Do the Grammys Have a Race Problem?
White people rejoice! You’ve managed to cold-jack yet another awards season, and in February no less. The Oscars will be whiter than they’ve been since 1998, and this year the Grammy Awards promise to be a throwback to that time when Shirley Temple got down in blackface — dumb-stoopid-affected accents and all.
Not only is every single Best New Artist nominee white (the first time since Sheryl Crow trounced Counting Crows in 1995), so are the contenders for Record of the Year! And — inhale — a full third of the rap album nominees are also white!
Exhale, then pretend that Azealia Banks, the Roots, YG and Future to name a few, never existed or dropped well-deserving joints this year. Ponder this while taking in what will likely be a somber (high five, Taran Killam) white re-imagining of R&B from Best New Artist and Record and Song of the Year nominee, Sam Smith, as he performs “Stay With Me.”
If you suddenly start craving Wonder Bread and mayo-rap sandwiches at some point during the broadcast, try not to blame it solely on race or the unbearable whiteness of a newish category — Best Antiseptic Rap/Sung Record — that’s been gaining traction. A million-billion social networking years ago — in 2012 — the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences did something totally leftfield in our checkbox-obsessed world. They decided to siphon off 31 jazz, world music and Latin-centric categories from the Grammys. (However, NARAS later reinstated Best Latin jazz album after Carlos Santana, Herbie Hancock, Paul Simon and Bobby Sanabria got in their asses). Without warning the industry that professed to “honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without regard to album sales or chart position,” ethnically cleansed its musical categories. Most viewers of the awards show were none the wiser because those categories, in a twisted case of art holding a mirror up to society, were never given screen time.
How to push the conversation forward? Look back. When DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince beat out LL Cool J, Kool Moe Dee and others in 1989 to win the first Best Rap Performance Grammy, a lesson should have been learned: Expect the Grammys to get it wrong, at least in those few categories artists of color are expected to reign in — especially if Marshall Mathers III decides to release an album or haiku that year. (In all fairness, Eminem not only paid his dues but also is consistently excellent.) The Grammy voters have historically displayed its huge cojones with the public crimes against hip-hop music they’ve committed over the years.
The hip-hop artists, including those who’ve managed somehow to strike an emotional chord with a broad audience, that have even hinted at self-determination, political or social activism, and presented unprocessed depictions of life in urban America, have never walked away with a Grammy. Not Public Enemy, or N.W.A, Wu-Tang Clan, Mobb Deep, and dead prez? Nope. And, brace yourselves, not even Notorious B.I.G. or Tupac Shakur.