He barely had features in both Born Sinner and Sideline Story... with Born Sinner, it was JUST Kendrick on a hook and TLC on the hook and the bonus tracks with Fiddy and Jhene. And Sideline Story was label enforced.
And the features isn't an issue when you go double platinum WITHOUT them the previous album. He sold more records outside of DRAKE than any rapper currently OUT to include Kendrick and this is while not having any feature. He's content at where he is at now. What's the necessity for him to go seek for features at his point of the game? And collaborations are cool... but it is not a NEED and that's been lost in hip hop today. But since day one J. Cole been going against the grain from what mainstream tells you to do. They always tell you to hop on that hot new featured artist, they always tell you to come up with that lazy pop radio single, they always concern with imagery, and downplaying the intellect of their audience. That's why we got these down-syndrome rappers currently popping now with generic trap beats that are like 5 minutes to make on a computer. Long gone is the freedom of expression. Long gone is the art and craftsmanship of music. Say what you will about THIS album, but it is hard for someone like J. Cole to devolve back to how he was when he just spit to impress people with his wordplay and endlessly sample tracks and loop them over a drum beat. For people want that Nostalgic type J. Cole, he gave you a piece last week, but the reality is and has been for the last few years that he evolved and matured. It's like asking Andre3000 to go back to rapping the way he did on Southernplayalistic.... you're NEVER going to have that Andre again... he's on a totally different vibe.
