LA multi-hyphenate Terrace Martin has dropped his new record ‘Drones’, a sprawling concept album featuring many of hip-hop’s brightest stars in guest spots.

The title track features Kendrick Lamar, Ty Dolla $ign, James Fauntleroy and Snoop Dogg, with Martin also linking up with the likes of Cordae, Channel Tres, YG, Hit-Boy and Leon Bridges elsewhere on the record. You can listen to the title track below.

The album was announced through a teaser aired on ESPN, and was released today (November 5) via Sounds Of Crenshaw/BMG.

Martin hinted in a press release that it will feature elements of R&B, jazz, house, classical and hip-hop, as well as Cuban and West African styles. “You’re going to hear all elements of Black music within this record,” he said. “It’s not one element I can leave out if I call myself a true Black artist.”

You can check out ‘Drones’ and stream the full album below:

In a new interview with Stereogum, Martin explained that he first thought of the concept behind ‘Drones’ shortly after he finished working with Lamar on the latter’s 2015 album, ‘To Pimp A Butterfly’. He said that he and Lamar “had this whole conversation and we were looking at our phones and not each other the whole time”.

“We’re like fuckin’ robots,” he continued. “And it’s not just us. Everybody always says the younger generation is so on the phone, but naw, everybody is addicted to the phone. Everybody. So he went in there, man, and he just started saying what being a drone means to him, and… the song ‘Drones’ itself is pretty much a statement that we are all one and we are all even robots as one.

“It’s like we are all in a weird state to where we have these things, these gadgets [that] control us, and they help us but a lot of times they make us more shallow. We lose trust, we have lack of compassion, we have lack of love, it’s shaming going on, it’s all these different wars between these different people that everybody thinks everybody’s different, and the phone is a big deal.”

Meanwhile, Lamar’s is expected to make his long-awaited comeback imminently. The follow-up to 2017’s ‘DAMN.’ has been teased repeatedly throughout 2021, with speculation renewed in the summer after he announced his final album for longtime label Top Dawg Entertainment in a letter to fans.

Speculation was then further fuelled when he registered a host of new songs with ASCAP, and earlier this month changed his profile picture on Spotify. He’s scheduled to headline the Day N Vegas festival in Las Vegas this month, and will perform alongside Dr. Dre, Eminem, Snoop Dogg and Mary J. Blige at next year’s Super Bowl Halftime Show.