Kendrick Lamar Scrapped ‘Good Kid, MAAD City’ Three Times Before It Was Ready

Kendrick Lamar and Top Dawg Entertainment CEO Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith will cover the September 23 issue of Billboard, and their cover feature is a gold mine of insightful quotes and side-splitting reminisces from the pair of rap luminaries. At 47, Top Dawg has more than enough street tales and studio stories to fill a book, but it’s Kendrick’s revelation of the work ethic that led him to re-record his groundbreaking debut Good Kid, MAAD City four times that perfectly explains why TDE is indeed at the top of the hip-hop world today.

You were already working on Good Kid, MAAD City?

Lamar: Yeah, we did Good Kid about three, four times before the world got to it.

Meaning new songs?

Lamar: New songs, new ­everything. I wanted to tell that story, but I had to execute it. My whole thing is about execution. The songs can be great, the hooks can be great, but if it’s not executed well, then it’s not a great album.

Top also relates the hilarious story of how he got his first studio set up, back in his hustling days.

Tiffith: They made me do this. [Laughs] When I built my studio, I was looking for equipment — I’m not going to name where I got it from. When we picked it up, this dude told me he could help put it together. [Later], I go and pick the dude up, and I say, “Yo, I got to blindfold you.” He’s like, “What?” I’m like, “Lay down back here. I’m not going to do nothing to you. You don’t need to know where you’re going. I don’t want you coming back, stealing my shit.” He’s like, “Oh, yeah, I understand.” I get home, pull into the garage, and my girl’s there. So when I was like, “Come on,” he pops in with the blindfold, and she thought I had kidnapped the n*gga. Like, “What the f*ck is going on?”

Lamar: This dude got stories like this all day.

Tiffith: The next day, when he got in the car, he was looking for his blindfold. [Laughs]

Billboard also got some choice quotes from TDE co-presidents Dave Free and Terrence “Punch” Henderson, reflecting on building the label into the rap empire it is today. It’s clear that TDE is a brotherhood as much as it is a business, giving their artists the creative freedom to experiment and reaping the rewards of success.