Following the release of his most recent album, Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, hip-hop star Kendrick Lamar has teamed up with Spotify to produce a documentary in Accra, Ghana. Titled A Day in Ghana with Kendrick Lamar, the film shows the Compton rapper in the Ghanaian capital, where he can be seen enjoying many activities in the city, such as going to the beach, taking pictures and playing soccer with locals, and visiting a skatepark created by the late Virgil Abloh.
Kendrick opened the short film by revealing that it was his first time in the West African nation. “I can’t even tell you what that is. I’ve just been in the moment,” he said in the first minute of the video. He also mentioned the importance of therapy, how it has worked for him, and what it could do for others.
“One of my favorite lines on the album is where it says, ‘You need to go to therapy.’ And I say, ‘Real niggas don’t go to therapy.’ ‘Cause that’s how niggas feel, you know what I’m saying? We grow up where our parents don’t know about that. Our grandparents don’t know about that. You live and you experience this shit that you go through, and you deal with it right then and there or you don’t ever deal with it. We learn to hold all our shit in.”
Released in May, Kendrick Lamar’s latest album is an 18-track body of work that also features names like Keem, Kodak Black, Taylour Paige, Summer Walker, Ghostface Killah, Blxst, and more. The album deals with Lamar’s personal issues about family, mental health, false idols, and more. It has been well-received for its warm and innovative sound and delicate lyrical artistry.
With Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, Lamar has reached his fourth number one on the Billboard 200 during its first week of release.
Ghana is one of the favorite destinations for Black Americans. In 2019, the country’s government launched a campaign called The Year of Return, marking 400 years since the first enslaved Africans were brought to U.S. shores from West Africa. It was part of a multi-year initiative to increase global tourism to Ghana and to make the nation a destination of choice for Black Americans to make a physical and cultural reconnection to the land of many of their ancestors.
Check out more of what Kendrick Lamar had to say on A Day In Ghana below.
Related: Here’s Why Ghana’s ‘Beyond the Return’ Campaign Is Controversial Among Locals
