With all the Nicki, Remy, Kim and Iggy talk lately, one female lyricist has been notably absent from the conversation. Jean Grae has consistently proven herself to be the go-to-girl for quality on the hip hop scene. Yet the media seems to focus on her more pop oriented contemporaries. Regardless, Jean made a brief reappearance on Twitter early this morning to blast Jon Caramanica’s August. 11th Times article on female rappers. He stated that from the mid-1990’s to the early 2000’s female emcees were at the top of the charts selling millions of records, “but to find a critical mass of female rappers in 2014, you have to turn to another industry: reality television.”
Jean strongly disagreed and posted, “No they’re not. Do whatever you want…Seriously that is absolutely infuriating.” She continued to comment for the next hour and a half, which leads me to believe poor Jon wishes that he had written a piece on female parking lot attendants instead of rappers…Anyway, Jean made her point clear. Artists shouldn’t be put into a box. Creatively, the sky’s the limit.
Below is a throwback video plus Part one of her online web sitcom, “Life with Jeannie.”
