The greatest rapper of his generation — from mixtapes to masterworks

When KendricK Lamar came on the scene in 2003, the world wasn’t ready for his precocious genius. Mixing hard-knocks Compton sensibilities with a sophisticated worldview (which made him seem wiser than his 16 years), K.Dot blew us away with surgical precision. And as his stardom has grown, he’s only kept upping his iconic game.