Art begets big questions. Reminds us that the role of the artist is to reflect the times and somehow, while leveraging being the ultimate hater reincarnated in the form of a cinammon roll, Kendrick Lamar did just that. We can see it in the conversations popping up online. Half the internet don’t know what the hell just happened and the rest of us are over here battling back the Holy Ghost after watching Samuel L Jackson author us into an artistic coma. There ain’t nobody in the game doing it like Kendrick, and, I say this disrespectfully, 1 doesn’t deserve to have witnessed his brilliance.

The man opened with this, “the revolution will be televised/you picked the right time but the wrong guy”. CAN WE PAUSE? EVERYBODY PAUSE. PAUSE IMMEDIATELY. Off rip, we’ve got double entendre going crazy. That ain’t just about Aubrey. Saying that with the raging fascist, wannabe dictator in chief in attendance, there’s a direct bristling up against the establishment as it stands. The performance following? An openly political call to action confronting more than just Drake, but gifting us a challenging reminder that the grift is up! We’re surrounded by folks set on stealing from the culture. Stealing us. Stealing away what’s owed. Folks who have made whole careers out of co-opting narratives to approximate themselves closer to Blackness, as an identity, as a style for convenience. As a means to serve nefarious purposes. Build what you can use and destroy what remains. Baby, Drake’s made it his whole personality trait. Bo-bos, click-clacks, barrettes, braids and all. But so has America.

What a gift to be in on the not so secret secret.

Black folks have a history with using symbolism for survival. Art as a coded language, music the vessel for understanding. Kendrick is sounding the alarms for us, as if we, the 92%, ain’t already been told y’all. So of course, white folks are confused. Of course they were bored. But the tomato is on their faces, because the performance was never intended for them. Know your place.

I’m struck by his use of HUMBLE, off a fully Pulitzer Prize winning album (a lot of girlies are just now finding out!), and an American flag— the original one, with 13 stars stitched by a freed Black girl, Grace Wisher,2 from Baltimore in the 1800s, being formed (shoutout out to the choregrapher, Charm La’Donna) with Black bodies in skullies, durags, and hoodies, slowly being deconstructed as his lyrics wear on. Revealing an America divided. The quick motion of Klan hoods from those in white, the ultimate gang, the original domestic terrorists. But then, the colors red, white and blue going beyond patriotism, fuck the country, let’s touch on the unification of Bloods and Crips. What’d Kendrick say— he put 100 hoods on one stage and brought peace to LA? I’m watching this with Tupac in mind, his awareness that he might not be around long enough to effect change, to see his own impact and how though that may be true, there’s something full circle in Kendrick bringing us into this moment.

Something really specific in Samuel L Jackson as Uncle Sam, a sort of— I’d argue literal personification of America. I know that went over a lot of y’alls heads but I’m throttled back— to pimp a butterfly is curling through my veins. The use of Uncle Sam as a through-line in story, guiding us along a literal choose your own adventure. Did we clock that the stage was a video game controller? Paired with the presence of Uncle Sam, more double entendre because Mr. Jackson really is the people’s unc, a beloved elder in our cultural landscape who’s colored the social lexicon after amassing decades worth of respect for pushing off the notion of performative representation. The conversation has been recognized that that man is one of few navigating this industry with integrity and authenticity.

So here he is, a Tom, if you wanna get shaky, poised to represent the guise of our elders, and frankly, anybody else, especially whiteness both in body and concept, trying to encourage Black people to walk this way, talk this way, play the game the way we're "supposed" to. Don’t be “too loud”, “too ghetto”, “too reckless”, “too hood”, act too Black and you’ll die. “Stay calm,” because that’s how they like us. Even if it means accepting oppression and subjugation as the status quo. There are certain requirements those with proximity to power, affluence and influence expect us to fulfill. When the shuck and jive doesn’t meet the standard, or better yet, when there is a direct rejection of that demand- the uproar is loud. Kendrick is shouting from the rooftops that this performance isn’t meant for your entertainment, Karen. It’s not meant for you at all. We’re not playing that game anymore, Black folks need to have another conversation. “This is the Great American game,” wasn’t a shoutout to football, not alone. Additionally, it calls us to examine how power is pawned off in our country and who gets to play. And should we heed the advice of the gatekeepers that came before? With “loyalty and royalty inside our DNA”, the DNA from our bloodlines off which this country was built. There’s a push and pull playing with an exchange of mainstream popularity; playing the game vs. controlling it. Because you can’t what? Fake influence. Lawsuits be damned.

