Every week, Consequence’s Songs of the Week column looks at great new tunes from the last seven days and analyzes notable releases. Find our new favorites and more on our Spotify Top Songs playlist, and for other great songs from emerging artists, check out our Spotify New Sounds playlist. This week, digging into Kendrick Lamar’s surprise song.

During the MTV VMAs earlier this week, Kendrick Lamar returned without warning and dropped an untitled track on his Instagram page. The timing of the release was likely no coincidence, as the song goes beyond his Drake beef to run down the state of hip-hop and the music industry as a whole.

Bringing the black Air Force 1 energy from the accompanying artwork, Kendrick opens with the chilling line, “I think it’s time to watch the party die.” Continuing a general throughline from his Drake disses, Kendrick unloads his frustrations with the state of “the culture,” taking more subliminal shots at Drake and his associates, as well as unnamed rappers turned podcasters.

As Kendrick sees it, hip-hop is too focused on materialist goals and gaining clout over seeking substance: “So where the soldiers at?” he asks. “The one’s that lost it all and learnt to learn from that/ A thirst for life, head inside a book ’cause he concerned with that/ Information that’ll change his life because he yearns for that.”

Kendrick’s disgust for some of his cohort is so strong that he would “trade all of y’all” for the late Nipsey Hussle, and he’s lost in a “sunken place” haunted by ghosts. Seeing no way out of hip-hop’s malaise, his only solution is to burn it all down and build it from the ground up.

With an upcoming headlining appearance at the 2025 Super Bowl Halftime Show, speculation for a new Kendrick album is at a fever pitch. After rapping in the new song that he’s “not enthused to drop,” there are no guarantees, but it seems like Kendrick still has plenty to get off his chest.

— Eddie Fu
News Editor