Kendrick Lamar Debuts 'God Is Gangsta' Short Film
After issuing his “Hard Work” PSA, Kendrick Lamar goes on a drunken rant in the video for “God Is Gangsta.”
The short film, comprised of “u” and “For Sale?” off his Grammy-nominated album To Pimp a Butterfly, opens with the Compton rapper alone in a room drinking from a liquor bottle while rapping along to “u” before being baptized in a pool of water. He finds himself surrounded by half-naked women, who can’t keep their hands off him, while his interlude “For Sale?” plays. In between the powerful imagery, subliminal messages flash on screen: “I followed your rules for way too long” and “You played the game. I pimped it.”
Kendrick will head to the Grammys in February, where he is nominated for 11 awards. While he wants to win them all, he didn’t record the album for accolades. “This album did what I wanted it to do,” he told The New York Times. “That’s not necessarily to sell tons of records—though it didn’t do bad at that either—but to actually have an impact on the people and on the culture of music.”
Watch K-Dot wash away his sins just in time for 2016.