Kendrick Lamar Talks Album, Depression and Music in Exclusive Interview with Rolling Stone

Grammy winner Kendrick Lamar, who has been tight-lipped these past few months about his upcoming album, has opened up in an exclusive interview with Rolling Stone.

In the latest issue, which comes out on stands Friday, the 27-year-old rapper talks about growing up on the streets of Compton, dealing with depression and self-doubt, and overcoming these obstacles through his music.

For Lamar, his music was the game changer. He revealed that although he is anxious about how people will react to his latest album, titled To Pimp a Butterfly, which drops on March 23, he had a lot of fun making and recording the music.

He told the magazine, "After [the album] comes out, it's just a numbers game. The funnest part is making it."

Lamar unveiled his album cover on Instagram. The cover features a group of black men, children and one baby in front of the White House. They are all shirtless while holding cash and bottles of alcohol. There is one white man, who looks like a judge, lying on the floor in front of the men, holding a gavel. His eyes have X's drawn on them.

Lamar did not talk about what his album cover symbolizes. But based on his latest single, "The Blacker the Berry," many can expect that his follow up album to good kid, m.A.A.d city will be focused on controversial topics, such as race, stereotypes, and police violence, particularly toward unarmed black men.

During the interview with Rolling Stone, Lamar played the magazine six tracks from his album and according to the magazine, "The songs range from the intensely personal to the swaggeringly aggressive - like 'King Kunta,' which could be the theme song from a Seventies blaxploitation flick. When Pharrell Williams first heard the track, he praised it by calling it 'unapologetically black.' 'It's just him expressing how he's feeling at the moment,' says Lamar's longtime producer Mark 'Sounwave' Spears. 'And right now, he's mad.'"

Sounwave added, "It's a unique sound. Every producer I've ever met was sending me stuff [for the album], but there was a one-in-a-million chance you could send a beat that actually fit what we were doing."

Derek "MixedByAli" Ali also talked about the music-making process and how Lamar would talk in moods and colors.

"He would say, 'I want it to sound eerie,' or 'I want it to sound like you're driving past something.' Or he talks in colors: 'Make it sound purple. Make it sound light green,'" MixedByAli said.

Lamar's album is available for pre-order on iTunes. The only track name that has been revealed is "The Blacker the Berry."