"Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" edited for radio as "Trick, Don't Kill My Vibe" or simply "Don't Kill My Vibe", is a song by American rapper

Kendrick Lamar Kendrick Lamar Duckworth (born June 17, 1987) is an American rapper, singer, songwriter and record producer. Regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time, he was awarded the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Music, becoming the first music ...

, from his major-label debut studio album ''

Good Kid, M.A.A.D City ''Good Kid, M.A.A.D City'' (stylized as ''good kid, m.A.A.d city'') is the second studio album by the American rapper Kendrick Lamar. It was released on October 22, 2012, by Interscope Records, Top Dawg Entertainment and Dr. Dre's Aftermath Enter ...

'' (2012). The song, produced by frequent collaborator

Sounwave Mark Anthony Spears (born February 28, 1986), known professionally as Sounwave, is an American record producer and songwriter. He is a frequent collaborator of rapper Kendrick Lamar, having worked on all of his projects since his 2009 self-title ...

Top Dawg Entertainment Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE) is an American independent record label. Specializing in hip hop and R&B artists, TDE is based in Carson, California. The label was founded in 2004 by record producer Anthony "Top Dawg" Tiffith, who is the chief exec ...

in-house

production team A production team is the group of technical staff who produce a play, television show, recording, or film. Generally the term refers to all individuals responsible for the technical aspects of creating of a particular product, regardless of wher ...

Digi+Phonics CelcomDigi Berhad (Trade name, d.b.a. CelcomDigi), formerly known as Digi.Com Berhad (Trade name, d.b.a. Digi), is a communications conglomerate and mobile service provider in Malaysia. Its largest shareholders are Axiata and Norwegian-based Te ...

, heavily samples "Tiden Flyver", by Danish

electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductors * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic c ...

group Boom Clap Bachelors. It was originally intended to be a collaboration with American singer

Lady Gaga Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Known for her image reinventions and versatility across the entertainment industry, she is an influ ...

, but her contributions were ultimately excluded from the final recording due to timing issues. A remix of "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" featuring American rapper

Jay-Z Shawn Corey Carter (born December 4, 1969), known professionally as Jay-Z, is an American Rapping, rapper, businessman, and record executive. Rooted in East Coast hip-hop, he was named Billboard and Vibe's 50 Greatest Rappers of All Time, the ...

was sent to radio as the album's fifth single on March 21, 2013, with the original version and another remix featuring British singer

Emeli Sandé Adele Emily Sandé ( ; previously Gouraguine; born 10 March 1987), known professionally as Emeli Sandé, is a British singer and songwriter. Born in Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, England and raised in Alford, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, Sandé rose t ...

later being released. The song's music video, directed by The Lil Homie and OG Mike Mihail, notably ends with an abrupt cut to a black title screen reading "Death to Molly", intended to be a criticism by Lamar of glorification of the drug

MDMA 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), commonly known as ecstasy (tablet form), and molly (crystal form), is an empathogen–entactogenic drug with stimulant and minor Psychedelic drug, psychedelic properties. In studies, it has been used ...

in contemporary hip hop music. "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" peaked at number 32 on the United States ''Billboard'' Hot 100 chart, also reaching the top ten on the

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by '' Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 ...

and

Hot Rap Songs Hot Rap Songs (formerly known as Hot Rap Tracks and Hot Rap Singles) is a chart released weekly by '' Billboard'' in the United States. It lists the 25 most popular hip-hop/rap songs, calculated weekly by airplay on rhythmic and urban radio stat ...

charts.

