Good Kid M.A.A.D City chosen as ‘greatest concept album ever’

Kendrick Lamar’s 2012 sophomore album Good Kid, M.A.A.D City is regularly discussed as one of the most influential albums ever and now Rolling Stones has scored it #1 in its Top 50 Greatest Concept Albums Of Time list.

“Good Kid, M.A.A.D City vividly takes us through a day in the life of Lamar with Compton as a backdrop in each song’s hook, skits, melodic rhythms and masterful lyricism.

In addition, Good Kid, M.A.A.D City has spent 519 weeks on the Billboard 200 album chart. Lamar’s critically-acclaimed body of work is the longest-charting Hip Hop studio LP of all time.

On Tuesday, W magazine interviewed Kendrick Lamar and he expounded on the conflicting feelings that came with releasing his latest LP, Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers.

“When I got to completion and I said, ‘I may or may not put this out; I’m not going to put this out; it’s way too much,’ I thought about my children,” he said. “I thought about when they turn 21, or they’re older in life, and when I got grandchildren, or if I’m long gone—this can be a prerequisite of how to cope. That’s the beauty of it for me.”

Lamar continued, “I’m a private person; it was tough for me… The reason why I had to make that decision, whether they was for or against it, I just didn’t want the influence. I could have cut corners and got flashy with it and worded my words a certain way—nah, I had to be in the rawest, truest form I could possibly be in order for it to be freeing for me, in order for me to have a different outlook and the perspective on people I’m talking to. I had to reap whatever consequences came behind that, and also be compassionate and show empathy if they were hurt by it.”

The Top 5 of Rolling Stone‘s “50 Greatest Concept Albums of All Time” also included The Who’s Tommy (#5), Raekwon’s Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… (#4), Pink Floyd’s The Wall (#3), and Green Day’s American Idiot (#2).

Link to Black Wall Street Times>