Q-Tip rails against Grammys after A Tribe Called Quest album snub
Q-Tip is not brushing off his Grammy snub quietly. The Tribe Called Quest rapper called out the Recording Academy in two expletive-filled videos on Instagram after the 2016 album "We Got It from Here… Thank You 4 Your Service" did not receive any nominations.
In a selfie video, he accused the Recording Academy of being "corny." The rapper pointed out that Bob Marley and Jimi Hendrix never won any Grammys, while Marvin Gaye only got one. In the background, a woman is cooking in a kitchen while jazz music plays.
The rapper talked about how last year, Tribe performed at the Grammys less than a year after member Phife Dawg died of diabetes-related complications in March 2016. Q-Tip said, "You think I wanted to go out there and perform after we lost our man? We closed your show and we didn't get no f**king nominations? Last Tribe album. My man is gone." (The group performed but did not close out the Grammys.)
Tip also said that it's no big deal that no white men are nominated for the album of the year Grammy this year.
"We were the most black-cultured group out there," he continued. "That's all we stood on. That's what we represented."
He said "come over to the Kennedy Center," where he became the first artistic director of hip-hop last year.
The late Phife Dawg contributed to "We Got It from Here… Thank You 4 Your Service." Q-Tip talked about upholding Phife's legacy during an interview with Gayle King on "CBS This Morning."
"Yeah. We just, you know, hope that… people enjoy it. And it makes people feel good -- that's what we always wanted," he said. "And I just want to hold my brother up and celebrate him. He wanted us to do an album more than anything."