Kendrick Lamar teamed up with former Top Dawg Entertainment president Dave Free in March to launch a “service company” called pgLang. The mysterious announcement came with a four-minute visual mission statement, starring K. Dot, Los Angeles rapper Baby Keem, UK singer Jorja Smith and actress Yara Shahidi.
Now, we’ve got a first taste of what pgLang has to offer. On Friday (September 18), Keem dropped two new singles in the form of “Hooligan” and “Sons & Critics,” which were both released through pgLang under Columbia Records.
Before his latest drops, Keem had released his albums DIE FOR MY BITCH and The Sound of Habit independently.
The elusive pgLang is described as a “service company” that considers itself part of “music, film, television, art, books and podcasts.”
“pgLang is multilingual,” the original mission statement read. “Our community speaks music, film, television, art, books, and podcasts — because sometimes we have to use different languages to get the point of our stories across. Stories that speak to many nations, many races, and many ages. That is why our writers, singers, directors, musicians, and producers break formats when we build ideas and make them real for the curious.
“Putting round pegs through square holes is not a process, but we embrace the idea of anarchy and challenges that make us stronger. pgLang is focused on using our experiences, and nurturing our many collaborators, to build stories that are equally accessible and engaging then fitting them within the best media.”
Shortly after pgLang was announced, Nas posted a photo with Kendrick on Instagram holding a copy of The pgLang Times newspaper.
In October, Rolling Stone reported Dave Free had left TDE. Sources said he’d been doing his own thing for months and was working with Baby Keem.
Keem was one of the 12 artists included in this year’s XXL Freshman Class, alongside Polo G, Rod Wave, NLE Choppa, Mulatto, Lil Tjay, Jack Harlow, Chika, Calboy, Lil Keed, Fivio Foreign and 24kGoldn.
Listen to Keem’s new songs above and revisit the pgLang announcement video below.
Welcome to pgLang. https://t.co/IucgqwEiG0 pic.twitter.com/pooIBPEWl0
— Kendrick Lamar (@kendricklamar) March 5, 2020