Introducing Dissect: A Serialized Music Podcast

EWe live in a world creating and consuming more content than ever before. Every minute of every day, the world generates nearly three million Facebook posts, tweets and Instagram photos, and over two hundred million e-mails. There’s a 24-hour news cycle, infinite blog posts, and an entire history of music that you can now stream instantly from your phone. We’ve quickly become a scrolling culture, hurriedly swiping through an infinite swath of content that seems to replenish without end. Dissect was created to counter this cultural shift. After too often feeling exhausted and unfulfilled from binging my daily digital diet, I wanted to create a platform that forced me to think critically, not passively. I wanted to spend hours with one thing, not a few minutes with a zillion things. And I wanted to reward artists who, in the face of our new consumption habits, continue to craft their work with care, complexity and depth. And so, Dissect was born: a serialized musi

S1E1 – Compton, K Dot, and Kendrick Lamar

EEpisode 1 of Dissect examines Kendrick Lamar‘s To Pimp a Butterfly with the history of Compton, California and Lamar’s transformation from K Dot, a young mixtape rapper, to Kendrick Lamar, a true artist.

S1E2 – good kid, m.A.A.d. city by Kendrick Lamar

EDissect podcast continues its preface of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly with an overviewof Lamar’s major label debut good kid, m.A.A.d. city. good kid, m.A.A.d. cityspans one pivotal day in Lamar’s teenage upbringing in Compton, California. The album’s protagonist, Kendrick himself at age 16, is jumped by gangbangers in front of Sherene’s house, Kendrick’s girlfriend at the time. Kendrick and his friendsretaliate, leaving one of Kendrick’s best friends dead in his arms. While debating whether to retaliate once again, Kendrick and his friends are approached by an old woman, who leads the children in the Sinner’s Prayer. This sets Kendrick on a new path, dedicating his life towards family, God, and music. Thematically, the album explores the idea of a good kid in a mad city and the ways in which one’s environment influences can taint the purity inherent in us all. He also battles to reconcile his love and r

S1E3 – Wesley’s Theory by Kendrick Lamar

EWe begin our season-long examination ofKendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly with the album’s opening track, Wesley’s Theory. To Pimp a Butterfly is a concept album that documents Lamar’s journey from caterpillar to butterfly (metaphorically, of course). Wesley’s Theory introduces the album’s protagonist, Kendrick himself, a young, naive rapper that has achieved stardom and escaped from the cocoon of Compton. We also meet the album’s antagonist, Uncle Sam, who looks to exploit young Kendrick for profit. Through the lens of this song, we’ll cover topics like the American Dream in modern society, the originsof the phrase “40 Acres and a mule”, Dave Chapelle’s exit from his hit TV show, and Wesley Snipes’ tax evasion conviction. We’ll also examine how Wesley’s Theory is written cinematically and sets the stage for the narrative that unfolds throughoutTo Pimp a Butterfly. If you li

S1E4 – For Free? by Kendrick Lamar

EDissect – A Serialized Music Podcastcontinues itsseason-long examination of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly with the album’s second track “For Free? (Interlude).” “For Free?” is a personal favorite of mine. It’s songslike this that separate Lamar from his contemporary hip-hop peers. He’s assembled some of the greatest living jazz musicians to back hima raucous, unapologetic critique of the American Dream expressed in a rapid-fire stream of consciousness. It takes extreme versatility in craft to executea piece of music of this caliber while still operating within the sphere of popular culture. When I saw Kendrick perform an intimate show at the Fox Theatre in Oakland, he opened with this piece. And the crowd went nuts. Can we think about this for second? A theatre full of rowdy twenty-somethings went wild about a spoken word piece recited ove

S1E5 – King Kunta by Kendrick Lamar

EDissect – A Serialized Music Podcastcontinues itsseason-long examination of Kendrick Lamar’sTo Pimp a Butterflywith the album’s thirdtrack “King Kunta.” “King Kunta” is perhaps the album’s most unabashed tribute to the pervading funk influences throughout To Pimp A Butterfly. On its surface, King Kunta is boastful, heroic, prideful, and at times, vain. Upon further examination, however, we’ll realize there’s a deeper, contrasting message to the song’s calculated, overtly valiant air. We’ll also discover that “King Kunta” is the pinnacle of the album’s first act, which we’ve named Pimped by Consumption. If you’ve enjoyed Dissect so far, consider rating us on iTunes. It really helps.

S1E6 – Institutionalized by Kendrick Lamar

EOur season-long examination of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly continues with the album’s fourth track Institutionalized. After the introduction to the album’s ever-important narrative poem,Kendrick begins to unpack the complexities of his new life of stardom. It begins with Institutionalized, a bouncing, head-nodding track that details Kendrick’s frustrations with his Compton friends’ behavior at the BET awards. By naming the song Institutionalized, Kendrick alludes to broader issues that plague our country and manifest in the behavior of the impoverished and repressed population. Before dissecting this song, I believedminorities faced residual discrimination still resonating from our nation’s dark history. But until I researched institutional racism for this episode, I didn’t understand itscomplexities and

S1E7 – These Walls by Kendrick Lamar

EDissect’sseason-long analysis of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly continues with the album’s fifth track “These Walls.” On “These Walls,” Kendrick speaks of various metaphoric walls to express the confinementsof vice. It interweaves a complex threesome between Kendrick, an unnamed woman, and an imprisoned man serving a life sentence. Each deals with their own personal set of constricting walls that work to prohibit personal progress. Upon first listen, “These Walls” is a similar experience to “King Kunta.” It’s so infectiously danceable and enjoyable that the intricacies of the story it tells is easily lost. But this only works to exemplify Kendrick’s extraordinary talent to craft radio-ready singles without sacrificing the album’s narrative or itsability to stand on its own under scrutiny. It’s only after thorough examination that one realizes its intricacies. “Thes

S1E8 – u by Kendrick Lamar

EWe continue our serialized examination of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly with the album’s next track “u.” “u” is the album’s emotional rock bottom. It’s one of the most gripping, emotionallyvulnerablerecords in hip-hop. It’s a confrontation of inner demons and insecurities told with an honesty rarely found in the genre. If forced, I’d have to say “u” is my favorite song on To Pimp a Butterfly. From the uniqueproduction and musicianship, the metaphoric division of the song’s structure, the foley sounds of clinking bottles, and the moving execution of itsheart-wrenching lyrics, “u” is a crowning achievement on one of the best album’s of all time. Being a native of Sacramento, California, it’s an added bonus that the second half of “u” was produced by relatively unknown Sacramento musician Whoarei, who was found throughhis

S1E9 – Alright by Kendrick Lamar

EWe continue our serialized examination of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly with the album’s next track “Alright.” In the context of the album’s narrative, “Alright” takes place the morning after the drunken confession heard on the previous song “u.” After a therapeutic confrontation of his demons, it seems Kendrick has awoken with a more optimistic outlook and seems determined to overcome his anxieties. Outside of the album, “Alright” has been adopted as an unofficial anthem of the Black Lives Matter movement. The song’s simple message of hope through solidarity and resilience has struck a chord with supporters of the movement, and the refrain “we gon be alright” has been heard chanted at protests and rallies across the country. While Black Lives Matter is an ongoing movement, let’s think back to the time of To Pimp a Butterfly’s release in March 2015. Just three months prior, the decision not to indict the officer who kil