After hearing the news that Drake's Take Care has spent nearly 250 weeks on the Billboard charts, it got me reflecting on the album. I don't know about you, but it was one of the first times I heard Kendrick Lamar, if not the first. When Marvin's Room transitioned into the hypnotic "Buried Alive Interlude" I was immediately fixated on Kendrick's magnetic performance. "Look inside the mirror I'm embarrassed, feeling like a suicidal terrorist," he raps, in one of the album's more memorable opening lines. What follows is a haunting and revealing reflection on fame and vanity, delivered with earnest sincerity from the then-emerging Lamar.
It's crazy that Kendrick ultimately had one of the highlight verses on a Drake album, and their dynamic is a dominant theme throughout the track. There's a moment where K Dot reminisces about a meeting they shared, in which he admits to feeling a sense of resentment toward Drizzy: "Then he said that he was the same age as myself, and it didn't help 'cause it made me even more rude and impatient, so blame it on Mr. OVOXO, the reason why I'm breathin' all the vanity I know."
Lookin' in the mirror, I'm embarrassed
I'm feelin' like a suicidal terrorist
React like an infant whenever you are mentioned
Mind over matter never worked for my nemesis
I'm in the matter of man arm wrestlin' hands I was dealt
When I said the music business was all I needed
When I got it I was greeted by an alien
That said last year that she slept with a Canadian
That gave him an addiction that'd keep him in Mercedes Benz
Bright lights and Rihanna as a lady friend
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