With the Thanksgiving holiday in the rearview, a few of the 2021 HipHopDX Rising Stars are expressing their gratitude for their most recent accolades.
As a reminder, a DX Rising Star is a burgeoning talent HipHopDX pinpoints within the year before or after their initial introduction and rollout of new rap music. These are the artists DX feels have the ideal total package in terms of their musical sound, stage presence and genuine personalities. Over the course of the 2021 year, DX highlighted the career progression of 10 rap stars through special and exclusive features, interviews, playlist love and other indulgent surprises.
On Tuesday (November 23), the Recording Academy announced the full list of nominees that will have a chance to snag a Grammy Award on January 31, 2022. Among those nominees were 2021 HipHopDX Rising Stars Morray and BLEU.
Morray is nominated alongside J. Cole for “Best Rap Performance” and “Best Rap Song.” BLEU (formerly known as Yung Bleu) is nominated for Album of the Year after being featured on H.E.R.’s Back of My Mind album. Morray took to his Twitter to announce his nominations with a few words: “2x Grammy nominated Morray.”
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Morray has had an amazing year as he started of the year with receiving an abundance of love on his breakout single “Quicksand” and is now ending the fourth quarter of the year with a knock-out.
Morray has truly been consistent with cementing his name in the game each week. DX has covered every move of Morray’s journey — from inking a deal with Interscope Records earlier this year to purchasing his first home. But it wasMorray’s contribution to J. Cole’s “my.life” from The Off-Season that elevated Morray’s career in ways he probably felt were unreachable at one point.
J. Cole's 'The Off-Season' Crashes Spotify With Features From Lil Baby, 21 Savage, Cam'ron & More
But the good news doesn’t stop at Morray – BLEU has also had an unforgettable year thus far. On Thanksgiving day (November 25), Bleu took to his Instagram to share his Grammy-worthy news.
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“Add Grammy Nominated Songwriter to my resume @hermusicofficial congrats on Album Of The Year Nomination proud to be apart of this #Paradise,” he wrote.
BLEU is being nominated for his feature on H.E.R.’s “Paradise” from Back of My Mind. BLEU has already snagged a BET Hip Hop Award for Best New Artist and is nominated for three Soul Train Awards, including Best New Artist, Song of The Year and Best Collaboration for “You’re Mine Still” featuring Drake.
Blxst Scores 4 Soul Train Award Nominations - Including Best New Artist & Album Of The Year
After earning a few gold singles, BLEU finally went platinum this year for his 2020 smash “You’re Mines Still” featuring Drake, which also hit over 100 million YouTube views. His debut album, Moon Boy, also peaked at N0. 12 on the Billboard 200 chart. More recently, BLEU dropped the infectious single “Baddest” with Chris Brown and 2 Chainz. The single landed at No. 80 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
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Viewers will have to tune in this Sunday (November 28) on BET to see if BLEU will get a Soul Train Award.
Star Bits
DDG drops a hefty bag on his mama’s “Bussdown” watch. (Look here.)
Flo Milli takes selfies with Halle Berry on the set of “Bruised.” (Click here.)
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Blxst drops “Chose Me” music video featuring Blueface. (Watch here.)
