Lord Jamar Says Eminem Is Not The King Of Hip-Hop
Lord Jamar, apparently, isn’t a fan of Eminem.
During an interview that took place last week with BossChick Raine of the RapMatic podcast, Lord Jamar expressed his qualms with Eminem being crowned the “King” of rap due to album sales versus actual skill set.
“My thing about Eminem and all that, and I hate even bring his f**king name up. But, my thing about this motherf**ker is you can’t crown somebody king and circumvent the true kingdom. You see white people will crown Eminem king because he sold the most records out of all rappers, but when we go into everyday life of black people, the people who are the originators of this shit. We don’t f**king listen to Eminem,” Lord Jamar said.
Before Jamar expressed his feelings about Eminem, he said that hip-hop needs gatekeepers just like country music and other genres.
Jamar, a member of hip-hop veteran group Brand Nubian said that he has the authority to talk about this topic because he’s participated in all five elements of hip-hop “to the highest degrees.”
“We don’t go to the gym and turn on Eminem. We don’t turn on Eminem on the way to the club. I’m talking live ni**as now. I don’t know about corny ni**as. I’m talking about live ni**as. You don’t hear Eminem in the club unless he’s f**king somebody else on the f**king record. They don’t play Eminem in the club. In the tavern they play him, but not in the black clubs,” Jamar explained.
“When you leave black people to their own devices, no one is going to put Eminem at the top above a f**king Jay-Z, or a Nas, or any f**king body that we see as our true king okay. Period,” Jamar continued.
Jamar reiterated that if an MC’s content is wack, nobody should care about how well they can put words together.
Check out the full interview above.
Glennisha Morgan is a Detroit-bred multimedia journalist and writer. She writes about intersectionality, hip-hop, pop culture, queer issues, race, feminism, and her truth. Follow her on Twitter.
