The first solo female rapper to win a Grammy for lifetime achievement is hip-hop artist Roxanne Shant, who pioneered the genre as a teenage battle rapper in the 1980s.
I never would have imagined that I would win a Grammy. Ahead of the presentation on Saturday, where lifetime achievement and other special honors will be given out, Shant, 55, told NBC News this week.
I was done with music. It’s incredible for me to get a lifetime award for my choices rather than my music, Shant remarked. Even if a lot of individuals chose to do the wrong thing by me, I’m here to support everyone else in choosing to do the right thing.
Her narrative begins in the early 1980s, when hip-hop was just getting started. She was a mainstay of the underground rap culture in New York City by the age of ten, and by the age of thirteen, she was an unbeaten battle rapper.
However, Shant’s 1984 song Roxanne’s Revenge, which was a reaction to the Brooklyn rap duo UTFO’s Roxanne, Roxanne, caused a stir. At least 86 response tracks were inspired by the Roxanne Wars, an early rap feud that began with her hit.
Shant was raised in the Queensbridge Houses, the biggest public housing development in New York City. Many of her childhood pals who later became producers and collaborators, like as the future music icons Nas, Biz Markie, Tragedy Khadafi, and Big Daddy Kane, lived in the Queens complex.
Shant claimed that her interest in the wordsmithing of comedians such as her favorite Nipsey Russell before her career as a rapper. However, she was constantly challenged to rap battles by the males in her area, and she consistently emerged victorious from each contest. “I found the music,” she remarked.
Before long, Shant was winning against guys who were more than twice her age.
Her reputation in music history was solidified when she collaborated with renowned DJ and producer Marley Marl to record the well-known freestyle song Roxanne’s Revenge, which lasted seven minutes.
However, she said that this was somewhat of an accident. She had no idea that the song would turn into a diss track or that the freestyle was a reaction to UTFO.
She was requested to record a freestyle by her neighbor, Marley Marl, when she was en route to do laundry. When he offered to buy her and her sister three pairs of Sergio Valente jeans, Shant changed his mind after originally declining.
The freestyle appeared on radio stations all throughout the nation almost overnight. Shant, however, remembered only minor changes in her life.
She claimed that life after Roxanne was genuinely normal. Although I was already well-liked, you might argue that I was a bit more well-liked than I actually was. I was already a well-known rapper before I became Roxanne Shant. I was Shant from 12th Street.
Hip-hop was still seen as an underground art form at the time, not the multibillion-dollar industry that it would grow into. “The best thing that I ever got out of being Roxanne Shant was being able to travel the world,” she stated, despite the fact that she was seldom paid for the performance despite the song’s fame. In the 1990s, Shant’s rap career came to an end.
It was never something that helped me financially. In other words, I never received the large checks or the signing bonuses, and I never lived in a mansion or anything similar.
Over 40 years later, the MC is at last reaping financial benefits and gaining reputation in the industry.
Former Queensbridge inhabitant and rap artist Nas claimed that Shant’s success in the 1980s served as inspiration for him.
In 2020, Nas stated on the radio program Ebro in the Morning that Roxanne Shant “sparked something in me that really made me want to take [rap] seriously.” Her presence is one of the reasons I genuinely believed it could even occur.
Shant started hosting a show on LL Cool J’s Rock the Bells channel on SiriusXM that year.
The 2017 biography Roxanne Roxanne, which starred Chant Adams, chronicled the tale of Roxanne’s revenge. Growing up in a single-parent home, assisting her mother in raising her brothers, becoming a mother at the age of 16, and overcoming the daily obstacles of living in public housing are all depicted in the movie. According to her, it also demonstrated to the world that her tale is evidence that initiatives can move forward.
At the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, the movie and Adams took home the special jury prize for a breakthrough performance.
Shant won the NAACP Legacy Award in 2023, and the Paid in Full Foundation, which compensates hip-hop artists who have not been fairly compensated for their work, presented her with the Hip-Hop Grandmaster Award last year. Shant took home almost $1 million that evening.
Shant stated that if she could go back in time, she would reassure her 14-year-old self that everything would work out. Like, don’t stress or worry; everything will work out. You might believe that you won’t make it. You may believe that you won’t live past the ages of 18 or 21, but I’m about to tell you that you will live to be a wealthy, healthy old woman. And quit ingesting bubble gum—it’s bad!