Kendrick Lamar almost recorded a song with Prince.

Kendrick Lamar

Kendrick Lamar

The 30-year-old rapper had talked about collaborating with the 'Purple Rain' singer after they performed together unexpectedly when he went to visit the late star's Paisley Park estate in Chanhassen, Minnesota, but was devastated that they never got to do the track before Prince died of an accidental drug overdose in April 2016.

He said: "It's one of those things where, it's so much going on in the moment, man. I did a show that day with him, I didn't even know I was coming out on stage. The studio was next door where I just played him the song. We were running back and forth. I totally forgot about the song after that."

Kendrick puts a lot of thought into who he collaborates with because he likes to make sure the chemistry is natural and he's free to express himself.

But he has admitted there wasn't too much thinking involved when Taylor Swift sent him over her song 'Bad Blood' and asked him to join her for some vocals.

Speaking on the 'Howard Stern Show', he explained: "we talk about is how does the music sound? I'm a hip-hop artist, so how far in the pop world is the sound? So the first thing is, let's hear the music, 'cause the music is gonna dictate the concept on where can we take this. With this particular record, it was me just vibing and catching her lyrics. I didn't want to get into her head too crazy. I just wanted to have my own inspiration and see where it took it... Fortunately, the vibe was right and it didn't take too many takes, and we was really locked in on the chemistry and we really felt what was going on when I was in the booth."