J. Cole has unveiled yet more previously unreleased collaborations with Kendrick Lamar and offered his honest thoughts on the Compton rapper’s good kid, m.A.A.d city.
Speaking on the latest episode of his Inevitable audio series, Cole recalled recording with Kendrick during a stop on Drake‘s Club Paradise Tour in 2012.
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“He came to Fayetteville and we worked on that studio bus for two or three days,” he said. “Before, I had sent him joints, but this was the first time we actually got to lock in and work on shit. And that shit was so fun, dawg […] It felt like when your cousin would come over to your house.”
He added: “I knew we would do something crazy if we ever got the chance to do an album. So we came up with a few ideas.”
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Cole’s longtime manager Ibrahim “Ib” Hamad then played an unreleased collaboration between the two rap titans which was produced by Oddisee.
Ib also unearthed a second unreleased track which features a much harder beat and Cole and Kendrick exchanging aggressive bars, with the former channeling Project Pat‘s signature cadence.
J. Cole x Kendrick Lamar – Unreleased Song (Produced by Oddisee)
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J. Cole x Kendrick Lamar – Unreleased Song #2
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After the song finished playing, J. Cole revealed that he and Kendrick Lamar have more music in the vault: “There was another we did that is my favorite one.”
The North Carolina native also revealed that he got an early listen of excerpts of Kendrick’s good kid, m.A.A.d city during those studio sessions.
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He went on to recall hearing the album in full after its release, saying: “This n-gga did exactly what I wanted to do [with a debut album]… It was so pure. He hit it out the park. It was perfect. It walked the line perfectly between classic content and commercial appeal.
“Sonically, that shit was fucking phenomenal. From a writing perspective, from the hooks and the melodies — it had all of that. You just felt it right away.”
Cole also admitted to feeling like Kendrick had “surpassed” him at that time: “When Kendrick’s album dropped, the journey got harder, the mountain got steeper. Because similar to when Drake [So Far Gone] dropped where it was like, ‘Oh shit, there’s another person out there that has the same ambitions as me,’ it happened like that with Kendrick.
“It was a feeling of surpassment. It was two indicators that told me: his first-week numbers were more than mine [with Cole World: The Sideline Story]. The other thing was we had a show where we were both on the same lineup […] and I went before him and he went after me.”
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The “Middle Child” MC added that he felt no bitterness or jealousy towards Kendrick’s success and, after witnessing the impact of tracks like “Swimming Pools,” “Backseat Freestyle” and “m.A.A.d city,” he completely “understood” why Kendrick was selected to close out the concert.
During a previous episode of Inevitable, J. Cole played two other unreleased songs with Kendrick Lamar called “Temptation” and “Shock the World,” which were recorded in 2010.
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The audio series has also seen him unearth never-before-heard material he made with Pharrell during his early pursuit of a “hit.”
