Macklemore were almost cut from Grammys - source

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis had a rousing 2013 in hip-hop: Source magazine named Macklemore its "man of the year," the duo was Billboard's top rap act and they took home most of the year's key hip-hop trophies from the MTV Video Music Awards to the American Music Awards.




While Macklemore & Lewis are up for seven honours at Monday's (NZ time) Grammy Awards, including album of the year and best rap album for the platinum seller The Heist, most rap committee members felt the duo shouldn't qualify for the rap categories because of their success on mainstream radio and their appeal in the pop world, the source said.


The group's follow-up, Can't Hold Us, helped assimilate their name in pop music when it hit the No. 1 spot and sold more than five million tracks.



"Because of the controversy with them as a rap group it became something the entire Grammy committee discussed," the person said.


"It's not that they don't think he's a rapper," the person said of the rap committee's decision. "It's just that when you're trying to protect categories and someone has become popular, it should be judged as much. Where does their music exist? Who are their fans?"



Their manager used an expletive to describe the rap category debate.

"If you strip away being influenced by the popularity or by who their fans are or by the amount of radio traction their songs got ... and just dissect musically what it is, there's no question it's a hip-hop album; they're hip-hop songs," said Zach Quillen, who didn't attend any of the Grammy meetings.


Artists can submit songs or albums to multiple genres for Grammy Awards, but a screening committee decides where they best fit. Artists, though, can be nominated for multiple genres: Justin Timberlake's Mirrors and Pusher Love Girl are nominated for best pop solo performance and R&B song, respectively. Rihanna is also nominated for R&B and pop awards.

Quillen, who has managed Macklemore & Lewis since 2009, said the heavy play on Top 40 radio "absolutely changes perception," somewhat taking away from the group's hip-hop credibility.

"And perception can be very powerful," he said. "And the thing Ben and Ryan are messing with is perception and people's desire to put things in boxes."

Noah "40" Shebib, Drake's producer, believes Macklemore & Lewis should earn rap nominations, adding: "I'm not against either decision."

"The playing fields are different. (Macklemore is) playing in a world that has more numbers. Bigger impact, bigger reach, more everything. All the rappers, they can dabble in those areas, but they don't necessarily exist in that area. If you want to talk about the logistics of it - that would be a reason in my opinion to isolate him into the pop category because that's his weight class," Shebib said.


Shebib won the best rap album Grammy with Drake for Take Care last year and they are competing with Macklemore & Lewis for the honour this year with Nothing Was the Same. Drake's Started From the Bottom and A$AP Rocky's F*****' Problems, songs co-written by Shebib, will battle Thrift Shop for best rap song.


"Sometimes people say Drake's not a rapper, he's a singer, but there's a certain group of people who take that opinion of Drake because of the music that he makes, being that he isn't boxed into just rap songs," he said. "Now obviously, we all know Drake is a rapper and should be in the rap category. Same thing applies to the Macklemore conversation."


Ebro Darden, program director of New York's Hot 97, said he believes Macklemore & Lewis should compete for hip-hop Grammys, though he thinks sonically the group "lends itself to a more mainstream taste palate".

"If you're rapping over a beat, it's hip-hop," Darden said.



"Ben's been rapping onstage since he was 14 years old and before Thrift Shop hit pop radio, he very much considered himself an underground rap artist, Quillen said of Macklemore, whose name is Ben Haggerty.

"Ben also has a thick skin and he's also extremely proud of and confident with the art he puts out. But I think like anybody he's a human being, he'll look at a comment like that and it's disconcerting. But he's also quick to move past it."

- AP

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