After years of boycotting the Grammy Awards, rapper and entertainment mogul Jay-Z was honored with eight nods for the 60th year of the prestigious music awards ceremony held in New York last Jan. 28. Jay-Z, whose real name is Shawn Carter, was nominated for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, Best Rap Album, Best Rap Song, Best Rap/Sung Collaboration, Best Music Video and Best Rap Performance. Yet, despite being the most nominated artist, he left with zero wins.
He recently made an impassioned speech at producer Clive Davis' pre-Grammy gala at the Sheraton Time Square as he accepted the Grammy Salute to Industry Icons Award. Jay-Z reminded the audience how he started boycotting the Grammys in 1999 due to the "snubbing" of rapper DMX, who had two number one albums during the previous year.
According to an interview he gave to MTV News back in 2002, Jay-Z said that he felt The Grammys did not accord hip-hop with the level of respect that the genre fully deserves. It seems that the awards has a track record of not having a solid connection with the rap genre. In 1999, Eminem also did not attend the ceremony where he was supposed to accept an award for Best New Artist, and in the succeeding years, artists such as DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince (Will Smith), Salt N' Pepa and Kid N' Play boycotted the show because the rap category was not aired.
After six years, all it took to get him to pack up the boycotting stance was his then-girlfriend Beyoncè's "Crazy in Love" album which he said, the industry considered as a "breakout." He stated, "I realized, man, all this is super subjective, and everyone's doing their best, and the Academy—they're human, like we are, and they're voting on things that they like; it's subjective. And we believe in it because we do."
He went on to say that as artists, they all aspire to be on the stage and that was in large part what drove him to be in attendance again. For Jay-Z, great artists such as Bob Marley, Tupac and Biggie will always be considered "great," whether they won awards or not.
