I love that opening track. He’s always so psychedelic, but after listening to Section 80 many times, and Pimp the Butterfly, this album from the get go with United in Grief got me more than anything else I’d listened to because it’s less busy and it’s mixed so his voice lays on top of everything else instead of an experimental sound scape his lyrics are encoded in. My favorite part of United In Grief though is definitely that jazz piano and playing with the classical bowed strings is lovely. There’s still almost no structure and it floats like a dream from one spot to another, but the voices you hear are clear and in focus.
Before I move on, I have to say the photograph album cover is so beautiful. Family in beautiful browns and whites is so endearing as it doesn’t scream rich, but in modern days when rich people seem to try to hide their wealth, it doesn’t seem poor either. It’s a simple house where Kendrick is crown as King and his walls have ripped off paint from where the previous occupants of the room may have tore things off of the wall. Simple living with a beautiful family, but still looking good.
In general the album is pretty consistent with its sonics. Lots of piano, reverses and bowed strings.
Album cover of Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers
Father Time is pretty powerful. Kendrick doesn’t reveal specifics in action from his father, but he reveals a specific in emotion. This track builds really well.
I really like the slow down of Auntie Diaries. I love how he talks about his relatives and notes how his relative’s reality conflicted with his words in school. I think it doesn’t take sides, it just expresses an experience. It’s very modern. The ending to the track is pretty cool. If anything, like the discussion being had, it makes you think. In the end the words we chose have different meanings to different people. Things recorded live in time and that meaning may change. If anything it feels like looking straight at the word faggot. I didn’t choose those words randomly either.
The thing I again really enjoy about this album is that you can actually concentrate on his voice. It’s just such a relief after listening to his early albums that I usually never wanted to get all the way through. This one I relate to much more, I’d choose it as an entry point to start to like Kendrick.
Mother I Sober, I like it, as it’s simple with a gentle delivery that doesn’t pull you closer, again, just states. The whole album feels like an artful documentary, maybe like Montage of Heck about Cobain. That is until it talks about the sexual abuse of all the rappers he knows. It’s like he wakes up at times after a drifting dream in tracks like this, Father Time and We Cry Together.