Drake has added his voice to the number of artistes who are reacting with dismay at the Grammys nominations.
Many notable artistes have been left off of the list, including those like The Weeknd, whose millions of fans reacted with shock and surprise at the Grammy selection. Now, Drake, a four-time Grammy award winner who has also received 44 nominations, is speaking out at the machinery that once was the most recognized and respected.
In a lengthy post on Instagram, the artiste said it’s time to move on past the Grammy and time for a new Award machinery. “I think we should stop allowing ourselves to be shocked every year by the disconnect between impactful music and these awards and just accept that what once was the highest form of recognition may no longer matter to the artists that exists now and the ones that come after.”
Drake went on to say that trying to influence the Grammy to act with fairness and integrity is a lost cause. “It’s like a relative you keep expecting to fix up but they just can’t change their ways.”
He also expressed solidarity with The Weekend, who was expected to be in the line up for song of the year and album of the year but was noticeably left out from the nominations this year. “I said @theweeknd was a lock for either album or song of the year along with countless other reasonable assumptions and it just never goes that way. This is a great ime for somebody to start something new that we can build up over time and pass on to the generations to come.”
Drake also listed a number of names he would have wanted to see on the Grammy list, including Lil Baby, Pop Smoke, PartyNextDoor, and Popcaan and many others he said were “too many missing names to even name.”
Last year, Drake received a Grammy Award for best rap song for “God’s Plan.” During his acceptance speech, Drake slammed the Recording Academy in his acceptance speech and had his mic cut off before he could finish.
The Grammys later said a producer thought he was finished speaking and the mic cut was not intentional. The point he was making seemed to invalidate the importance of Grammy recognition. He said, “look if there’s people who have regular jobs who are coming out in the rain and snow, spending money to buy tickets to your shows, you don’t need this right here, you already won” before his mic cut.
Drake joins many others criticizing the Grammys. Earlier this year, Kanye West posted a video of himself peeing on his Grammy that was placed in a toilet bowl.
Nicki Minaj, earlier this week, blasted the Grammy for being racist and gender-biased in not recognizing her Pink Friday album and instead gave it to a “white man, Bon Iver.”
Fifteen-time Grammy winner and rapper Eminem is also anti-Grammy. He has dissed them in several songs include “Slim Shady.” However, he seemed to harbor resentment to the Recording Academy in spite of still accepting their awards. The Grammy has been accused of being racist and refusing to recognize music from African Americans. If African Americans are nominated, they still give the award to someone white in spite of the numbers and public sentiment disagreeing.
Eminem once said the Grammy used artists to sell their show and promote their body only to slight and disrespect them when it was time to honor them.