Which doesn’t even fully encapsulate the block driving euphoria into man at the garden into peekaboo. Look, I ain’t no conspiracy theorist… but that X seemed mighty pointed3. Or even Uncle Sam’s declaration, “Oh! I see you brought your homeboys with you, your cultural cheat code.”4 The lights in the crowd spelling “Warning! Wrong way.” “Deduct 1 life.” A mirror, a visual representation for what happens when you fall out of line. What could we accomplish if we stopped code switching to be understood, divested away from performative politics and took of the mask of double consciousness when in shared space? On top of that, we get a moment of cinematic brilliance. Kendrick, disappearing from frame and literally peekaboo’ing his way back in, can the audience keep up with him? And just like that, we hurtle forward, to a Greek chorus of Black women in two toned wigs, black and red and glorious— where are we off to next as we watch the supposed meritocracy crumble around us?

When the blessed time comes, when Kendrick forges forward, ready to give the we the people what we came here for, against Uncle Sam’s better judgement— he says it all. “Not Like Us” begins and there it is, the whole beloved opening verse. “Say Drake, I hear you like em young,” hits real hard live, hits even harder in ASL. There wasn’t a world where I could have imagined, in an era of mass censorship, that verse would clear regulations. And then Serena Williams!??! Cripping in, rocking Compton blue, looking down the barrel of the camera like her name is Cynthia Erivo5, blue mascara popping (shoutout Wyn Beauty). Calling back not only to c-walking at Wimbledon and later being decimated by the powers that be for not “behaving appropriately”, but reminding Drake to pipe down, there’s more than one clown in the room— you’re just one of quite a few. Fuck around and find out if you want to. We got two of your ex’s on stage dogging you out and we’re loving it. A real nigga, mic in hand, airing you out with a smile and an “a minor” chain as the whole stadium, as the whole country, sings along. You’re merely a means to an end, a small piece in a much larger picture.

And embedded the whole way through, all I see is us. Locs draped over shoulders and tightly coiled fros, colored bright red and blonde. Chocolate drops with gold fronts, teeth gleaming under street lights. A rotating sea of our people, ushered about like chattel. History repeating itself, new incantations in seance circles conjuring something new that’ll take hold if only we hop into the driver’s seat of our fate. Commandeer the GNX. The free Gaza, free Sudan flag during “tv off”6. Two toned wigs in 99J and 1B. Crop tops and soft bellies. The pglang Gloria jacket designed by Martine Rose. The 12345+5 reference on the front of his cap… the owl’s feather since we probably can’t directly call on the OV-hoe of it all. The costuming, baggy clothes, white tees billowing in the wind. Mobilized Black bodies, reminiscent of generations of our bodies marching through the streets seeking liberation. It’s Black Panther, and as Sza sings, you realize it’s not just the movie we’re talking about. The comedic timing. The lofting of southern Black imagery and west coast Black imagery, in a country that hates both but loves to wring it dry like a wet rag for all it can get. A subversive kind of boldness we don’t get to see very often. A booming refusal of what is in the name of what could be.

This, I promise you, wasn’t a performance for the masses. Even still, it manages to etch itself into one of the greatest halftime performances of all time. Even as I write this, I’m challenged by an internal questioning: is this something I’m meant to share. Is this something to be held in quiet? A revolutionary cry, so loud and clear, but it seems only to appear as a grating buzz. The president was in the room and remains none the wiser. A clear rejection of the white gaze and commercial superficiality, a celebration of our shit and no one else’s, twisting away from America’s Conscience and stepping into our own. And anybody can be a part if they’re willing to sit down and pay attention. That’s the assignment here, I think. To clue in to the message: bravery as provocation.

Bravery makes room, makes way for opportunity. Gives us clearance to dismantle the shit that won’t ever meant to work in our favor. Critical thinking shouldn’t be treated as some passing hobby. Here we have an artist who has made his work accessible, leaned into the “game” and still came out swinging, no misses, at not just the industry but the whole damn country. It’s a beautiful thing, to be delighted into delirium. To have something so irrevocably ours. Resistance moves in a lot of ways. Disruption can take a proxy for a target. Kendrick stands in protest, calling into question white bodies unable to register his voice, and in this lies a repeated pattern. Our history is storied with secret messages, instruction manuals, bound up in song, left out in the open by our ancestors, even before they were gone.

Intentionality serves a greater purpose. It’s efficacy comes from how we’re activated and where it goes beyond conversation. What is it that we’re willing to commit to? Are we willing to step outside of ourselves? To press in on the established bodies of power that have us thinking they’ve choked the life out of our collective power to demand change. This shit was so accessible and folks have still missed it, so I offer an invitation to come sit with us. Or squabble up. It’s up to you, babes. Either way, it’s game over. Go birds.