With the 58th Annual Grammy Awards now just two days away, there’s a reasonably enormous amount of excitement surrounding Kendrick Lamar, who leads this year’s ceremony with 11 nominations – a would-be all-time high if it weren’t for Michael Jackson‘s Thriller LP earning the King of Pop a whopping 12 nods in 1984. Adding to the hype yet some more is five-time consecutive host LL Cool J, who during an interview recently gave away clues as to what we can expect from the TDE rapper’s performance on Monday night.
“Kendrick Lamar’s gonna do something very controversial,” he revealed before proceeding to not only rationalize, but also commend the Compton native for his courageous approach. “And that’s what art is about, right? It’s not about whether you agree or disagree; it’s about it stimulating conversation and provoking people to have conversations about society. And if that’s what you want your art to do as an artist, if that’s the lane you choose, then you’re accomplishing something if people talk about what you’re doing.”
Perhaps whatever Kendrick has up his sleeve shouldn’t come as a complete shock however, especially when taking into account his bold, politically-charged performance of “Alright” from To Pimp a Butterfly to open up the 2015 BET Awards, which raised eyebrows and ruffled several conservative feathers, as folks had the nerve to deem the display counterproductive due to K.Dot standing on top of a vandalized cop car while expressing he and the general public’s unwithering grief towards police brutality and social injustice as a whole.
