There was going to come a point in Lamar’s progression where he was going to make this decision, and truthfully from a business standpoint, it’s hard to blame him. Worldwide pop icon, Lady Gaga, opened eyes and discussions recently by taking to Twitter announcing she would collaborating with K-Dot on his impending October 2 release, good kid, m.A.A.D. city. The announcement, while noteworthy, wasn’t exactly shocking. They were pictured together at Chicago’s Pitchfork Music Festival in July and the two have been tweeting one another on occasion. While the tweet was later deleted (of course), there is no confirmation if the collab will indeed be a single, but it’s hard to imagine it won’t. That leads to one simple, but important question.

How important is this, really?

For one, as said earlier, there’s no way to fault Kendrick for this and the purpose of an album is to promote with the hopes as many people as possible will purchase it. And there aren’t many people in music with a larger umbrella of influence than Gaga these days. However, seeing as how an artist such as Wale went down this path in 2009 with his L.G.-assisted number, “Chillin,” there is cause for concern if you can call it that. The was a marginal success, but nowhere in the realm of what many expected beforehand. One could argue to co-sign – at least in the world of long-term Kendrick fans – from Hip-Hop pillars Kanye West, Jay-Z and Eminem hold more weight than the multi-platinum singer whose outfits make headlines nearly as much as her music. Wale went to see his debut album, Attention Deficit, post extremely low numbers. Part of it was due to Interscope under shipping the album while part of it was due to that song in particular never exploded the way it appeared it would on paper.

Now, three years later, Kendrick finds himself on Interscope in somewhat the same situation. For not only his sake, but everyone who has ever supported Lamar in the past, here’s to hope this chain of events fails to repeat itself. Ideally, Gaga helps launch Kendrick into another stratosphere of success while the album still manages to harbor his patented sense of self, awareness and sharpness his previous projects have embodied. Kendrick almost appears too talented to fail, Gaga or no Gaga. In any event, this still does not mean the anticipation and pressure to deliver a gem increases by the day as October approaches.

Soon enough, however, we’ll see if a certain single can put Compton back on the mainstream conscience of America. Yep, soon enough.