S. Samuel
With Lil B's I'm Gay album title continuing to generations mixed reactions, SOHH reached out to New York's Power 105.1's "The Breakfast Club" host Angela Yee for her take on the hype.
Although Yee supports the album title, she admits Lil B will likely continue to face criticism from the hip-hop community.
“Personally, I like Lil B,” Ang told SOHH. “I know a lot of people are critical of him, obviously he has a whole lot of fans out there and yes, hip-hop is definitely very homophobic. I understand his point in what he was trying to say. He said, ‘I’m gay’, [and] gay means happy. He’s said he’s not a homosexual, but I think it is going to be very difficult for an artist to come out and say they are homosexual in this climate. But, I also feel like it could be a very groundbreaking situation and may even have a lot of support in the gay community. I think [in reference to] Lil B, people think that it’s a gimmick and I feel he’s probably going to have a lot of that support.” (SOHH)
Ang also compared the title’s controversy to Nas‘ renamed 2008 album, Untitled.
“Even with dance artists or big R&B artists like Beyonce, Rihanna and Nicki Minaj, who has a huge gay fan base, those are the people that are going out and buying the albums and showing support,” Yee added. “So I feel like the same thing could potentially happen for somebody like Lil B where the gay community could really embrace and support him [whether he’s gay or not]. It’s a statement that’s made that has people talking. It’s like when Nas decided he wanted to call his [2008] album N*gger. It didn’t work out, but there was a huge uproar over that. I think anything that creates dialogue in our community is a good thing.” (SOHH)
Following B’s album title announcement in mid-April, Yee publicly expressed her opinion on the move.
“I love that @LILBTHEBASEDGODnamed his album “I’m Gay.” Tooooo much!,” she tweeted April 17th. (Angela Yee’s Twitter)
Lil B announced the album title during last month’s Coachella music concert in California.
“I’m gonna do the most controversial thing in hip-hop,” B said while performing at Coachella in Indio, California. “Y’all heard it hear first. And I’m gonna just show y’all that words don’t mean sh*t. I’m gonna make an album called ‘I’m Gay.’ Now I’m gonna tell y’all why I’m the first person to do it in hip-hop and why y’all are the first people to know my reason…First of all, gay means happy. I like women, I love women, you feel me? But it just shows me, no matter what you do, live life, you only got one life to live, be happy. F*ck the hating.” (YouTube)
Check out Lil B’s album title announcement below:
