There's not much else you can really say about Kendrick Lamar and his sophomore album, To Pimp A Butterfly. It's undoubtedly the best hip-hop album of the 2010s decade and easily one of the best of all time. Where it ranks in say a top 50 list, we will leave that to you to decide. But the reason we are revisiting this classic today is because it has just turned 10 years old. It's quite hard to believe for obvious reasons, but looking back, it's wild how Lamar was able to put together another flawless album together. Especially after dropping good kid, m.A.A.d city three years earlier. To celebrate, we are going to dive back into perhaps his strongest opener of his career, "Wesley's Theory."
We don't enough room to detail this track in full as there are simply too many nuances and themes. But in short, (and for those who may have not heard this song) Kendrick Lamar touches on greed, fame, ignorance, and white supremacy. He's able to touch on all of this with precision by using the first verse to explain how's he going to blow all of his label money on materialistic things, a common stereotype among black artists he himself wanted to touch on. Then, in the second verse, he raps from the perspective of "Uncle Sam" (the government). Sam essentially encourages Lamar to fall into those common pitfalls we mentioned. "Wear those gators," "Count it all together, baby / Then hit the register and make me feel better, baby." Overall, it's the perfect table setter for TPAB and features one of the most infectious beats of his career, pulling from G-funk, West Coast hip-hop, neo-soul, and etc.
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Kendrick Lamar "Wesley's Theory"
Quotable Lyrics:
At first, I did love you (Love you)
But now I just wanna f*ck (I just wanna f*ck)
Late nights thinkin' of you (Of you)
Until I get my nut ('Til I get my nut)
Tossed and turned, lesson learned
You was my first girlfriend
