He called out some of the biggest and best rappers around (including J. That's not a comment on Big Sean or Jay Electronica's verses, both of which are totally fine, but Kendrick's verse put the entire hip hop community in shock. Some of his most iconic turns of phrase ("DOO DOO! I hate y'all," "that ba-na-na clip, straight from the rip," "If I'm not the hottest than hell must have froze over") are on this song alone.Īt this point, Kendrick Lamar's verse on "Control" is bigger than "Control" itself. (Even Yelawolf, the one rapper on this song who quickly fell off, is on fire.) It's nearly impossible to decide who had the best verse - sometimes I think it's Big K.R.I.T., sometimes I think it's Danny Brown, but Kendrick is up there. Over a lurching beat from Hit-Boy and no hook, all of the rappers make cases for themselves as the next big thing, and all of them delivered career-best verses. "1 Train" wasn't even released as a single, but in many ways it's the defining song of the era. It was clear in the early 2010s that there was an exciting new generation of rappers from all around the country all taking off at once, and A$AP Rocky captured that with his song "1 Train," a posse cut featuring a who's who of then-rising rappers, including Kendrick Lamar, Joey Bada$$, Yelawolf, Danny Brown, Action Bronson, and Big K.R.I.T. "When the press get this verse, they sure to press rewind." Well, yeah. Both rappers are great on this song, but Kendrick brings the track to another level, showing off an early example of his ability to take his guest verses into unexpected, mind-bending territory. Kendrick eventually blew up, while Smoke DZA remained an underground staple, but in 2011, they were on an equal playing field, and collaborations like this one and that same year's "Ball Game" capture the refreshing vibe of that era perfectly.
EMINEM 2015 NEW SONG FREE
Smoke DZA - "How Far We Go" (Uptown 81)Īt the turn of the 2010s, Kendrick was part of a new wave of rappers that were using free online mixtapes to create a thriving rap underground that eventually overthrew the then-stale rap mainstream. Narrowing it down to 35 meant leaving off some heavy hitters, but we aimed to cover as much ground as we could, from his breakthrough verses to the ones when he was already a star, from collaborations with his contemporaries to his influences, from underground faves to superstars, from fellow rappers to jazz/electronic musicians, and beyond.ģ5. Missing out on Kendrick's guest verses means missing out on some of his best songs, and since there are so many, we've picked what we think are the 35 best and ranked them from least great to most great. It's a given by now that he'll be the star of almost any song he's on, and he knows it, but he still treats almost every verse like it could be his last. His guest appearances became less frequent over the years, making each new one feel like a mini event, but even as his fame rose, his hunger never died. As his career went on, he'd hop on tracks by smaller artists that he wanted you to know about, introducing them to the world the way bigger rappers once did for him. As he was starting to reach bigger audiences in the early 2010s, Kendrick used guest appearances to prove himself, hopping on tracks by artists whose fans might not have known him yet, and using the opportunity to overshadow everybody else involved with the track. A Kendrick guest appearance is often so much more than 16 worthy bars he'll go from rapping to singing, change up his flow multiple times, and often give the song a hook too. He's put out over 200 guest verses throughout his 15-plus-year-long career, and he steals the show on so many of them. Kendrick's verse on Baby Keem's "Family Ties" is one of the best of his career, and it reminds you of two things: 1) that Kendrick remains unparalleled, and 2) that many of his best verses are on other people's songs. He first broke his silence by appearing on the new Baby Keem album, which he helped release and which features his first verses in nearly a year he appears on the new Terrace Martin album he's playing his only live show of 2021 at Day N Vegas (update: that happened) and he's gearing up to perform at the 2022 Super Bowl Halftime Show alongside Dr.
Kendrick Lamar seems to be inching towards the release of his highly anticipated followup to 2017's DAMN., which will close his longest gap between albums yet, and though details are still mostly unknown, he's slowly been getting active again.