Kendrick Lamar Channeled Michael Jordan For His New Album Announcement And Fans Love It

For most of the day so far, the music world was focused on looking back at the first weekend of Coachella. Everything changed this afternoon, though, when Kendrick Lamar came out of nowhere and announced that his next album is called Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers and it’s set for release on May 13.

Lamar shared the news via a tweet and almost immediately after doing so, he became the No. 1 trending topic on Twitter. While most of the conversation consisted of excited knee-jerk reactions to the news, some fans took a minute to observe how Lamar’s announcement bears a striking resemblance (intentionally, it appears) to an iconic Michael Jordan moment.

Lamar shared the news via a simple letter that plainly states the news of his album, with the formatting of the note seemingly modeled after the famously minimalist fax MJ sent in 1995 to confirm he was ending his retirement and returning to the NBA. Journalist Andreas Hale also observed that Lamar’s announcement comes almost exactly 27 years after Jordan’s: MJ’s note was dated March 18, 1995, while Lamar’s is from today, April 18.

Imitating the Jordan fax has actually become a bit of a trend in hip-hop lately: Migos did the same thing last May and Logic followed suit the next month.

Check out some more Lamar reactions, to both the Jordan similarities and to the album news more broadly, below.