Rapper Kendrick Lamar has turned criticism of his controversial performance at the 2015 BET Awards into art by including remarks from a conservative news broadcaster on his new album.
Fox News anchor Geraldo Rivera famously took aim at the hip-hop star in June, 2015 after Kendrick delivered a powerful performance of his single Alright at the BET Awards, while rapping the anti-police lyrics on top of a vandalized cop car in light of a string of police brutality cases across the U.S.
"This is why I say that hip-hop has done more damage to young African-Americans than racism in recent years," the veteran newsman declared after quoting a line from Alright about hating the "po-po (police)". "This is exactly the wrong message..."
Kendrick hit back by questioning Rivera's logic, telling TMZ, "How can you take a song that's about hope and turn it into hatred? The overall message is 'We gonna be alright...' Hip-hop is not the problem..."
Now, two years on, it appears the MC is even more fired up about the criticism, and has sampled Rivera's on-air comments on the first three tracks on DAMN., which was released on Friday (14Apr17).
Listeners were quick to recognize the news clip featured at the end of the opening track BLOOD. The audio from Fox News also appears on the album's second song, DNA, while the Poetic Justice hitmaker addresses Unetwork bosses and Geraldo directly on the third tune, YAH.
On the second verse of YAH, he raps, "Fox News wanna use my name for percentage/My latest news is my niece, she's worth livin'/See me on the TV and scream, 'That's Uncle Kendrick!'/Yeah, that's the business/Somebody tell Geraldo this n**ga got some ambition..."
The newsman has since responded to the shout out by "the great" Kendrick, who he considers to be the second-best rapper behind Drake.
"I didn't particularly care for the way he mentioned me," Rivera said during a podcast on Friday. "I think that the mention is relatively benign... I have no beef with Kendrick Lamar."
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