Kendrick Lamar is the best rapper alive, but I don’t care. I’m more interested in Future.

Why?

Let’s cut out the fat.

Kendrick Lamar deserves a heap of praise for uniting rap stars
under him.

Music has never been more decentralized than now.

Here is a person who’s managed to bypass that obstacle, and find a home among the pop clouds.

Crinkle his alfalfa curls, shake his little hands. He deserves it.

But Future is still more interesting.

This is a man who belongs to the Dungeon Family, a collective that includes the likes of Outkast, Janelle Monae and CeeLo Green.

The Dungeon Family schtick melds gritty, humanist topics with a forward-thinking approach to pop.

Future is a songwriter who’s spent his career trying to innovate on that formula.

After years of ghostwriting (those are his creepy drawls on the chorus to Ludacris’ “Blueberry Yum Yum”) he found simplicity.

Make music poignant and simple, but forward.

It’s a principle that’s buoyed him to popularity in the last few years and kept him there.

This isn’t a feat to cast aside lightly.

Let’s remember how low people regarded “ringtone rap” and auto-tune a few years
ago – novelty.

Future took these two elements and shaped them into layered, three-dimensional songs, each one different from the last.

“Turn On the Lights” sounds nothing like “Magic” sounds nothing like “Honest.”

They’re oh so melodic and, yes, challenging.

No one flows or writes melodies like Future. It’s a compliment his predecessors in the Dungeon Family deservedly receive to this day.

Kendrick Lamar deserves his crown, OK. He’s made friends with the right people, crafted a thoughtful album invoking the magic of greats past and rapped his ass along the way.

Future took junk musics and churned out work both experimental and catchy. Kendrick’s cool, but “make mine future.”