With the debut of his second studio album Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, Kendrick Lamar has been garnering much attention and respect from the hip-hop community. Good Kid, M.A.A.D City features big names like Drake, Dr. Dre, and Jay Rock. With Dre. Dre as his producer, Kendrick Lamar has been slowly bringing back west coast rap with his unique style and flow. He has been critically acclaimed and crowned the “King of the West”.
I have always been a huge fan of Kendrick Lamar, and when I heard he was coming to Berkeley on October 24th, I was super excited. Not only was it a free performance, it was right around the corner from the UC Berkeley Campus at Rasputin Music on Telegraph. The only downside was that Rasputin issued wristbands to people who purchased Good Kid, M.A.A.D City the day before the performance, and you needed a wristband to get into the show. Luckily I was able to obtain a wristband and on the day of the show I arrived 30 minutes early and there was already a huge crowd outside and inside the store. Kendrick Lamar was scheduled to perform at 6pm and as 6 o’clock slowly rolled around, he arrived and was greeted by anxious adoring fans. He opened by performing “Money Trees” and he ended with “Backseat Freestyle”, two songs from his new album.
I was a little disappointed that he only performed two songs, and the whole time he had little energy or enthusiasm. All in all, I still had fun although I wished he performed at least a little longer and was a little more energetic.
