'm trying to grab the leak, so I have things to talk about, but we spoke and sat down in Vegas, and that was a great interview.00:38 Kendrick Lamar: Definitely.00:39 Host: And here we are, the pimple butterfly, man.00:41 Kendrick Lamar: Man. Journey.00:43 Host: How relieved, I know you worked hard on this. Was there like an exhale once it came out and you were done with it?00:50 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, definitely. It was an exhale once we... The final mix, because it's so much, for me, it's so much of a spiritual process in making the album.01:06 Kendrick Lamar: I got to really feel connected to the music. I got to feel connected to what I'm talking about, and that can drain you, you know, because you're pulling all these different emotions out.01:14 Kendrick Lamar: You're grabbing all these different experiences around the world and all these different conversation pieces, and you almost have to reenact that, because you can't...01:23 Kendrick Lamar: The time I got inspiration, I probably was on the road. I didn't have no tour bus to record.01:28 Kendrick Lamar: So I got to pull that energy back out, you know, and locked in with the same people for six, seven months to a year.01:36 Kendrick Lamar: That's a big relief getting down to that last mix, a big relief. So it's a blessing, man.01:42 Host: When did you decide upon To Pimp a Butterfly? Did you know coming in that's what it was going to be, or was there a process of recording and filling out in the studio and then the concept for this album came to you?01:51 Kendrick Lamar: The concept, I knew that was going to be the concept. I didn't know if that was going to be the title.01:57 Host: What's a trip about that title?01:59 Kendrick Lamar: And I just seen on this blog called... What's that type of dog?02:06 Kendrick Lamar: No, Dead End Hip Hop?02:08 Host: What's that, Dead End?02:10 Kendrick Lamar: When they was talking about To Pimp a Caterpillar?02:13 Host: Yeah, To Pimp a Caterpillar.02:15 Kendrick Lamar: That was the original name, and they called it because the abbreviation was Tupac.02:23 Kendrick Lamar: T-P-A-C.02:25 Kendrick Lamar: And that was the original point once I got the interview.02:32 Host: Okay.02:33 Kendrick Lamar: You know what I'm saying?02:34 Kendrick Lamar: So I'm coming with the idea, and me changing it to Butterfly just really wanted to show the brightness of life, and the word pimp has so much aggression.02:46 Kendrick Lamar: And that represents several things. For me, it represents using my celebrity for good.02:53 Kendrick Lamar: You know what I mean?02:54 Kendrick Lamar: Another reason is not being pimped by the industry through my celebrity.02:58 Host: Right.02:59 Kendrick Lamar: You know, so it gets even deeper than that for me.03:02 Kendrick Lamar: I could be talking all day about it.03:03 Kendrick Lamar: But it was almost called To Pimp a Caterpillar.03:06 Host: Yeah, a Caterpillar.03:06 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah.03:07 Kendrick Lamar: And shout out to them, too, for picking that up.03:09 Kendrick Lamar: Real talk.03:11 Host: They just got a major look.03:13 Kendrick Lamar: That's the good minds, man.03:14 Kendrick Lamar: That tripped me out when Top Dog showed me that, for real, that somebody actually caught that.03:20 Host: Let's get into the first song, Wesley's Theory. You know, and I look at the titles. I look at track lists before I go, and I ain't know where you was. I was like, who's Wesley?03:28 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah, yeah.03:28 Host: And you go in, and it almost feels to me like you're playing this character. When I get signed, homie, I'm going to act a fool.03:34 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah.03:34 Host: This is one of my favorite records off the joint.03:39 Kendrick Lamar: First off, the lyrics is me going back to that feeling of what I wanted to do when I got signed. These are actually real thoughts.03:49 Host: Right.03:50 Kendrick Lamar: You go back to that same mentality when you get some money.03:53 Kendrick Lamar: You know what I mean?03:54 Kendrick Lamar: I'm going to go do this for the homies. I'm going to take them around the world, let them see things they've never seen before. And that was the energy.04:01 Kendrick Lamar: I wanted to, everything was a time capsule. I just couldn't put it out.04:05 Kendrick Lamar: You know what I mean?04:06 Kendrick Lamar: That was a time capsule. That was a moment.04:08 Kendrick Lamar: But the overall theme of the record, why I love it so much, is because it talks about something that we weren't taught in school when we get this money.04:21 Kendrick Lamar: I've spent all my time in school and escaping prison and escaping the system. So you mean to tell me the moment I become successful and I get some money and I don't know how to manage my money, that you're going to throw me back in jail for taxes?04:38 Host: Well, you had the line, educated, but I got a million dollar check.04:42 Kendrick Lamar: Exactly.04:42 Host: So nobody's prepared you for, and this is how it relates to Wesley Snipes.04:47 Kendrick Lamar: They might have Wesley Snipes your ass.04:49 Kendrick Lamar: Nobody prepared us for this. Nobody, it's so important.04:54 Kendrick Lamar: They teach us everything else in these curricular activities, redundantly.05:01 Host: Well, how did you learn? Because, I mean, though you start off, when I get signed, homie, I'm going to act a fool.05:06 Kendrick Lamar: I didn't learn.05:06 Host: I don't see you acting a fool. I don't see the big change. I don't see, maybe you got them tucked somewhere, but you kind of always seem like you had your head straight.05:14 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, that's the likes of God.05:17 Kendrick Lamar: I didn't learn from a person. I didn't learn from a man.05:21 Kendrick Lamar: That's me, him putting something in me to know, okay, you have a lot of responsibility. But I wouldn't say I know 100% today.05:34 Kendrick Lamar: And these are steps. The more fortune I get, the more success I get. These are things I got to learn.05:40 Kendrick Lamar: And standards and delays I got to learn how to put money out. And the things I work hard for and accepting that, because you can't