True Music In Hip Hop: Kendrick Lamar Says "i" Came From Depression & Insecurity

In a past interview with Hot 97 personalities Ebro Darden and Peter Rosenberg, Compton, California rapper Kendrick Lamar revealed that his “i” record was made for those locked up and those who feel they have nothing to live for. K-Dot again addressed the record while speaking with 93.7 The Beat’s Devi Dev and shared that he too has dealt with depression and insecurity. The TDE lyricist explained that newfound fame and fortune can bring about a lot of depression and turmoil. “The record feels great and feels good, but it comes from a place of depression,” Kendrick said. “It comes from a place of insecurity. Not only from them, but from myself. It’s a lot of things that I deal with personally that you deal with. That all of us in this room deal with. So, it touched on so many different things. As far as equality within us as human beings and accepting one another…It comes a lot of turmoil when you talk about money. When you talk about fame and fortune and success. A lot of things you gotta handle and balance and that brings a whole lot of depression. I’ve spoken with artists that’s done it before me. They said they went through the same phases too.” Kendrick later touched on his good kid, m.A.A.d city cover art. He explained that the cover art consists of “so many dynamics” and is something that will stick with him forever. “What’s even more tripped out, somebody that’s responsible for me being who I am today was the actual poster that was in the back,” he said. “That’s me and my father. If you look right in the back it’s me and him. He light-skinned, super pale, light…So, it’s so many dynamics in that cover, man. It’s something that’ll stick with me forever. Just the fact that I got my parents on there. It’s something that I can carry with me forever. When I have grandkids and they never met they grandparents. They great-grandparents or whatnot. They can go back and trace that album and say ‘Okay, I know what they was like in real life.’” With his upcoming appearance on “Saturday Night Live” scheduled for November 15, Kendrick revealed that he hopes to also appear in a skit on the show. The rapper even offered his own idea for a skit, which would touch on matters of gentrification. “I wanna do skits out of the norm,” Kendrick said. “Something that contrasts. I always talked about—but recently we started talking about how it never was any white people in the city, in my schooling. From the Compton school district. I would like to do something where I can contrast that and bring it all the way back and put me in the class where it’s different types of ethnicities other than the minority. I wonder how would I function in that type of environment. I think that’d be fun."