Kendrick Lamar’s ‘GNX’ Is a Meticulous, Versatile, Hard-Hitting Masterpiece: Album Review

variety.com:

Peter A. Berry Midway through his snarling Drake diss, “Not Like Us,” Kendrick Lamar issued a succinct, but forceful personal mandate: “Sometimes you gotta pop out and show n—as.” It was both a plan of action and a self-fulfilling mandate.

Since then, he’s won that rap beef in the most unequivocal terms imaginable: “Not Like Us” has been nominated for multiple Grammys, a rare diss track to achieve that status (ironically the last was Drake’s Meek Mill swipe “Back to Back”), the peak of a six-song flurry, beginning with his guest verse of Future and Metro Boomin’s “Like That,” that got just one response before its target conceded with silence.

Months after his historic, L.A.-boosting “Pop Out” concert on Juneteenth, he was selected to perform at halftime for Super Bowl LIX.

After “Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers,” Lamar’s strong yet challenging sixth studio album, it was a re-coronation for the best rapper in the world — a flawless album rollout, but without an album.