The most anticipated video of the year so far has finally dropped.
“Not Like Us,” Kendrick Lamar’s jubilant Drake diss track that topped the Billboard Hot 100 and has stayed on the chart for eight weeks, has enjoyed a legendary run. It’s been played in clubs and sports arenas, soundtracked children’s birthday parties, and inspired an…interesting opening number at this year’s BET Awards.
But, despite the song dominating airwaves for two months and Kendrick performing it multiple times at the end of his Juneteenth Concert, “The Pop Out,” fans still hoped the Pg. Lang captain would drop an official visual. Confirmation that a video was on the way came not long after the Amazon Prime-streamed show when Kendrick took to his hometown of Compton and brought the entire city out to be a part of the production.
And, after a series of a stills from the video leaked last night, Kendrick and Pg. Lang delivered the official video this evening. Directed by Kendrick and Dave Free (who also makes a quick cameo), the video matches the energy of the fun but blistering diss track with a number of Lamar’s lyrics brought to life. For example, there’s a scene where he beats an owl-shaped piñata with a stick, one where he gets slipped a bible that he tucks into his jacket, and another one where an enormous crowd in Compton dances and engulfs him as he proclaims that the “city is back up, it’s a must we outside.”
However, the highlight of the video comes towards the end of the nearly six-minute clip when Kendrick poses with his fiancé Whitney Alford and their two kids before all of them break into dance. It’s a clear refutation to the allegations made by Drake in his song “Family Matters” where he claimed, among other things, that Alford and Lamar were separated and that he did not regularly see his children.
It’s hard to imagine the song getting a second wind as it’s still dominating the cultural conversation, but this video may just extend its runway.
Watch the video below.
