Ice-T lit the stage up as one of the many legacy acts that performed at the 2023 Grammy Awards’ Hip Hip 50 tribute – but his participation almost didn’t happen.
The legendary rapper/actor admitted to ET while talking to the outlet at the show on Sunday (February 5) that he was hesitant to join. Luckily, however, Questlove was able to convince him to perform.
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“Questlove calls me up and he says, ‘Alright, you gotta come to L.A. this weekend. It’s a big performance, I got you in the lineup,'” Ice recalled. “And I was still hesitant ’cause it’s a long travel. But then he says, ‘You don’t want to be sitting at home watching this show, saying you should’ve been there. I was invited but I didn’t show up.’ And [so] I got my Black ass on a plane.”
Curated by Questlove, the segment was a multi-generational celebration of Hip Hop that included everyone from Salt-N-Pepa, Run-DMC, the Furious Five, De La Soul, Queen Latifah, Public Enemy and Rakim to Method Man, The Lox, Missy Elliot, Nelly, Lil Baby, GloRilla, Lil Uzi Vert and more.
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“Real talk, unfortunately, that’s usually the only time we all get together and see each other,” Ice-T added. “So the GRAMMYs brought us together and it’s so crazy that for a while, rap wasn’t even represented at the GRAMMYs. I got one of the early GRAMMYs with Quincy Jones, you know, but I felt Quincy kinda snuck us in the backdoor.”
He continued: “We don’t get invited to this type of party! The people that were raised by us are now the people making the decisions, and so what a difference a day makes. You see Dr. Dre doing the Super Bowl with 50 Cent, Eminem, all the outlaws. That means that the culture has really broadened to where the people in power are our children.”
Will Smith was also supposed to be a part of the Hip Hop 50 tribute, but according to Questlove, he was forced to back out.
“I’ll give the spoiler alert away. Will Smith was a part of the festivities tonight, but they started shooting Bad Boys 4 this week,” Quest said. “There were a lot of preliminary shots that he had to do, so we had to lose Will.”
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Quest admitted that Will’s inclusion was “a shot in the dark” due to the actor’s busy movie schedule, adding that Ice-T, Queen Latifah and LL COOL J — all successful actors in their own right — had to “leave their respective [TV] shows” to partake in the performance.
