Black Panther the album : music from and inspired by

"The tie-ins to the film can be tenuous, but Kendrick and company bring 50 minutes of big-time team-ups and crossovers scanning black music across three continents: rap, R&B, gqom, Afro-soul, and pop from South Africa, throughout California, London, Texas, and Ethiopia by way of Toronto. The album is a sampler of the film's broader vision of black excellence. It's fitting that this slightly convoluted, sometimes generic offering largely delivers on its promise, much like the larger comic world it now occupies. A fun, rap-centric album is now Marvel canon. In their first roles as bit players, the TDE roster delivers a product benefiting the whole. Their effort is one befitting the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and its blackest entry".

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"Curated and pretty much dominated by Kendrick Lamar, Black Panther: The Album is the Super Fly of its era, an attempt to bring a broader measure of cultural resonance to an indulgent action fantasy ... Though not as powerful as Lamar's own albums, it's similarly diverse, with elements of boudoir R&B, sinister street creep and ebullient electro dancehall stippled with a variety of sonic detail, such as whistle and kalimba, reflecting the film's African setting".

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"The Black Panther soundtrack album has been nearly as feverishly anticipated as the film, and no wonder: It is helmed by another improbable straddler of cultural categories, Kendrick Lamar, A-list pop star and Black Lives Matter-era protest poet nonpareil ... It is tempting to compare Black Panther to Curtis Mayfield's Superfly and Marvin Gaye's Trouble Man, classic blaxploitation soundtracks that channeled the social consciousness and sonic adventurism of early Seventies soul. But the analogy is imprecise. Lamar co-executive produced the album, has writing credits on all 14 tracks, and appears throughout, in starring roles and cameos. His main job, though, is a definitively 21st Century one: musical curator".

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"Black Panther-fortællingen finder sted i den fiktive østafrikanske nation Wakanda (...) - et uafhængigt, selvstændigt og ressourcestærkt drømmesamfund, hvor afrikanere råder over egne ressourcer og er langt foran den vestlige verden. Alt dette burde manifestere sig tydeligere i Kendrick Lamars soundtrack. Black Panther er en afrofuturistisk film, der rummer både det afrikanske kontinents håb og smerte, det er essensen af det, vi kalder afrofuturisme ... Lamar er blevet iscenesat som manden bag lyden af Black Panther-filmen (...), [men] den egentlige filmkomponist, der står bag filmens lydunivers, er den svenske komponist Ludwig Göransson. I Göranssons filmlyd er der, i modsætning til Kendrick Lamars, alt fra afrikansk elektronisk pop til mere traditionel malinesisk musik. Når vi i flimen er på [prinsesse Shuris] teknologiske laboratorium (...), er der skruet op for nye afrikanske beats, der understreger det veludviklede teknologiske samfund Wakanda. Kendrick Lamar harinviteretnogle af tidens mest markante (...) afroamerikanske stjerneskud som SZA og Khalid [ind på albummet]. Det er disse stemmer, der drukner de ellers interessante afrikanske navne ... Hvis man ellers vil høre lyden af opfindsomme afrikanske futurister, er det den sydafrikanske musikscene og ikke dette soundtrack, man skal henvende sig til".

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