While accepting the Dr. Dre Global Impact Award at the 2024 Grammy Awards, rapper Jay-Z appeared to take a jab at the academy for snubbing his wife Beyoncé for Album of the Year.
“How far we have come since Will Smith and Jazzy Jeff won their first Grammy and boycotted because it was not televised,” he said. “And then they went to a hotel to watch the Grammys. I don’t even understand, it was not a great boycott. But then in ’98, I took a page out of their book and was nominated for Best Rap Album. And DMX put out two, and they were both No. 1, and he was not nominated at all. So I boycotted… and I watched the Grammys. I’m just saying, we want you all to get it right. We love y’all. We want y’all to get it right. At least get it close to right.”
He continued, “And obviously it’s subjective. Because it’s music and it’s opinion based. I don’t want to embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than anybody and never won album of the year. So even by your own metrics that doesn’t work. Think about that. The most Grammys, never won album of the year. That doesn’t work. Some of you are going to go home tonight and feel like you’ve been robbed. Some of you may get robbed. Some of you don’t belong in the category. When I get nervous I tell the truth.”
Viewers immediately began to deconstruct the situation. One user noted that Beyoncé appeared neither taken aback nor annoyed by her husband’s speech.
A user wrote, “Jay Z said I’ll accept your little award but y’all are gonna sit and listen to how y’all keep doing black artists wrong.”
Another user said, “Not Jayz getting onstage being messy and spilling tea. He ate that.”
Currently, Beyoncé has 32 Grammy wins and 88 nominations. Last year, Renaissance, which was hailed by critics, won Best Dance/Electronic Music Album, Best R&B Song, Best Traditional R&B Performance, and Best Dance/Electronic Music Recording, but did not win Album of the Year. Instead, Harry Styles accepted the award for Harry’s House.
It’s a common pattern for Black artists in Grammy history: Win the Black awards but fall short in the broader categories to a white artist. On Sunday night, Album Of the Year went to Taylor Swift, and not SZA or Janelle Monae.
The Daily Dot reached out to a representative for Jay-Z via email for comment.
