Meet Kendrick Lamar, Super Bowl halftime performer and Drake beef winner

Here’s what you need to know about Kendrick Lamar, including our dream Super Bowl halftime set list.

In the midst of one of the best years we’ve seen from any rapper, 22-time Grammy award winner Kendrick Lamar is performing during halftime of the Super Bowl this year.

This will be the second Super Bowl halftime show Lamar has appeared in, the last one being in 2022 when he co-headlined with Dr. Dre, Eminem and Mary J. Blige. Lamar is one of the greatest rappers of all-time coming off another banger album “GNX” where almost every song has made my playlist (“Hey Now” has me in a chokehold). Starting with Section.80 back in 2011, Lamar has consistently put out insane albums, and that makes it hard to pick a favorite song from each album.

My favorite song from each album goes like this:

• Section.80: A.D.H.D
• Good Kid, M.A.A.D City: Money Trees (ft. Jay Rock)
• To Pimp a Butterfly: Alright
• Untitled Unmastered: Untitled 06
• DAMN: DNA
• Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers: Count Me Out
• GNX: Hey Now

So, with all of this in mind, how did we get here with Lamar headlining the Super Bowl?

Who is Kendrick Lamar?

Kendrick Lamar is a rapper from Compton, California. He is 37 years old, and is already considered one of the greatest hip-hop artists ever.

We can’t discuss this without discussing the absolute obliteration that was the Kendrick Lamar-Drake beef. For something that started off with two of the best rappers in the game finally taking direct shots at each other, it turned out to be a one-sided victory in favor of Lamar. I accidentally woke up my girlfriend the night that Drake released “Family Matters” then Kendrick Lamar released “Meet the Grahams” 20 minutes later. For Lamar to go with the verse on “Like That”, into the tracks “Euphoria”, “6:16 in LA”, “Meet the Grahams” then “Not Like Us” is a four for four better than anything Wendy’s has released.

Let’s talk about “Not Like Us” for a second. The final diss track in the Lamar-Drake beef is the biggest song of the year, winning five Grammys including Record of the Year and Song of the Year. All for a diss track that calls Drake so many unsavory things that aren’t left to the imagination. BEYONCE was singing along to it as it got played during Lamar’s acceptance, that would make me never go outside again.

“Not Like Us” is sure to be played during halftime of the Super Bowl, but what other songs should and will be played? Here’s a potential setlist, complete with links so you can go listen to the songs now in preparation. I’m basing this off previous halftime show performances, and it looks like there could be a range of 7-13 songs performed, with the least in recent years being The Weeknd in 2021. Last year, Usher performed 13 songs, but also had multiple guest appearances. Rihanna performed 10 songs, so I think 10 is about the sweet spot for Lamar.

• “Hey Now” has been used in every promo for the performance, so expect it to be played
• “TV Off”, largely just so we can get everyone in the Superdome yelling MUSTAAAAAAAAARD
• “Not Like Us”, duh
• “Luther” and “30 for 30”, because SZA will be performing with Lamar during the show
• “Euphoria”, arguably the best of the diss tracks Lamar made during the beef
• “Meet the Grahams”, look I know it might not get played, but I want NEGATIVITY. Make things get really evil for the first few minutes. Even if it’s just the piano intro.
• “DNA”, I think this would be the first time Kendrick has performed it live in a while so it would be cool to see.
• “Like That”, at The Pop Out he performed his verse and I think we could see something like that happen as well here, unless Future makes an appearance. If he and Future perform Like That I will ascend to the heavens
• “Squabble Up”, another super popular song off GNX that got a music video as well.