Ett gemensamt projekt av J. Cole och Kendrick Lamar har länge varit hiphopfans våta dröm, en förhoppning som bara växt sig starkare med åren i takt med att de båda rapparna tagit sig till den absoluta toppen av rapskiktet. Även om den drömmen sannolikt aldrig kommer besannas får vi nu höra två osläppta låtar.

Det är i det fjärde avsnittet av J. Coles ljudserie “Inevitable”, som lett till släppen av mixtapen “The Come Up” och “The Warm Up” på streamingtjänster, som rapgiganten spelar upp låtarna “Temptation” och “Shock The World”. I avsnittet berättar han också när han träffade Kendrick för första gången.

“It was early 2010 in L.A. at a U-N-I release party […] I remember seeing him on stage and he spit a verse, and I was like, ‘Yo, this n-gga right here is nice!’. So he got off stage and I let him know like, ‘Bro, I fuck with you. You hard as fuck.’ He was like, ‘Yo, I met you! I was at the [2010] XXLFreshmen cover shoot [with Jay Rock].’”

Han tillägger sedan:

“So we stayed in touch every now and then, and he sent me some joints. When I dropped ‘Blow Up,’ I remember him hitting me like, ‘N-gga, I need one of those!’ He was talking about how crazy the beat was. When I was out in L.A., he came by No ID‘s studio and I linked with him […] I played him the beat for ‘HiiiPoWeR,’ I played him ‘Temptation’ with my verse on it, I played him a couple of other joints that had one verse on it.”

“When I played them for him, I was like, ‘Bro, you can have these if you want.’ I remember he said — and it always stuck with me ’cause I had never heard nobody say this to me before — he was looking at me like, ‘N-gga, are you sure you want to give me these?!’”

“I’m like, ‘Yeah, go ahead, take them.’ He was like, ‘Bro, you sleepingon yourself.’ It struck me because it was actually the stone cold truth of my reality at that time. I was so focused on getting this unicorn hit for my album that I was actually sleeping on the shit that I did well.”

J. Cole avslöjade inte vilket eller vilka projekt låtarna var tänkta för, men vad gäller det efterlängtade gemensamma albumet så tog han som bekant död på ryktena i Lil Yachtys podcast “A Safe Place” i fjol. Han sa då:

“At one point, it was a real thing. But bro, time and life, we ain’t ever got the chance to go in and do it correctly because that would take time. For us to do something that’s full of our potential, that meets our real potential, you’re gonna need time. At least a year.”

“When you got two successful artists with lives and families, that’s hard to do. We put it to bed years ago. But at one point in time, it was a real conversation, for sure. It’s not like it’s a ton of songs. It’s not like it’s some album sitting on the shelf somewhere.”

Både “Temptation” och “Shock The World” framfördes av Kendrick Lamar i en butik runt 2011, 2012. Ett klipp som spred sig och sedan länge varit det som i mångt och mycket skapade den tidiga hajpen kring ett gemensamt album.

Se klipp nedan och håll tummarna för att även dessa dyker upp på streamingtjänster inom kort! Via en egen hemsida kan man få tillgång till samtliga avsnitt av “Inevitable” för 10 dollar.