“Pimp Pimp Hooray” Lamar Is Back -Untitled Unmasterd Review

What happens when the messiah of rap, big selling artist, leader of the thinking man’s music quietly releases a collection of demos after being in much obscurity for the longest time? Well, everyone goes nuts. That’s right, Kendrick Lamar has finally made his first post –To Pimp A Butterfly release and it’s not quite a follow up, more of an extension if you will.

Untitled Unmastered was very quietly and humbly released to the public, unlike a certain Kanye West’s Life of Pablo, as a collection of demos and outtakes from the 2014 recording sessions for TPAB in a move that may not be made for commercial success, but rather made to be an artistic envoy for Lamar’s expression. Not really an album, not really a mixtape, not even an EP, or an LP, Untitled Unmastered is truly acting as the extended coda for TPAB. More for the fanatics than the radio listeners.

This artistic exploration contains an 8 track selection that opens with a rather forgettable track titled “Untitled 1” and is followed by an extraordinary show of Lamar’s vocal control and manipulation as “Untitled 2” displays his master flowss without studio manipulation in a rather concert like performance. Enchanting is all that can be said of the track. Following, we get a previously performed track from “Untitled 3” that we saw on the goodbye episode of “The Colbert Report”, that is truly just classic Lamar serving up chilling beats on race and the music industry, while masterfully tying in bits of history and wisdom.

Then moving down to “Untitled 5”, Ana Wise, Jay Rock and Punch join Lamar for a long and bodacious jazz groove session. Following that, we get a Lamar and Cee Lo-Green duet flowing over the breezy and smooth production of Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad making some fine music. Lamar closes his album with studio horse play and jokes made into a rather entertaining cut, “Untitled 7” and crescendos the album with the polished smooth synth-funk beauty of “Untitled 8” that will have you jamming for days.

So, “Pimp pimp hooray” Lamar is back, maybe not in the way we really wanted or expected but it’s been a year and now we got some new beats to jam out to. No you are not gonna find these cuts on the radio or hear the billboards buzzing about them, but they are all truly worth a listen. The album might as well have been titled To Pimp A Butterfly Part 2, so take a look.