Kendrick Lamar’s “Pop Out” concert boasted a lot of special guest performers and attendees, but there’s one particular exclusion that has many fans speculating on potential explanations. Moreover, the show was a celebration of all things West Coast, but some rappers that have repped Los Angeles all the way did not appear for unknown and likely innocent reasons. However, one MC who didn’t attend might have more reason to avoid an appearance, and that’s The Game. Social media began to theorize on why he wasn’t there, especially considering that he and K.Dot have had a pretty good and stable relationship over the years.
Still, some factors have always interfered with this perception, such as past claims of jealousy and, most notably and recently, The Game’s apparent support of Drake during the latter’s beef with Kendrick Lamar this year. In fact, he even dissed Rick Ross, who supported Ken against his formerly close colleague Drizzy, so a lot of fans assumed that the Los Angeles spitter sided with his city’s opposition this time around. Regardless of whether this was intentional or not, there honestly aren’t a whole lot of solid indicators that he actually picked a side. The closest thing we got to that was a social media post playing The Boy’s “Energy,” which was enough confirmation for many.
Kendrick Lamar With A Sea Of West Coast Artists & Fans At “The Pop Out”
Meanwhile, this is what The Game had to say a few years ago about his exclusion from 2022’s Super Bowl halftime show, which hosted many Los Angeles artists including Kendrick Lamar. “I was hurt by that,” he told I Am Athlete‘s Brandon Marshall. “The real reason I wasn’t on the Super Bowl is because I’m not a ‘safe’ artist. You don’t know what the Game gon’ do when he get up there. So, it’s just like, ‘He not safe,’ so they went with the safe artists.
Fans React To & Speculate On The Game’s Absence
“We, on the West Coast, are the only motherf***ers who have this crab-in-a-barrel mentality, where we wanna keep n***as down,” The Game claimed. “Snoop Dogg is icon. Dre is icon [he popped out for the Kendrick Lamar show, too]. Em is an icon, but Em is not from L.A. 50 is not from L.A. I’m not taking away from the fact that they were on the Super Bowl, but L.A. [artists] wouldn’t have been in the Detroit Super Bowl or New York Super Bowl. It just wouldn’t have happened… L.A., L.A., L.A. all around the Super Bowl and I didn’t get the call.”
About The Author
Gabriel Bras Nevares is a music and pop culture news writer for HotNewHipHop. He started in 2022 as a weekend writer and, since joining the team full-time, has developed a strong knowledge in hip-hop news and releases. Whether it’s regular coverage or occasional interviews and album reviews, he continues to search for the most relevant news for his audience and find the best new releases in the genre. What excites him the most is finding pop culture stories of interest, as well as a deeper passion for the art form of hip-hop and its contemporary output.
Specifically, Gabriel enjoys the fringes of rap music: the experimental, boundary-pushing, and raw alternatives to the mainstream sound. As a proud native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, he also stays up-to-date with the archipelago’s local scene and its biggest musical exponents in reggaetón, salsa, indie, and beyond.
Before working at HotNewHipHop, Gabriel produced multiple short documentaries, artist interviews, venue spotlights, and audio podcasts on a variety of genres and musical figures. Hardcore punk and Go-go music defined much of his coverage during his time at the George Washington University in D.C.
His favorite hip-hop artists working today are Tyler, The Creator, Boldy James, JPEGMAFIA, and Earl Sweatshirt.
