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Jay-Z is sharing his thoughts and proclaiming that his wife Beyoncé’s album RENAISSANCE should have taken home the Grammy for Album of the Year.
The music mogul sat down for an exclusive interview with Tidal ahead of Sunday’s award ceremony. And explained that while there is excitement around his wife being nominated for Album of the Year, he doesn’t allow himself to get too caught up in the emotions around it.
Yeah, I remove myself from the process and hope they just get it right. It got to the point where I was like, it’s just a marketing thing. You go, you got an album out and it could help the sales go up. It got to that point, but deep down … Again, we grew up idolizing this. It was like one of the pillars for us…
The 53-year-old went on to explain why he feels his wife’s latest body of work deserved the accolade.
Look what it’s done to the culture. Look how the energy of the world moved. They play her whole album in the club. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that. The whole entire joint — like, everything?! Every remix is amazing. Everyone’s inspired. It has inspired the world.
Jay went on to explain that every cover released by fans is “better than the other one.”
It’s inspiring creativity… When it just inspires creativity, that’s an album. That has to be Album of the Year. It has to be.
The Brooklyn-bred rapper also addressed his longstanding frustration with the Grammys.
The truth is, we grew up wanting to be on the Grammys, and it was our goal. We just want them to get it right. That’s what we want. … Obviously it’s music and it’s all subjective, but you got to be in the ballpark. That’s all we want. We just want them to get it right because we love it so much…
Jay went on to explain that he feels the Grammys “missed the mark” by failing to award his album 4:44 with Album of the Year at the 60th Annual Grammy Awards. Additionally, the Grammys nominated the album eight times and Jay ended the evening with zero awards.
In that moment, I was like, ‘They missed the opportunity,’ because people emulate success. In that moment, that album, 4:44, was a moment for us to say, ‘Hip-hop is viewed as a young man’s sport. Now here is this album that could take us into the next sphere.’ I feel like they missed the moment.
Despite his longstanding frustration with the Grammys, the 53-year-old revealed that he felt he needed to take the stage “for the culture.”
I thought about it, I was in my head and I just broke down and said, ‘You know, it’s a four-minute verse.’ Again, for the culture, for hip-hop, we got to do that. This ain’t your traditional song. … It’s not your traditional structure of what you think a song that would be nominated for Song of the Year would sound like. It’s not what you expect… A four-minute verse performed at the Grammys. We owe it to the culture, and it ain’t even a burden. It’s a blessing. It’s easy and fun.
Roommates, are you happy that Jay performed despite his frustration with the Grammys? Do you agree with him feeling RENAISSANCE deserved Album of the Year?
