AILSA CHANG, HOST:
All right. What do actor Samuel L. Jackson, tennis icon Serena Williams, a 1980's muscle car and a producer named Mustard all have in common? Well, they all popped out at various moments during Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl halftime show on Sunday. Here's some of the broadcasts from Westwood One Sports.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
KENDRICK LAMAR: (Rapping) We go body for body. I hand you a body. I'm prolly a better masseuse. Really don't bother nobody, but they run it by me...
CHANG: But for NPR Music's Rodney Carmichael, there was one moment in particular that carried the weight of the entire performance. And he's here to help us unpack that moment. Hey, Rodney.
RODNEY CARMICHAEL, BYLINE: Hey. What's up, Ailsa?
CHANG: What's up? OK, so Kendrick Lamar, he is, like, the first hip-hop artist to headline the halftime show solo - right? - like, which is a huge deal.
CARMICHAEL: Definitely.
CHANG: And rather than taking the usual approach to the performance - like, doing, you know, a greatest hits showcase - Kendrick did something kind of unorthodox with the show, right? What struck you the most, Rodney?
CARMICHAEL: Well, Ailsa, for one thing, it's really rare that an artist is even hitting this stage when they're, you know, at the apex of their career. I mean, the Super Bowl halftime show, for years, it's been a stage for the career retrospective...
CHANG: Yeah.
CARMICHAEL: ...You know? This is the chance for an artist who's often in the twilight of their career to showcase their hits and take us down memory lane.
CHANG: Yeah.
CARMICHAEL: But for Kendrick, the only year that he was really interested in highlighting was the year leading up to this moment, and that is the beef with Drake that culminated in him releasing "Not Like Us" last year, in May, as it became the biggest song of his career and the biggest dis song in hip-hop history.
CHANG: And it won two of the biggest Grammys of the year just...
CARMICHAEL: Exactly.
CHANG: ...Last weekend.
CARMICHAEL: Yep.
CHANG: But, you know, it's been this really controversial song, right? And people were wondering all this time, is Kendrick going to sing it at the Super Bowl?
CARMICHAEL: Yeah. I mean, in this song, Kendrick has lyrics that connect Drake and members of his crew with pedophilia. And Drake has filed a defamation lawsuit against Universal Music Group, which is also Kendrick's recording label, and his. And this lawsuit, it says that the corporation knew that the accusations in the song were false, but they distributed and promoted "Not Like Us" anyway, as a way of damaging Drake's reputation.
CHANG: OK. So spoiler - Kendrick did perform "Not Like Us," but he stopped short of rapping some of the song's most inflammatory lyrics. And, you know, he's always been incredibly detailed and intentional with his music, right? And there were all these Easter eggs last night, like Samuel L. Jackson, Serena Williams. How do you think featuring people like them figured into the message that Kendrick wanted to leave the audience with?
CARMICHAEL: Well, Kendrick was definitely interested in raising all the eyebrows, from the highbrow to the lowbrow.
CHANG: (Laughter).
CARMICHAEL: I mean, he found crafty ways to do it too, like having a team of dancers dressed in red, white and blue taking the form of an American flag, or Samuel Jackson playing the role of Uncle Sam and constantly reining him in from doing anything too Black or too un-American.
CHANG: Yeah.
CARMICHAEL: But at the same time, throughout, there were all these deeper messages that Kendrick was teasing out, while he was hanging this beef, this raw meat over our noses - kind of alluding to his beef with Drake.
CHANG: (Laughter).
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
LAMAR: I want to perform they favorite song, but you know they love the soup.
UNIDENTIFIED PERFORMERS: (Singing) What song?
LAMAR: Yeah, that song.
UNIDENTIFIED PERFORMERS: That song?
CARMICHAEL: He wasn't just acknowledging that the question of whether he would perform "Not Like Us" was on everybody's minds. He was actually using that to build up hype within the performance and ultimately toying with whether or not hip-hop, mainstream America, even the music industry would be ready for what would come if he did.
CHANG: Well, I guess the ultimate question I have for you, Rodney, is what did you think of the show? Like, there was all this drama, but was it a good show to Rodney Carmichael?
CARMICHAEL: OK, so unpopular opinion - like, the more I've been watching this, the more I'm falling in love with it. But I can't help but wonder where Kendrick could have taken us or how much more he could have challenged us - even in 13 minutes - if he wasn't busy stumping out the competition.
CHANG: That is in NPR Music's Rodney Carmichael. Thank you so much, Rodney.
CARMICHAEL: Thanks a lot, Ailsa.
(SOUNDBITE OF KENDRICK LAMAR SONG, "NOT LIKE US") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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