Kendrick Lamar was only originally supposed to contribute one song to the Black Panther soundtrack, according to the film’s director Ryan Coogler.
Speaking to LeBron James for Interview magazine, Coogler revealed that the Compton rap star took it upon himself to record a whole album for the Marvel blockbuster after being asked to contribute just one track to it — much to the filmmaker’s (pleasant) surprise.
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“There were a few moments where I’d be like, ‘Oh man, this shit is getting crazy,'” he said while reflecting on the hit 2018 film. “For instance, Kendrick was supposed to do a song, so he and Dave Free came by and watched a bit of footage, and then bounced.
“Then a few weeks later they hit me back like, ‘Hey man, come listen to the music,’ and they had a whole damn album.”
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Coogler added: “Each song had a reference to the movie. I’m like, ‘Man, this n-gga just wrote this.’ And then on set, Chadwick [Boseman] was doing incredible work every day, Mike was doing incredible work every day, but I couldn’t appreciate the moment.”
The director, who is currently busy promoting his highly acclaimed new movie Sinners, previously explained how Kendrick became involved with the music for Black Panther.
“I’ve been a massive Kendrick fan ever since I first heard him, since his mixtapes, and I’ve been trying to track him down,” he told NPR in 2018. “Eventually I caught up with him a couple years ago — first with Anthony ‘Top Dawg’ Tiffith, who runs his label, and then later on sat down with him and Kendrick and just spoke about much his music affected me.
“He talked about my movies that he had seen, and we said if the opportunity comes, we’d love to work with each other on something.”
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Coogler added: “To Marvel’s credit, they really supported the idea of getting some songs from him. At first, he was just going to do a few songs for the film, and then he came in and watched quite a bit of the movie, and the next thing I know, they were booking a studio and they were going at it.”
The Black Panther soundtrack was curated by Kendrick, who also contributed vocals to the entire 14-track album.
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It spawned hits such as “All the Stars,” “King’s Dead” and “Pray For Me,” while also boasting appearances from the likes of Future, Travis Scott, The Weeknd, SZA and 2 Chainz.
