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Kendrick Lamar’s Politically Charged Grammy’s Performance

By Stacey Cole
Published on: 00:29 PST, Feb 20, 2016

Kendrick Lamar dominated this year’s Grammy Awards with the most awards and a very controversial politically charged performance, as reported by Vox. The “Alright” rapper took home five awards: best rap album, best rap song, best rap performance, best rap collaboration, and best music video.

In a rather politically charged performance of his hits “The Blacker the Berry” and “Alright,” Kendrick Lamar appeared on stage popping in and out of shadows, and then he was standing shackled in chains with a microphone.

Kendrick Lamar was nominated for as many as 11 nominations at this year’s Grammy Awards, stealing the record set by Eminem, who had held the most nominations in a single night. As for the number of most nominations ever, Michael Jackson holds the first place, while Lamar is second.

Kendrick Lamar’s music rivals – Taylor Swift and The Weeknd – received seven nominations each. Meghan Trainor also got some love from the Grammys, receiving the award for the best new artist, while Mark Ronson’s “Uptown Funk” won in the record of the year and the best pop duo/group performance categories.

The Grammy Awards saw Kendrick Lamar’s performance of two songs – “The Blacker the Berry” and “Alright.” When performing the former one, Lamar rapped “Your plan is to terminate my culture,” with no elaborations as to whose plan it is.

The rather fearless politically charged performance by Kendrick Lamar was introduced by Iron Man actor Don Cheadle, who welcomed the rapper on stage as the author of “a hip-hop masterpiece.”

Kendrick Lamar’s performance started with him celebrating black identity in “The Blacker the Berry,” then there was an African motif transition followed by the rapper singing “Alright,” which was accompanied by drummers and dancers in front of a large bonfire.

“Alright” was about survival and hope, and Kendrick Lamar turned it into a true spectacle featuring neon colors, black lights and a well-performed choreography.

The 28-year-old rapper finished his performance with a map of Africa with the word “Compton” in the middle. Compton is Kendrick Lamar’s home town.

Kendrick Lamar was praised in news reports and social media for sending such a powerful and provocative message during his Grammy Awards performance. Trevor Noah, the Daily Show host, took the chance to make fun of Kanye West when he tweeted about Lamar’s performance.

Music legends Katy Perry and Justin Timberlake also tweeted about Kendrick Lamar, praising him for his powerful Grammys performance:

It’s no secret that Kendrick Lamar doesn’t tweet too often, which is why when he started retweeting hilarious videos from the Twitter page of Rich, a Los Angeles-based comedian, Lamar’s fans were surprised.

Not sure who “this guy” (Rich) is, Kendrick Lamar praised the comedian for his hilarious videos in a separate tweet.

Later that day, the Fader reached out to Rich, who some say resembles Tupac Shakur and takes the advantage of it by impersonating the rap legend in his videos, in order to find out about his reaction to Kendrick Lamar’s tweet endorsements.

When the Fader asked the comedian what was his first reaction to Kendrick Lamar retweeting his videos, Rich answered that he was honored to be endorsed by Lamar, who is not “a casual tweeter.”

“He comes sparingly maybe like once a week so when he did that and he did the first video I was just like, “Wow, that’s dope.” Then he did another one and then another one and he kept going and I’m like, “This is huge. This is Kendrick Lamar. I’m just Richard.”

[Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images]

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