To Pimp A Butterfly Analysis

In Kendrick Lamar's 2015 Third studio album To pimp a Butterfly, Lamar uses Imagery, Storytelling and symbolism in his music to speak on race relations, materialistic culture and what its like to be Black in America. He covers a broad range of topics in each of his songs that almost all share the same theme, like how blacks in America often have to adhere to white standards. Lamar takes a deep look into himself and systematic racism deep rooted in american culture. Kendricks Album takes you through his spiritual journey to free himself from mental slavery that was caused by persistent racism in his country.

Caterpillar Theory

Kendrick uses symbolism and compares himself to the title of his song. At the beginning of the album, kendrick sees

Buying name brand things only to go along with the evils of capitalist societies. This is shown in the first three songs, “Wesley’s Theory”, “For Free”, “King Kunta. The First song of the album “Wesley's Theory” he describes everything he’s going to do after he “gets big”. This is followed by his next song “For Free(interlude)”. Where kendrick describes how America is only using blacks for profit and talent. This is followed by “King Kunta” where he feels as if he's at the top of the rap game and nothing can stop him. This is followed by the next section of the album where he is in a cocoon state. In his next few songs in the album he is no longer boasting about his lifestyle because he already has money, power and women and he realizes it's not the answer. Kendrick is in a self analyzing state. Where he is trying to find out where he went wrong. This idea is first displayed in his song “Institutionalized” where he talks about being stuck in the ghetto and how even when he left the ghetto it stayed with him. Kendrick states that “Shit don't change until you wash your ass”. So you have to fix yourself before things will

I think it was definitely necessary to black culture and for everyone else to hear. As he also talked about police violence and the deep rooted racism in our society. Which of course was already going to be controversial. Whenever Black people try to work to better ourselves it seems like there's always a group on the other end trying to stop our efforts. Kendrick is very socially aware artist who works hard to share important messages and of course there is always an opposition. Kendrick uses his art form Hip hop to express how blacks struggle and survive in hostile situations. Especially with police brutality. The opposing view might think he's speaking on Anti-police views and stirring up violence and anarchy against the system. When in reality he is just helping his community voice themselves. Fox news spoke on his performance of his album at the 2015 BET Awards. Criticizing him for being Anti-police. They said he was damaging to the African American community,claiming him to be counter-productive to his people. Which is a very conservative view as they are the reason nothing is being done to fix the corrupt policing