A Mars-in-Cancer native like Kendrick Lamar attacks from the side. He cobbles together his forces en masse — not unlike the invasive crab species currently dominating New England this Mars retrograde — until they grow to become an unmovable, armored force.

Last Sunday, Kendrick became the first solo rap artist to headline the Super Bowl halftime show. The Sunday prior, he won all five Grammys that he was nominated for, including Record of the Year. Kendrick’s clear triumph of the hip-hop industry, the Grammy Awards, and our cultural conversation is a Mars story.

‍

‍

Mars in Cancer knows how to wield humiliation

‍

In Kendrick’s birth chart, Mars is in its fall in Cancer. Planets in their fall have to swim upstream or against the tide. In the sign of the crab, Mars is aggressive-passive. It broods. Any provocation is personal. It’s come for me and I’ll come for you. Another way of thinking of planets in their fall is that they’re in their “humiliation,” as that’s how 9th-century Arabic astrologer Abū Ma’shar described Mars in Cancer:
‍

“Mars offends very much in its humiliation or in Cancer since it is a cold and moist sign while Mars is hot and dry as the nature of the fire is and therefore when it humiliates itself its affliction is double: both because it is in its own humiliation and because it is in a sign different from its own nature.”

It’s true that planets in their fall have their challenges. Yet they also present an opportunity. In a sign where resources are scarce, the planet has to use ingenuity and creativity to make things happen. Therein lies the magic. So yes, planets in their fall can be a pain, but they also invite us to work with the difficulty. When Kendrick harnesses the power of Mars in its fall, it’s a total triumph.

As I watched Kendrick tease the stadium with the question of whether he’d perform Not Like Us, I thought about humiliation as a battle tactic. If Capricorn (the cardinal earth sign opposite Cancer, where Mars is traditionally exalted) is where the red planet knows valor, then in Cancer, it knows how to weaponize disgrace like no other. And no one has been humbled more than Kendrick’s arch nemesis — the target of Not Like Us — Canadian rapper Drake.

‍

‍

“I want to perform they favorite song, but you know they love to sue”

‍

Kendrick released Not Like Us on May 4th, 2024, while Mars was in Aries. The planet of war is at home in this cardinal fire sign and able to vanquish its enemies efficiently, if not brutally. And brutal it was. After months of exchanging quips with Drake, each of them upping the ante, Kendrick dropped the song, and it was an instant commercial success. This is singular for a diss track; sometimes those only make the rounds between insiders. Not this one. It broke streaming records — most of which were previously held by Drake. Not Like Us is now the most-streamed diss track on Spotify. Last month, it hit one billion streams on that platform alone.

Flash forward to January 15th, 2025. Drake had had enough. His team filed their second federal suit alleging: “Beginning on May 4th, 2024, and every day since, UMG has used its massive resources as the world’s most powerful music company to elevate a dangerous and inflammatory message that was designed to assassinate Drake’s character, and led to actual violence at Drake’s doorstep.” Even the lawsuit uses Martian terms (bolded for emphasis). It turns out it was a pinnacle day astrologically for the red planet: Mars was in its “Full Moon” moment, exactly opposite the Sun.

Kendrick may soon become embroiled in a legal battle. On February 23rd, 2025, Mars will station direct at 17 degrees of Cancer, which is exactly conjunct his natal Mars. He won the culture war and garnered the masses to his side, but the astrology indicates there’s more tension brewing. The lawyer who filed the suit is experienced in high-profile libel and defamation cases, and it is said that the feud could be continued in court through to late April.

‍

‍

“The audience not dumb, shape the stories how you want”

‍

At the Super Bowl halftime show, Kendrick crouched atop the hood of a Buick GNX while countless dancers scuttled out and onto the field. The setting was Compton. Serena Williams was crip-walking — a dance she was chastised for doing at Wimbledon years ago, now on the grave of Drake. The dancers were Kendrick’s army, or co-conspirators, clad in red, white, and blue. They assembled into an American flag, then broke formation and sprawled out like chalk lines. Samuel L. Jackson’s “Uncle Sam” ran the commentary: “Too loud, too reckless, too ghetto.” It was unapologetic in its origins, another strength of Mars in Cancer. The shell, the nest, the place that raised you to be illustrated in such a literal way was striking. It was a street or a cellblock. The DNA and the lifeblood of the culture. What it means to truly be HUMBLE — not to sit down, but to crip-walk, clown, and smile in flared jeans on a national stage with 133.5 million people watching.

This Mars retrograde in Leo and Cancer has been grueling. Our zones have been flooded. The adults haven’t been in charge, at least not in the White House. I think the US needed to see a game beyond the Chiefs and the Eagles’. Kendrick’s performance was cathartic, a sly battle cry. It was also “restrained,” and away from the white gaze, as the New Yorker argued. We are five years out from the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. The public is able to detect the stench of shareholder activism and its parade of aesthetics. People want authenticity. They are saying either you’re like us or you’re not like us. Kendrick’s critique and attack may have started with Drake, but the art went far beyond one person. If you poke the bear of Mars in Cancer, you may just get a whole culture war. Kendrick let us know when he paused to declare, “The revolution’s about to be televised. You picked the right time but the wrong guy.” It was a reference to Gil Scott-Heron’s famous phrase, and a not-so-subtle warning toward any culture-vulture.