

Created by Matt Zoller Seitz
Directed by Judith Carter
“If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.”
Haruki Murakami
Photo by Justin Campbell on Unsplash
A stunning, in-depth look at the power and poetry of one of the most consequential rappers of our time.
Kendrick Lamar is one of the most influential rappers, songwriters and record producers of his generation. Widely known for his incredible lyrics and powerful music, he is regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time. In Promise That You Will Sing About Me, pop culture critic and music journalist Miles Marshall Lewis explores Kendrick Lamar’s life, his roots, his music, his lyrics, and how he has shaped the musical landscape.
With incredible graphic design, quotes, lyrics and commentary from Ta-Nehisi Coates, Alicia Garza and more, this book provides an in-depth look at how Kendrick came to be the powerhouse he is today and how he has revolutionized the industry from the inside.
REVIEWS
“With art and commentary from voices like Ta-Nehisi Coates, this book contextualizes Kendrick Lamar’s impact and digs into the significance of his lyrics.” - The New York Times
"An in-depth biographical and historical contextualization of one of the decade’s most heralded rappers."--Kirkus
“An insightful deep dive into the mind of Pulitzer-winning hip-hop artist and producer Kendrick Lamar … Lewis paints a captivating portrait of a luminary whose lyrics capture the struggles, triumphs, anger, and hope of an entire generation of Black Americans. … Fans and hip-hop enthusiasts will relish this thought-provoking work.” - Publishers Weekly
ABOUT THE EDITOR
Miles Marshall Lewis is a recognized pop culture critic, essayist, literary editor, fiction writer, and music journalist, with a B.A. degree in sociology from Morehouse College. He is the author of the essay collection Scars of the Soul Are Why Kids Wear Bandages When They Don't Have Bruises, concerning coming of age in the Bronx under the aegis of hip-hop culture at its genesis. He is also the series editor and founder of Bronx Biannual, an urbane urban literary journal of fiction and essays, and author of There's a Riot Goin' On, a book on the making of the seminal 1971 Sly and the Family Stone album of the same name.
During the past 20 years, he has written for GQ, The New York Times, Ebony, NPR, The Washington Post, Rolling Stone, The Believer, Essence, and many other publications. He served as the digital arts and culture editor of Ebony, music editor of Vibe, deputy editor of XXL, literary editor of Russell Simmons's Oneworld, deputy editor of BET.com, and a contributing writer for The Source during the 1990s. His interview with the late Pulitzer-winning playwright August Wilson is anthologized in The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers alongside Joan Didion, Zadie Smith and Dave Eggers, and his fiction has been published in Bronx Noir, Wanderlust, Brown Sugar 3: When Opposites Attract, Oneworld, Rap Pages, and Uptown.
MZS.Press is the online arts bookstore founded by author, critic, and filmmaker Matt Zoller Seitz and Directed by Judith Carter. It offers new, used, signed, collectible, and rare books on film, TV, music, photography, and the visual arts. The store was launched in 2019 on a different platform and has expanded to incorporate arts books published by MZSPress's private imprint: titles currently include Seitz's The Deadwood Bible: A Lie Agreed Upon and Dreams of Deadwood, about the HBO Western, and Walter Chaw's A Walter Hill Film.
Our deepest wish is to promote, encourage, and distribute work by small presses, academic presses, and individuals. Extraordinary work tends to get swallowed up on giant platforms like Amazon and Barnes & Noble. The titles featured here are personally selected by a group of curators and advisors, including Seitz and an array of critics, artists, journalists, educators, publishers, and arts mavens who are known for their ability to suss out what Seitz's jazz musician dad liked to call "the good sh*t."
In Honor of the greatest auteur of our time, Judith is using one of her favorite quotes by him.
"Every day, once a day, give yourself a present"
David Lynch (January 20, 1946-January 15, 2025)
Matt Zoller Seitz
Critic, Author, Filmmaker, MZS Press Creator
Matt Zoller Seitz is the Editor at Large and film critic of RogerEbert.com; Features Writer for New York Magazine and Vulture.com, Contributing Writer for D Magazine and Texas Highways as well as finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism. His writing on film and TV has appeared in Sight and Sound, The New York Times, Salon.com, The New Republic and Rolling Stone. Seitz is the founder and original editor of the influential film blog The House Next Door, now a part of Slant Magazine.
Seitz has written, narrated, edited or produced over a hundred hours’ worth of video essays about cinema history and style for The Museum of the Moving Image, Salon.com and Vulture, among other outlets such as Texas Highways and AARP. His five-part 2009 video essay Wes Anderson: The Substance of Style was spun off into the hardcover book The Wes Anderson Collection. This book and its follow-up, The Wes Anderson Collection: Grand Budapest Hotel were New York Times bestsellers.
Other Seitz books include the New York Times bestsellers The Sopranos Sessions and Mad Men Carousel; TV (The Book), The Deadwood Bible: A Lie Agreed Upon, The Wes Anderson Collection: The French Dispatch and the new The Wes Anderson Collection: Asteroid City. He is also an interviewer, moderator, and film programmer who has curated and hosted film and TV presentations for the Museum of the Moving Image, IFC Center, San Francisco's Roxie Cinema, and other venues. In October 2024 he brought the legendary filmmaker Oliver Stone back to Dallas for a historic return to the city and the Texas Theatre, considered the biggest film event of Dallas in 2024 by Dallas Observer!
Judith Carter was in the Upscale and Luxury Hospitality Industry for most of her life. In 2004 she had a beautiful baby boy with Special Needs and put the pause on her career until 2017 to dedicate herself to him and then others, assisting and volunteering as a legal advocate ensuring the best medical care, evaluations and educations for Special Needs children and their families.
Matt and Judith were family friends for over 20 years. She was there with her family in support when his wife Jen passed away suddenly in 2006. Then just 6 weeks later while Matt was in Dallas; he and his Father, Dave, and Step-Mother, Genie, were there as support, when Judith was alone and her son received the first of many diagnoses that changed the trajectory of their lives. So it made sense in the turbulent year of 2020, Matt asked Judith to take over running the online store that has become MZS.press. The rest as they say is, "Their"-story.