Kendrick Lamar’s music is always going to have a deeper meaning, even when he’s dissing his biggest rival, Drake. So it should be no surprise that K. Dot’s much-anticipated music video for “Not Like Us,” which dropped earlier this month, is packed with symbolism and hidden meanings. Let’s dig into it.
At the end of Drake’s Kendrick diss track “Family Matters,” he raps, “This shit gotta be over by now for anyone that’s calling it right? Ya dead, ya dead, ya DEAD!” Well at the beginning of the “Not Like Us” video, Kendrick debuts a brief song or snippet that the internet has dubbed “Broccoli (Reincarnated)“ in which his first words are “I am reincarnated!” Not quite dead, indeed.
Many fans on social media have speculated on this: The knock Lamar used at the start of the video is called “Shave and a Haircut Two Bits.” It originates from the 1899 song, “At a Darktown Cakewalk,” which is a minstrel song. Darktown was a neighborhood in Atlanta, which is the city Lamar references in his final verse of “Not Like Us.”
Since Kendrick’s whole critique of Drake centers on the latter “pretending” to be a Black rapper and “proper” member of the culture, some have interpreted the knock as one of the first subtle shots at Drake in the entire video.
In “Family Matters,” Drake raps, “Why did you move to New York? Is it ’cause you livin’ that bachelor life?” Some have interpreted that line as suggesting that Kendrick sold out and left his city behind (perhaps in the name of getting with other women).
But the “Not Like Us” video is fully, unabashedly Compton, from the opening scene at the Compton City Hall and Civic Center to featuring L.A. legend Tommy the Clown and plenty of his “clowning” version of krumping dancing to a street full of locals chanting in the street.
Lamar took on the “Boogeyman” moniker after his 2013 verse on “Control.” Nobody knows exactly who called him that first, but it fits perfectly with his persona. During this shot, a man who is dressed similarly to Drake on “Dark Lane Demo Tapes” attempts to sneak up on Lamar but is instead pulled back into a pit of darkness.
Remember when Drake told Dot to “drop and give ‘em 50” on “Push Ups”? Well during this music video, he did. But instead of doing 50 pushups, he stops at 17, which might indicate his 17 Grammys.
Much ado has been made about Kendrick’s departure from Top Dawg Entertainment, the label run by Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith, his son Anthony Jr. and Terrence “Punch” Henderson. But the presence of Top Dawg and Punch in the video, along with Lamar’s Black Hippy crew Jay Rock, Ab-Soul and ScHoolboy Q (all of whom were also at the Pop Out concert) shows that the love remains even though Kendrick moved on from the label.
See those hand signals on the bottom half of the screen? Lamar is seemingly referencing a specific video doing the rounds on TikTok in which Drake is seen doing the hand signal with a young fan. The otherwise innocuous video of Drake with a young girl takes on a more ominous tone considering the allegations Kendrick makes against him.
On “Push Ups,” Drake raps, “I know my picture on the wall when y’all cook up.” K. Dot put this notion to bed by including a framed photo that’s turned around in the background of this shot.
There’s not much of a deeper meaning here...the owl is Drake’s OVO mascot and this just represents Dot f***ing them up. The “No OVHOES were harmed during the making of this video” disclaimer at the bottom of the screen is a nice touch.
The shot represents multiple things. Kendrick’s clothing looks awfully similar to the clothes the guy is wearing in this viral video in which he says, “His hair, wack! His gear, wack! His jewelry, wack!” It sounds similar to Kendrick’s bars from the “Euphoria” diss: “I hate the way that you walk, the way that you talk, I hate the way that you dress.”
Furthermore, Dot doing hopscotch during this A-minorrrrr line just reinforces his claim that Drake has inappropriate relations with minors...since, of course, hopscotch is a kids game.
Throughout the music video, Lamar doesn’t look into the camera that much, taking a more laid-back approach to his demeanor. But during the delivery of the line, “What OVO for, the other vaginal option?” he looks directly into the camera, making it clear who he’s talking to.
During the second part of Lamar’s second verse, he spends much of it in front of these white shipping containers. He also conducts what looks like a transaction in front of the containers.
Many have taken this as Lamar symbolically accusing Drake of child trafficking, as this is a method many traffickers have used in the past. The fans in the back of one of the canisters - presumably designed to keep cool human cargo - lend credence to this theory.
No, Lamar wasn’t talking about Derrick Rose, he was referencing NBA veteran Demar DeRozan. He is not only from Compton but also used to play for Drake’s hometown team, the Toronto Raptors. DeRoz came home from Toronto to Compton.
DeRozan recently spoke to The Sacramento Bee about his appearances in the video and Kendrick’s June “Pop Out” concert, insisting “Drake’s still my man, still my man, none of it changed.”
Drake made some serious claims about Kendrick and his family on “Family Matters,” most notably that one of Lamar’s kids could be fathered by Dave Free, Kendrick’s creative partner and co-founder of their production company pgLang. Lamar deaded those allegations by including Free in the music video. It’s also believed that the now-iconic “A-minorrrrrrrrr” line in “Not Like Us” is jacked from Drake’s “Dave Freeeeeeeeeeeee” from “Family Matters.”
Likely the most powerful scene in the entire video. In “Family Matters,” the 6 God says that Lamar abuses his wife Whitney Alford, and in “The Heart Part 6" he adds that Kendrick hasn’t seen his kids in weeks.
Lamar never directly responds to this claim in any of his lyrics. Instead, he just shows himself dancing with his family (presumably on Drake’s grave). Alford’s Crip walking shows loyalty to his fiancé’s gang ties, and her mere appearance shows that, despite Drake’s insistence that Kendrick beats on her, they’re forming a united front. “The family matter and the truth of the matter/ It was God’s plan to show y’all the liar.”
Throughout “Not Like Us,” Lamar raps “freaky ass n***s need to stay they ass inside.” So Lamar literally put an owl (the OVO mascot) in a cage to represent Drake being locked up. The owl may also represent Drake’s imprisonment to his own fame, or perhaps the persona he’s curated throughout his entire career — one over which he’s been criticized many times for adapting to the wave du jour.
Following Drake’s suggestion that Free fathered one of Kendrick’s kids with his wife Alford, Kendrick has made it a point to keep Free’s name at the top of his creative output since. His was the first name you see in the end credits of Kendrick’s June 19 “The Pop Out: Ken & Friends,” and the same with the “Not Like Us” video.
