DAMN. is released

Why it matters

DAMN. came out April 14, 2017, on TDE/Aftermath/Interscope. It is Kendrick Lamar's fourth studio album. The album sold 603,000 copies in its first week and won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Music — the first non-classical, non-jazz album to ever win the Pulitzer in music's century-long history. The Pulitzer is the part that matters. The Pulitzer for Music had, for the better part of a century, been awarded only to academic-classical composers and a handful of jazz figures. DAMN. winning in 2018 was a recognition by one of America's most institutionally conservative cultural awards that commercial rap had achieved the kind of formal artistic seriousness the Pulitzer was meant to honor. The Pulitzer board's citation called the album "a virtuosic song collection unified by its vernacular authenticity and rhythmic dynamism." The album itself is densely structured (the tracks can be played in reverse order to produce a different narrative arc, which Kendrick released as Damn. Collectors Edition in December 2017). "HUMBLE.," "DNA.," "LOYALTY." with Rihanna, "LOVE." with Zacari, "XXX." with U2. You should hear DAMN. forwards. Then hear it backwards. Both work.