Background

Recorded for Lamar's second studio album ''

'' (2012), "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" originally featured

vocal The human voice consists of sound made by a human being using the vocal tract, including talking, singing, laughing, crying, screaming, shouting, humming or yelling. The human voice frequency is specifically a part of human sound producti ...

s from American

pop Pop or POP may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Pop music, a musical genre Artists * POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade * Pop! (British group), a UK pop group * Pop! featuring Angie Hart, an Australian band Album ...

musician

. On August 15, 2012, Gaga announced that she had collaborated with Lamar on another song recorded for ''Good Kid, M.A.A.D City'' entitled "Partynauseous", and that it would be released on September 6. Eight days later, she announced that the song would no longer be released on the announced date and apologized to fans for the delay. None of Gaga's contributions were ultimately featured on the album due to timing issues and creative differences, with Lamar stating: On November 8, 2012, Lady Gaga released the original version of the song featuring her vocals, in which she performs the

chorus Chorus may refer to: Music * Chorus (song), the part of a song that is repeated several times, usually after each verse * Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound * Chorus form, song in whic ...

and a verse. Lamar expressed his surprise and approval of her releasing the song, as he felt it showed confidence in their work together. Further, a Lady Gaga solo version of their song "Partynauseous" was part of Gaga's ArtRave: The Artpop Ball tour, but the audio was never officially released.

Live performances

Lamar has performed "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" at every show on the ''Damn'' tour.

Music video

The

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

for "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe", directed by The Lil Homie and OG Mike Mihail, was released on May 13, 2013. The same day, the director's cut of the video was released, featuring

cameo appearances A cameo appearance, also called a cameo role and often shortened to just cameo (), is a brief guest appearance of a well-known person or character in a work of the performing arts. These roles are generally small, many of them non-speaking one ...

from

Juicy J Jordan Michael Houston III (born April 5, 1975), known professionally as Juicy J, is an American rapper and record producer. Originally from Memphis, Tennessee, he is a founding member of the Southern hip-hop group Three 6 Mafia, established ...

and

Jay Rock Johnny Reed McKinzie Jr. (born March 31, 1985), better known by his stage name Jay Rock, is an American rapper from Los Angeles, California. Rock signed with local independent label Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE) in 2005. He secured a major lab ...

and a bonus clip of a song by

Schoolboy Q Quincy Matthew Hanley (born October 26, 1986), better known by his stage name Schoolboy Q (stylized as ScHoolboy Q), is an American rapper. He began recording in 2007, and released his first two mixtapes, ''ScHoolboy Turned Hustla'' (2008) and '' ...

, titled "

Man of the Year __NOTOC__ Person of the Year, Man of the Year or Woman of the Year is an award given to an individual by any type of organization. Most often, it is given by a newspaper or other news outlet to annually recognize a public figure. Such awards hav ...

". American comedian

Mike Epps Michael Elliot Epps (born November 18, 1970) is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He played Day-Day Jones in '' Next Friday'' and its sequel, '' Friday After Next'', and also appeared in ''The Hangover'' and '' The Hangover Part III'' as ...

makes appearances throughout the video. The video ends with a hard cutoff of the string ensemble to a black screen with white text reading "Death to Molly". In an

MTV News MTV News was the news production division of MTV. The service was available in the US with localized versions on MTV's global network and an online news team. In 2016, MTV refreshed the MTV News brand to compete with the likes of BuzzFeed and ...

interview, Lamar explained that the text was meant as a criticism of lyrical promotion of the drug

—popularly known as "Molly"—in hip hop music, saying: "When everybody consciously now uses this term or this phrase and putting it in lyrics, it waters the

culture Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

down... So it's really just time to move on."

Remixes

On March 13, 2013, a snippet of the official

remix A remix, also sometimes called reorchestration or rework, is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, poem, or photograph ca ...

for "Bitch Don't Kill My Vibe" featuring a

guest appearance The term guest appearance generally denotes the appearance of a guest in an artistic or pop-culture setting. The guests themselves (referred to as guest artists, featured artists, guest stars, or guest fighters, depending on context), are disting ...

from American rapper

was premiered by Jay-Z's engineer

Young Guru Gimel Androus Keaton (born February 27, 1974), professionally better known by his pseudonym Young Guru, is an American audio engineer, record producer, disc jockey, and record executive from Wilmington, Delaware. In 2019, Young Guru won a Grammy ...

