We're only a few days away from Black Panther: The Album release. The anticipation for it has been high every since it was announced that Kendrick Lamar and Anthony "Top Dawg" Tiffith would be producing the film's soundtrack. Since then, they've released a few singles as well as the official video for "All The Stars" with Kendrick Lamar and SZA. In a recent interview with Black Panther director, Ryan Coogler, he reveals exactly how Kendrick Lamar and Top Dawg hopped on board for the project.
In a recent interview with NPR, Ryan Coogler revealed how the soundtrack came about. He said that Kendrick Lamar was initially going to do a few songs for the movie. After watching a good chunk of it, he and Top Dawg were fully on board for the project.
"At first, he was just going to do a few songs for the film, and then he came in and watched quite a bit of the movie, and the next thing I know, they were booking a studio and they were going at it." Coogler said.
TDE's in-house producer, Sounwave, said Kendrick and him started plotting the soundtrack during the DAMN. tour which resulted in the creation of half the soundtrack's song concepts.
"[During] The DAMN. Tour, we probably came up with 50 percent of it — the production, the hooks and ideas," he said, "When we got back from the tour in September, that's when we were able to execute our ideas and reach out to people we respect and whatnot ... kind of just put the stamp on it. So, I want to say those two months was the most vital on that tour, in terms of creative process."
While the original Black Panther came out in the 1960's, Sounwave wanted the sound of the album to reflect the sounds coming out today.
