b) Kendrick, with only 1 album in his discography, put himself in the same conversation as Jay-Z, Nas, Andre 3k, and Eminem, and
c) Kendrick called out all of his contemporaries, by name in his quest to raise the bar.
My favorite part of the verse is actually neither of the 3, but rather his closing bars, which you can read after the jump. Also, for those of you that aren't necessarily hip-hop heads or adept to listening to lyrics vs hearing them, you can check out Rap Genius for a breakdown of the lyrics.
As you can imagine, rappers are coming out of the woodwork with their responses, but to date only two have really provided the lyricism to be discussed further, and those are the responses of Joell Ortiz and King Los. Listen to the entire original song here.
Oh, and shout-out to XPAYNE for the art featured above.
The multi's here remind of Em, but he nailed the ending of the verse right after calling out his fellow 'new school' rappers:
What is competition? I'm tryna raise the bar high
Who tryna jump and get it? You better off tryna skydive
Out the exit window of 5 G5’s with 5 grand
With your granddad as the pilot he drunk as fuck tryna land
With the hand full of arthritis and popping prosthetic leg
Bumpin Pac in the cockpit so the shit that pops in his head
Is an option of violence, someone heard the stewardess said
That your parachute is a latex condom hooked to a dread
Not to get too rap-nerdy on you guys (I think I may have already did that with the Rap Genius link), but shout out to Talib Kweli for catching Kendrick's reference on the NY line, which was appropriated from a 2012 Kurupt verse (hence the Kurupt shout-out from Kendrick on Control right after he spit the line).
"I'm important like the Pope/I'm the King of New York/I'm live from South Central, I'm a Muslim on Pork" - Kurupt ("Get Bizy" feat Kendrick Lamar and Bad Lucc)