. When Lamar touched on the record, he called it an accomplishment to have a song featuring Jay-Z and revealed that he wrote his verse for the remix in one day. The full version of the remix was premiered by

Funkmaster Flex Aston George Taylor Jr. (born August 5, 1967), professionally known as Funkmaster Flex, is an American DJ, rapper, record producer, and host on New York City's Hot 97 radio station. In 1992, he became host of the first hip hop radio show on Ho ...

on March 17, 2013. The remix was added to the track listing of the iTunes Store version of the album and subsequently released to

rhythmic contemporary Rhythmic contemporary, also known as Rhythmic Top 20, Rhythmic Top 30, Rhythmic Top 40, Rhythmic CHR or rhythmic crossover, is a primarily American music-radio format that includes a mix of EDM, upbeat rhythmic pop, hip-hop and upbeat R&B hit ...

radio on April 9, 2013. Its single cover is a photograph of basketball players

Kobe Bryant Kobe Bean Bryant ( ; August 23, 1978 – January 26, 2020) was an American professional basketball player. A shooting guard, he List of NBA players who have spent their entire career with one franchise, spent his entire 20-year career with t ...

and

Michael Jordan Michael Jeffrey Jordan (born February 17, 1963), also known by his initials MJ, is an American businessman and former professional basketball player, who is currently a minority owner of the Charlotte Hornets of the National Basketball Ass ...

, who serve as representations of, respectively, Lamar and Jay-Z. A remix of "Bitch Don't Kill My Vibe" featuring British singer-songwriter

, billed as the "International Remix", was released on May 27, 2013. The two had previously debuted the song live at the Footaction event in New York City earlier in the month. The remix was released as a

digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Businesses *Digital bank, a form of financial institution *Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) or Digital, a computer company *Digital Research (DR or DRI), a software ...

single on June 25, 2013. On the remix, Sandé performs a new intro section and duets with Lamar on the

refrain A refrain (from Vulgar Latin ''refringere'', "to repeat", and later from Old French ''refraindre'') is the Line (poetry)">line or lines that are repeated in poetry or in music">poetry.html" ;"title="Line (poetry)">line or lines that are repeat ...

Release and reception

Speaking to ''

Rap-Up ''Rap-Up'' is a magazine launched in 2001 by founder Devin Lazerine. The publication was originally a website devoted to hip hop, until Lazerine decided to pitch the possibility of a magazine to several publishers. The magazine is focused on the ...

'' on March 9, 2013, Lamar stated that "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" would probably be released as a single from ''Good Kid, M.A.A.D City''. Shortly after the premiere of the song's official remix, Lamar confirmed that "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" would be the fourth official single. Following the release of ''Good Kid, M.A.A.D City'', "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" debuted at number 100 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 for the week ending January 13, 2013. It re-entered the Hot 100 at number 84 for the week ending March 24, later peaking at number 32 and becoming his third top 40 hit as a solo artist on the chart. "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" has been widely regarded as one of Lamar's best songs. In 2018, ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'' ranked the song number nine on their list of the 20 greatest Kendrick Lamar songs, and in 2021, ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' ranked the song number five on their list of the 50 greatest Kendrick Lamar songs.

Awards and nominations

Formats and track listings

* Digital download # "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" (edited version) – 5:11 # "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" (explicit version) – 5:11 # "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" (remix / explicit version) – 4:39 # "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" (International remix / explicit version) – 5:06 * Digital download (remix) # "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" (remix) – 5:06

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Radio and release history

References

External links

* {{authority control 2012 songs 2013 singles Kendrick Lamar songs Songs written by Kendrick Lamar Interscope Records singles Aftermath Entertainment singles Top Dawg Entertainment singles Songs written by Sounwave Music videos directed by Dave Free Music videos directed by Kendrick Lamar