You Can Practice Your Unseen Poetry Skills On Any Text
Scroll down for my 25 minute essay on Kendrick Lamar’s song ‘Not Like Us’
In the grand tradition of English teachers trying to make their subject relevant by referencing contemporary culture, I present my essay on Kendrick Lamar’s recently released song ‘Not Like Us’. In so doing, I’d like to make several points:
You can practice analysing language on any text. If you don’t like analysing poetry, analyse the lyrics to your favourite song, then try practising with song lyrics you don’t know so well. Try to ignore what you know about the artist, and instead concentrate on their language: the order of their words, the patterns and rhythm, the repetition, the metaphors, the imagery.
It’s perfectly possible to write about something you don’t fully understand. My previous essay on ‘The Loch Ness Monster’s Song’ demonstrates how to write about something you don’t understand at all. ‘Not Like Us’ contained more intelligible information, but also contained a huge amount of references and even whole lines that I didn’t understand. Don’t worry about understanding everything; prioritise engaging with what you do understand.
When writing about unseen texts (texts you have never studied), it is permissible to make mistakes. It is possible (indeed likely) that I have misunderstood the meaning of some of Lamar’s lyrics, but as long as I have explained my reasoning, it may still be creditable in terms of marks.
Below is the verse of ‘Not Like Us’ that I chose to explore. The question I set myself was: In ‘Not Like Us’, how does Kendrick Lamar present Drake?’ I allowed myself five minutes to plan and I wrote the essay by hand in twenty-five minutes.
Extract from ‘Not Like Us’ by Kendrick Lamar
[Intro]
Psst, I see dead people
(Mustard on the beat, ho)
[Verse 1]
Ayy, Mustard on the beat, ho
Deebo any rap nigga, he a free throw
Man down, call an amberlamps, tell him, "Breathe, bro"
Nail a nigga to the cross, he walk around like Teezo
What's up with these jabroni-ass niggas tryna see Compton?
The industry can hate me, fuck 'em all and they mama
How many opps you really got? I mean, it's too many options
I'm finna pass on this body, I'm John Stockton
Beat your ass and hide the Bible if God watchin'
Sometimes you gotta pop out and show niggas
Certified boogeyman, I'm the one that up the score with 'em
Walk him down, whole time, I know he got some ho in him
Pole on him, extort shit, bully, Death Row on him
Say, Drake, I hear you like 'em young
You better not ever go to cell block one
To any bitch that talk to him and they in love
Just make sure you hide your lil' sister from him
They tell me Chubbs the only one that get your hand-me-downs
And Party at the party playin' with his nose now
And Baka got a weird case, why is he around?
Certified Lover Boy? Certified pedophiles
Wop, wop, wop, wop, wop, Dot, fuck 'em up
Wop, wop, wop, wop, wop, I'ma do my stuff
Why you trollin' like a bitch? Ain't you tired?
Tryna strike a chord and it's probably A minor
Here is my essay:
From the very title, Lamar creates a sense of opposition and exclusion, asserting the presence of an in group with the collective pronoun ‘us’, and positioning Drake (only mentioned by name later) in opposition to this. This is followed by an intro, ‘Psst, I see dead people’ which immediately establishes and environment of threat and violence, but also mystery - who is dead and what happened to them? There’s also a mocking or comedic tone to this line, with ‘I see dead people’ being a famous and much memed line from a hit movie.
Throughout the verse, Lamar deploys questioning to challenge and undermine Drake. The first of these questions, ‘What’s up with these jabroni-ass n****** tryna see Compton?’ continues the title’s framing of Drake as an outsider - ‘tryna see’ implies incapacity or inferiority, a sense that Drake is desperately trying to be included in something that he will never fully understand. The ‘What’s up with…?’ creates a relationship of intimacy between Lamar and the listener, almost the tone of relatability which stand-up comedians typical use, fostering shared understanding with the listener, at the expense of the ostracised Drake.
The second question, ‘How many opps you really got?’ could be seen as a challenge to Drake’s honesty, with ‘really’ implying that he exaggerates to aggrandize himself. However, after the caesura, the second half of the line flips this idea, ‘I mean, it’s too many options,’ playfully repeating the ‘op’ sound, but this time implying that Drake has countless ‘opps’ (enemies), with the presumed implication that he is very widely disliked.
The next several lines include a range of references to violence that Lamar seemingly threatens to carry out to Drake, or to exhort others to do so. The breathless list ‘Pole on him, extort shit, bully, Death Row on him,’ reads almost like a spell being cast on Drake, a litany of punishments rising to the ultimate crescendo of ‘Death Row’. the harsh series of plosive sounds contributes to the violence of the phrase, whilst the repetition of ‘on him’ creates the image of Drake as beneath and in a position of vulnerability.
The following lines introduce a tone shift, transitioning from referencing Drake in the third person, as an object to be acted upon, to directly addressing him by name. At this point, any doubt in the reader or listener’s mind is removed as to the identity of this foe. The informal use of ‘Say’ before his name: ‘Say, Drake, I hear you like ‘em young’ comes across as patronising, a forced casual tone, as if Lamar has only just now finally noticed Drake and deigned to pay attention to him directly. The charge ‘I hear you like ‘em young’ is followed by a strong imperative ‘You better not ever go to cell block one’, at once demonstrating authority over Drake by instructing him on what to do, and also reinforcing the idea of Drake’s vulnerability, the presumed implication of ‘cell block one’ being a place where Drake would meet with retribution or punishment.
Chubbs, Party and Baka - presumably associates of Drake - come in for the next criticisms, ‘playin with his nose’ possibly implying drug use and ‘weird case’ suggesting deviance, before the group are seemingly given the collective label ‘certified pedophiles’, with the intentional choice to use that word in the plural.
The powerful onomatopoeia of the repeated ‘wop wop wop’ creates a final auditory image of gunshots, before the insulting and demeaning questions at the end, and the repeated use of the word ‘tryna’ reiterating the earlier idea of Drake as a try-hard, an unsuccessful striver. Rhymed at the end of the line with ‘minor’ this again positions Drake as an inferior ‘minor’ personality in comparison to Lamar.