If you know anything about hip hop and the Grammy’s you know that the relationship is not good. Many people believe that the Grammy’s does an especially terrible job representing hip hop. Last year controversy erupted when Macklemore beat Kendrick Lamar for best rap album. I wrote a recap and analysis of white rappers in hip hop that you can read it here. However the bad blood between hip hop and the Grammys goes back much further. Below is a video from Complex magazine breaking down how the Grammy’s treats hip hop.
Grammy Facts
- -Macklemore has more Grammys than Tupac, The Notorious B.I.G., Nas, DMX, Busta Rhymes, KRS-One, Rick Ross, Snoop Dogg, Mos Def, Run DMC, Public Enemy, Big Pun, Young Jeezy, Ja Rule and Kendrick Lamar combined!
- -Iggy Azalea has more Grammy nominations in rap categories than MC Lyte, Lil Kim, and Foxy Brown combined!
- -The Black Eyed Peas have won more rap Grammys than Gang Starr, Geto Boys, N.W.A., and Tribe Called Quest, combined!
- -Drake has the same number of Grammys as Coolio, and Sir Mix-a-Lot, with 1 Grammy.
- -A female rapper hasn’t won a rap Grammy in over 10 years. Not since Missy Elliot’s Work It.
- -Of the last 92 rap related Grammy’s given, 41 of them have gone to either Eminem, Jay-Z, or Kanye West.
Copyright Note
On a copyright note, this year’s Grammys will be the first ever to allow songs that use sampling or interpolations to be nominated in songwriting categories. Previously a song that used sampling as a technique, or didn’t sample but used interpolation instead, was automatically disqualified from categories like Song of the Year. For example in 2011 Jay-Z and Alicia Keyes won Best Rap Song for “Empire State of Mind”. However because “Empire State of Mind” sampled The Moments’ “Love On A Two Way Street” (1968) it was disqualified from being nominated for Song of the Year. Now, more than 40 years after the birth of hip hop, the Grammys will finally allow songs that contain samples to be honored.
