Grammy rap nominees better reflect today’s music reality

By Steve Jones, USA TODAY

The Grammy Awards have had a sometimes checkered relationship with rap, but this year’s nominations seem more in harmony with the music that rap fans found important.

Album-of-the-year hopeful Lil Wayne leads the field with eight nominations. He’ll join fellow rap superstars Jay-Z, T.I. and Kanye West at Sunday’s 51st annual show (CBS, 8 p.m. ET/PT), performing Swagga Like Us. Jay-Z and West also have six nominations each, while T.I. has four.

“It’s nice to see that Lil Wayne is the darling of the Grammys this year,” says Danyel Smith, Vibe editor in chief. “It’s an acknowledgement of his talent and the huge impact he’s had on music this year.”

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Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III has sold close to 3 million copies and was 2008’s biggest-selling album; he has had or been featured on nearly a dozen hits.

This year’s nominations are a far cry from two decades ago, when the Grammys first recognized rap by honoring crossover acts like Will Smith and nominating Vanilla Ice while more respected or edgier artists were ignored. Acts like Public Enemy boycotted the event.

That changed as rap became more mainstream. Lauryn Hill’s R&B-heavy The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill won album of the year in 1998, and Outkast’s Hey Ya-fueled Speakerboxxx/The Love Below won in 2003.

“Fifteen or 20 years ago, Hammer and DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince were among the few really commercially viable artists,” says Chuck Creekmur, CEO of the news site allhiphop.com. “Now hip-hop is still commercially viable, but it’s not as clear-cut who is crossover and who is underground.”