Who knew that Kendrick Lamar was such a trickster? On his first new track of 2017, “The Heart Part 4,” released a couple of weeks ago, people thought he teased Friday 7 April (ie: today) as his album release date. He rapped: “Y’all got till April the 7th to get y’all shit together,” and the rap bloggers excitedly queued their posts up. This made sense considering he was to drop the first single from that as-yet-untitled album – “Humble” – a mere week later.
But here we are, on 7 April, with no Kendrick album to speak of. Maybe you woke up extra early to get a cheeky listen in before work; maybe you stayed up last night in anticipation. Maybe you just really wanted some new Kendrick to bump on the bus. But Kendrick giveth, and Kendrick taketh away: he had us all fooled. Instead of the LP itself, his fourth album is now available to pre-order via iTunes, and its release date is listed as next Friday 14 April (which, interestingly, is Good Friday – is this a coincidence considering all the religious imagery in the “Humble” video? Just one of many questions).
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Seeing as how the artwork, album title and tracklist are still under wraps, the only other tidbits of information we’ve got are about the contributors (thanks, Reddit!). It’s a trippy-looking group, featuring U2, BADBADNOTGOOD, 9th Wonder and more, and the variety alone seems to suggest that it’ll be Kendrick’s most adventurous record yet, which alone feels worth another week’s wait. Kind of. In the meantime, here’s the Reddit version of the album composers, track by track, according to iTunes.
Track 1: D. Tannenbaum and Anthony Tiffith
Track 2: Mike WiLL Made-It
Track 3: Sounwave, DJ Dahi, and Anthony Tiffith
Track 4: Sounwave, James Blake, and Richie Riera
Track 5: Sounwave
Track 6: DJ Dahi, Sounwave, Anthony Tiffith, and Terrace Martin
Track 7: The Internet’s Steve Lacy, Anna Wise, and Anthony Tiffith
Track 8: Mike WiLL Made-It
Track 9: DJ Dahi, Mark Spears, and BadBadNotGood
Track 10: Zacari Pacaldo, Teddy Walton, Sounwave, Greg Kurstin, and Anthony Tiffith
Track 11: Mike WiLL Made-It, DJ Dahi, Sounwave, Anthony Tiffith, and U2
Track 12: The Alchemist
Track 13: Richie Riera, Sounwave, DJ Dahi, D. Tannenbaum, Anthony Tiffith, and Cardo
Track 14: 9th Wonder
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(Image via YouTube)
