good kid, m.a.a.d.e.r. city

Kendrick Lamar‘s debut album all but blew the rap game wide open, selling over 240,000 copies in its first week, despite only having one top 40 hit to his name in his entire career. The album was so highly touted and heralded, there was tangible uproar when it lost to Macklemore‘s The Heist at February’s Grammy Awards.

GKMC was released in 2012, and Top Dawg–TDE’s CEO and Kendrick Lamar’s label head–promised 6 albums from TDE this year (TDE only has six members), so it became apparent that unless one member planned on releasing multiple albums, common sense suggests Kendrick Lamar’s follow-up to GKMC would be arriving this year.

In Billboard’s cover story on Kendrick and ScHoolboy Q, Top Dawg “indicates” that Kendrick Lamar’s new album will arrive this September. Kendrick Lamar has admittedly already begun recording his new LP.

In 2014, TDE hopes to lock and load its most ambitious slate of releases: Rashad and the label’s first nonrap signing, New Jersey-based female singer-songwriter SZA, will be coming with albums, as will original team members Jay Rock and Ab-Soul. Meanwhile, Free thinks the long-awaited debut from Black Hippy – the supergroup featuring Lamar, Q, Rock and Ab-Soul – is likely to appear in 2014; Tiffith indicates that TDE is planning to release a new Lamar album this coming September, too.

Props to Miss Info on the find.