How to Sound Like Kendrick Lamar: The Vocal Sound, Explained
Published · by Loopin
How to sound like Kendrick Lamar isn’t one vocal sound: it’s several voices, each recorded and treated as its own character, then ridden so every word lands. Build it as separate tracks and check it in mono, the way his engineer does.
Start from what his engineer has actually said
What’s on the record (sourced). Derek “MixedByAli” Ali has recorded and mixed Kendrick since the early TDE records. For To Pimp a Butterfly (2015), Sound On Sound’s Inside Track reports that Ali recorded Kendrick mainly on a Stephen Paul-modified Telefunken U47 into a Neve 1073 preamp and a Tube-Tech CL1B compressor, a fat, warm front end. The same piece describes Ali spending most of a mix on a single Auratone speaker in mono, a habit he credits to Dr. Dre: if it sounds great on a small speaker it will sound great anywhere.
In interviews with Billboard and Okayplayer, Ali describes treating the vocal as an instrument rather than a fixed sound to preserve. No plugin settings for Kendrick’s vocals have been published, so everything below the sourced part is a starting point built from what you can hear.
Hear the characters on these songs
‘Swimming Pools (Drank)’ (2012): the lead is locked at a steady level while a second, altered voice plays his conscience. One published mix analysis points to roughly 1:32–1:40, where the vocal sweeps left and right across the stereo field. ‘u’ (2015): the second half sounds drunk and close to tears, with a rougher, more distressed treatment than the first half. The treatment follows the character, not the song.
‘The Blacker the Berry’ (2015): shouted, pushed to the edge of distortion. ‘DNA.’ and ‘HUMBLE.’ (2017): dry, centred, very loud, almost no audible reverb, so the consonants carry the rhythm. ‘Not Like Us’ (2024): a chanted hook over a lead that stays dry and forward. Across all of them the lead is rarely wet; space comes from arrangement and delivery.
How to sound like Kendrick Lamar: one track per character
Before you mix, decide how many voices the verse has. Record each one as a separate track, never as automation on one track, so each gets its own chain. Typical set: the main voice, a whisper or aside voice, a pitched character, and an aggressive voice. The main voice stays dry: a short plate of 0.6–1 second, sent low enough that it only shows on the last word of a line.
Starting treatments: whisper voice high-passed at 150–200 Hz, compressed hard (6–8 dB of reduction), with a +2–3 dB shelf at 8–10 kHz. Pitched character: shift +2 to +4 semitones, or −3 to −5 for a menacing one, and turn formant correction off if you want it cartoonish. Aggressive voice: parallel saturation blended at 10–25%. If every character sounds like the same plugin, the performances are too similar: change the delivery before the settings.
Set up the Kendrick Lamar vocal chain in this order
On the main voice: high-pass at 70–90 Hz, cut 1–3 dB in the 200–400 Hz boxiness range, then a fast FET-style compressor at 4:1 catching 3–5 dB, then an opto-style compressor taking another 2–3 dB. De-ess at 5–8 kHz, then add 1–2 dB of presence at 3–5 kHz only if words still get lost under the beat.
Then ride the level by hand, word by word, until every syllable sits within 1–2 dB of the others; compressors can’t do this for a rapper who whispers and shouts in the same bar. Finish by summing to mono on one small speaker or a single earbud at low volume. If any word vanishes, fix the level or the EQ clash with the beat, not the reverb.
Skip the Kendrick Lamar vocal preset and change the delivery
A Kendrick Lamar vocal preset gives you one chain. His records use several, and most of the difference between the voices is performance: cadence, breath, where he places the words against the kick. Loading a preset on a single flat take gets you a clean rap vocal, not the characters.
Skip heavy reverb, stereo wideners on the lead and pitch correction as a sound; none of them are defining traits here. Spend the time on delivery and on the level rides. For the recording side, see how to record a rap verse. If the takes are right but the balance isn’t, that gap is what Project Jade is being built to close.
Bounce, check, then hand off the mix
Order: comp each character, edit breaths, set the character chains, ride the lead, then the mono check, then effects throws. Compare your bounce against a reference at matched loudness; for a very different, fully processed rap voice, contrast it with how to sound like Drake.
Loopin isn’t affiliated with or endorsed by Kendrick Lamar; the name is used only to describe a style. Project Jade is our agentic mixing product, currently on a waitlist and not yet released: drop in your rough mix, get back a studio one. Want your track mixed toward this kind of sound? Join the Project Jade early-access list.
Frequently asked questions
What mic does Kendrick Lamar use?
For To Pimp a Butterfly, Sound On Sound reports a Stephen Paul-modified Telefunken U47 into a Neve 1073 and a Tube-Tech CL1B. Any clean large-diaphragm condenser or a good dynamic will get you most of the way.
Does Kendrick Lamar use Auto-Tune?
Not as a defining effect. His lead vocals sound natural and mostly uncorrected; the character changes come from delivery, pitch shifting and separate treatments.
How do you mix vocals like Kendrick Lamar?
Record each voice on its own track, keep the main vocal dry with a 0.6 to 1 second plate, compress in two stages for 5 to 8 dB total, ride every word within 1 to 2 dB, and check it in mono.
How do I make my voice sound different for different characters?
Change the delivery first, then pitch shift 2 to 4 semitones up or 3 to 5 down, and give each character its own EQ and compression.
Is there a Kendrick Lamar vocal preset that works?
A preset can give you a clean main-vocal chain. It can't create the separate characters or the level rides, which are most of the sound.