But her recent interview with Hot 97 painted a clearer picture of who Azealia Banks is as a person and why she’s so passionate and even confrontational with her opinions about other, mostly White, artists on Twitter.
Homegirl has some very deep, very fundamentally true thoughts about Black culture, American history, the media and more.
Here’s the thing with Iggy Azalea. I feel, just in this country, whenever it comes to our things, like Black issues, or Black politics, or Black music or whatever there’s always this under current of a ‘Fuck you.’ Like ‘Fuck y’all niggas. Y’all don’t really own shit. Y’all don’t have shit.’ That Macklemore album wasn’t better than the Drake record. That Iggy Azalea shit is not better than any fucking Black girl that’s rapping today. And when they give those awards out–cuz the Grammys are supposed to be like accolades for artistic excellency. Iggy Azalea is not excellent. And the message I see when I see these Grammys being given out…I have a problem when you’re trying to say that it’s Hip Hop and you’re trying to put it up against Black culture.
Even Nicki Minaj over the past 2,3,4 years has done so much to kind of create this social presence and this hold –like this social consciousness so she’s like “Re Up” and “Roman Reloaded” and here you got fucking Iggy like “Reclassified.” Like you’re trying to smudge out…it’s like a cultural smudging is what I see. And when they give these Grammys out all it says to White kids is ‘You’re great, you’re amazing, you can do whatever you put your mind to.’ And it says to Black kids, ‘You don’t have shit, you don’t own shit, not even the shit you created for yourself.’ And it makes me upset in that way.
So put her in the pop category. Put her with Katy Perry. Put her and Miley Cyrus is the same box together. Don’t put her in Hip Hop. Just because she’s not singing does not mean it’s rap music.
And then Ebro says something about this happening all of the time, don’t we know the drill?
Now everybody knows that the basis of modern capitalism is slave labor. Really, the selling and trading of these slaves. There are huge corporations that are still caking off that slave money and shit like that. So until y’all muthafuckas are ready to talk about what y’all owe me. Whether the number is 7 trillion, 8 trillion or 9 trillion. At the very fucking least, you owe me the right my identity and to not exploit that shit. That’s all we’re holding on to, like Hip Hop and rap.
And Bill Cosby…that’s too timely. You have like Eric Garner, Mike Brown and Trayvon Martin and y’all fucking talking about Bill Cosby. What the fuck? Y’all putting that on tv for the kids to see, for the youth to see. We really have to talk about this.
Then Ebro says, part of the reason you get in trouble is because you feel. And they disregard your feelings and you get dismissed as crazy.
And then she spoke about why she came for TI when he jumped in her beef with Iggy Azalea.
I got to be the bitter, Black bitch because I have to say about it. Here you got fucking, coon head ass TI. TI, you out here trying to fucking promote this White bitch and they got your wife on VH1. Whitey got your wife on VH1 and that bitch can’t fucking read. You understand? You got tour priorities fucked up. That’s really how I fucking feel about you. You a fucking shoe shining coon. How dare you?
You a fucking coon. Your wife can’t read and they got her on tv.. They making fun of— they got the fucking sound effects on her. Like Boing. She reading the thing with her finger and it’s like boing, boing. The fact that your wife can’t read makes you even more of a coon. The fact that you’re focused on what the fuck I have to say about this bitch [Iggy] saying she’s a runaway slave master and that’s really what you’re attacking me for. You have no other reason to come at me aside from the fact that I said something about her calling herself a runaway slave master. And the bitch so comfortably did a whip motion in the video. Oh shit, and y’all will sweep that shit right under the fucking rug.
Then Ebro asked she uses social media to address her issues with other artists…She does a mean TI impression before saying:
Where the fuck did you learn how to read? Freedman’s Bureau? Did you get your GED in jail?
Then Ebro told her that she should put the energy and that fire into her music because the social media presence is stronger than the actual artwork.
No. I don’t want to put this shit in my fucking music. I did put the energy in my music. It is speaking. Ok, but y’all work at a radio station. I’m a creative individual. I have the license to think and say and do whatever I feel. Y’all focus on the music. That’s your job. I’m a creative.
Well then that’s their problem. I talk about so many different things on my Twitter. Y’all niggas pick and choose what y’all want to see. Stop trying to play me. Let me be free. It’s been a long time since a Black woman can sit here and say whatever the fuck she feels like without being shot at or sprayed by a hose or some shit.
Ebro then asked Azealia where all of this passion came from. What happened to her or someone she knew that makes this issue so close to her heart.
What bothers me…when you have the media and the sensationalization that comes around it. I picked up the New York Post and it said “Hip Hop Is White.” They’re trying to erase us. All of our books and scriptures and everything that we are supposed to know about ourselves are gone, never to be seen again. Just like ok the fact that metallurgy was started in Africa, agriculture. All those things that created the world are ours and it’s really upsetting. Especially from young, you read your social studies textbook and all you see is stories of you under some White person’s foot. Or you and a White person and you failing in the face of a White person. Y’all niggas are fucking everywhere. I don’t want to share this with y’all. I don’t.
Even the fact that they still making movies like “12 Years A Slave” and shit like that. I don’t want to see no more fucking stories about no more fucking slaves. I don’t want to see no more White people whipping nobody in no fucking movies. I don’t want to see that shit no more because my Black story is bigger than the boat ride over. It’s very upsetting. So this little thing called Hip Hop that I’ve created for myself, that I’m holding onto with my dear fucking life is like being snatched away from me. THey do that just to fuck with you. Why y’all trying to fuck with Nicki Minaj? Why y’all trying to fuck with the Black girls?
I’ve never heard anything from Azealia Banks other than her throwing jabs on social media. I’m more R&B than Hip Hop, so I can honestly say I haven’t been paying attention. But this interview has shown me that she knows what time it is. She was actually preaching a sermon…with the exception of that off topic Bill Cosby piece. We need to be talking about that too. Which is why I think Twitter may have been a bit problematic. If she tweets Iggy is whack and she calls T.I.’s wife mediocre, we don’t have any backstory as to why she feels this way. All of it comes off as jealous jabs. But I don’t think she should stop speaking. We need people like her to keep us all awake. But I would love for Azealia Banks to start a blog where we can get the full depth and magnitude of her thoughts. At the end of the interview, she mentioned that she’s writing a fable–so hopefully we’ll get some more of this, there because 140 characters doesn’t cut it…most of the time. Honestly, this interview made me want to listen to her music to see what she’s talking about. It’s nice to hear Black women talk trash (be braggadocios) and truth in the same setting every once in a while.
You can watch the full interview, which I strongly encourage, in the video below.
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