Rapper first named his album 'Tu Pimp A Caterpillar' in honour of Tupac Shakur

jonathan

April 1, 2015 11:40 AM

Shakur was a huge influence on Lamar's new LP, the closing track itself 'Mortal Man' features the recording of a Swedish music journalist's 1994 interview with 2Pac.

Kendrick Lamar has stated that his new album 'To Pimp A Butterfly' was originally titled 'Tu Pimp A Caterpillar', a tribute to late rapper Tupac Shakur.

Shakur was a huge influence on Lamar's new LP, the closing track itself 'Mortal Man' features the recording of a Swedish music journalist's 1994 interview with 2Pac.Now, Lamar has told MTV that he nearly named the album in honour of Shakur. "['Tu Pimp A Caterpillar'] was the original name and they caught it because the abbreviation was Tupac, Tu-P-A-C."

He continued: "Me changing it to Butterfly, I just really wanted to show the brightness of life and the word "pimp" has so much aggression, and that represents several things. For me, it represents using my celebrity for good. Another reason is, not being pimped by the industry through my celebrity."

Kendrick Lamar's 'To Pimp A Butterfly' was the first US Number One album with 'Pimp' in its title. The previous highest-charting album with a mention of "pimp" was Pimp C's 'Pimpalation', which charted at Number Three in 2006. 'To Pimp A Butterfly' is the follow-up to 2012's 'Good Kid, MAAD City'. Speaking in a recent interview about the album, Lamar said the music ranges from "the intensely personal to the swaggeringly aggressive".

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jonathan