run from it, whether you're rich or whether you're poor.05:55 Kendrick Lamar: And it's just a system.05:57 Kendrick Lamar: So I put that through my music to give game to the kids that it's not being taught in them screens. It's up to me, because I'm going through it. And just like every other artist is going through it, whether it's me, J. Cole, or whoever, you know, they know what I'm talking about.06:11 Host: When I listen to songs, I visualize things. Maybe it's because it's the first song plus the album cover. But I envision the album cover in front of the White House.06:22 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.06:23 Host: And your people's just mobbing.06:24 Kendrick Lamar: Yep.06:25 Host: Acting the fool.06:26 Host: What was the impetus for that White House cover? Because that's a statement just in itself.06:30 Kendrick Lamar: It's several meanings, actually. It's several meanings.06:35 Kendrick Lamar: One of the meanings is Wesley Theory. You know, that song inspired that cover.06:43 Kendrick Lamar: For me, personally, it's going back to the neighborhood and taking the folks that haven't seen nothing and taking them around the world, whether you want to call them ignorant or not. They need to see these things, you know, whether it's the White House, whether it's Africa, whether, you know, it's London.07:02 Host: Robbins Island.07:03 Kendrick Lamar: Exactly.07:04 Kendrick Lamar: You know, they need to see these things. And that's one explanation for it.07:08 Kendrick Lamar: It gets a little deeper.07:10 Host: Yeah.07:11 Kendrick Lamar: But, yeah.07:12 Host: Let's move on, because I want to get through some of these, man. I want to give the people. These are the things that the people want to know, because we've gotten to sit with the album for a couple of weeks. And now we got questions.07:20 Host: King Kunta, to me, feels like, and there's a message in that, but out of all the songs, it might feel like the most rapidness, like pounding my chest, like, listen, don't get a twist.07:31 Host: I'm giving you knowledge.07:32 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah.07:33 Host: But I'm still the king out here.07:34 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah.07:35 Kendrick Lamar: It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it can go either way, you know, and I wrote it just because of that. And I want it to be not as complex as a lot of my lyrics, but still have a message behind it, you know.07:47 Kendrick Lamar: The actual rhyme and scheme of things is simple, and you know all about rhymes, it seems, so you can hear me a few times and say, I like that.07:55 Kendrick Lamar: But I want to make that, that real simplistic in a boastful way, but also have, also having a sense of integrity, you know, behind it.08:11 Kendrick Lamar: I've been called many things growing up, you know, and in the, in the state of just being a black man, I've been called, you know, many things from my ancestors, you know, they've been called many things, but it's taking that negativity and, and, and being proud of it and making it to your own and saying, I am a king, you know, no matter what you call me.08:30 Kendrick Lamar: And, um, along with that, I think it really just shows heart, heart of who I am, you know, it's always from the music.08:39 Host: It's sound eight feet tall, that record.08:41 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, man.08:42 Host: Got a short dude out here, like a giant.08:45 Host: You, you, you do have one line though that, when you call out, say, I could respect rapping.08:50 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah, yeah.08:51 Host: Oh, f* with a ghost rider, man.08:53 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah.08:54 Host: What the f* happened?08:54 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah.08:55 Host: Um, there was a time when having a ghost rider in hip hop was a no-no. Like, you, your career was done if that, if that was found out. And I think this generation, we've grown more accepting of it. And it seems like hip hop has gotten past that.09:08 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah.09:08 Host: But you seem to draw a line in the set, and I was wondering what prompted that.09:11 Kendrick Lamar: All the time, all the time.09:13 Kendrick Lamar: Um, I got in the game, ghost riding, you know, and I know how much work and how much ethic, you know, ethic you need behind that.09:25 Kendrick Lamar: So, at the end of the day, it's really about respecting that, respecting these riders, but also, as a new artist, you have to stand behind your work, man, and you have to really, truly honor the, the, the code of, of hip hop as a new artist.09:41 Kendrick Lamar: You know, I'm not mentioning the older guys that already laid down the foundations and have the accolades and things like that. The new kids that's coming in this generation.09:48 Kendrick Lamar: We weren't, we weren't taught that, you know. We shouldn't be taught that just because the time is new. We need to go in there and be creative as possible.09:57 Host: Right.09:58 Kendrick Lamar: Be creative as possible. And if you do, if you do have help, acknowledge their help, you know.10:05 Host: Who, who you seen with a ghost rider? Like, can we talk about that?10:07 Kendrick Lamar: No, I can't say who I seen with a ghost rider, but.10:10 Host: I knew you wasn't going to answer that, but.10:11 Kendrick Lamar: Nah, yeah.10:12 Kendrick Lamar: Yeah, yeah.10:13 Kendrick Lamar: Nah, but it just.10:15 Kendrick Lamar: But it's even like a newer generation. It's a newer generation. It's not, it's not even about who.10:21 Host: Right.10:21 Kendrick Lamar: It's the, it's the new kids.10:22 Host: Gotcha.10:24 Host: Gotcha.10:25 Kendrick Lamar: We got to stand behind that pin and honor your pin because, because growth is everything.10:29 Host: Right.10:29 Host: Well, I'm glad you took that stance. Like, like I said, I think we've become a little lenient.10:33 Kendrick Lamar: Oh, yeah.10:33 Host: On that situation.10:34 Host: And it was refreshing to hear you take that stance.10:36 Kendrick Lamar: Definitely.10:36 Host: So I commend you for that.10:37 Kendrick Lamar: Definitely. Definitely. Thank you.*There may be errors on this page.