Kendrick Lamar is always pushing himself as an artist, making him truly unpredictable. Movie director Ryan Coogler learned that after collaborating with him during Black Panther. Per HipHopDX, the Oakland native had been a big fan of his Compton neighbor for a while.
In a sit-down with NPR in 2018, Coogler explained how he got Kendrick Lamar on board. "I’ve been a massive Kendrick fan ever since I first heard him [...] and I’ve been trying to track him down."
He continued, "Eventually I caught up with him a couple years ago [...] and just spoke about [how] 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."
Coogler continued, "To Marvel’s credit, they really supported the idea of getting some songs from him." However, what most people don't know is that K. Dot completely outdid himself.
Ryan Coogler Sinners
As Coogler explains to LeBron James and Interview magazine, "[He] 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," he revealed.
"Each song had a reference to the movie," he said. "I’m like, 'Man, this n**** just wrote this.'" However, he was sad to admit that he "couldn’t appreciate the moment."
He never revealed what one song Lamar was initially supposed to do, but that's the very cool story about how we got the 14-song project he curated. While that entire project for Coogler was massive, fans have been absolutely enthralled with his latest work, Sinners. It also stars Michael B. Jordan, as well as Hailee Steinfeld, Jack O'Connell, Li Jun Li, Omar Miller, and Miles Caton.
