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It is truly horrible that a woman's mental health suffered because of an amusing 29 seconds during an award show that exists to produce exactly these types of moments. It took a lot of mental strength, spiritual strength, and physical strength, not to want to hurt others, not to want to hurt myself. But them not saying anything or even caring about the backlash…it taught me to be stronger and understand this is a business. I did it to myself, because I’m the one who went up there. “A lot of people felt like they didn’t want to take a chance on me with certain things because it might have made Jay-Z or Alicia Keys not want to work with them,” she said. In 2015, Lil Mama revealed to Complex the profound and devastating impact the incident had on her. While pop culture moved on and history focused, instead, on Swift and West, Lil Mama lived with the reaction to her on-stage interruption. "What imma do, fight Lil Mama?" he asked. To disrupt that was out of line." But he wasn’t about to take any action. "It was a lot of planning that went into that performance. It’s some serious Regina George shit.Īs for Jay: "To interrupt that moment for us, I don't think that was the right thing to do," he said on Angie Martinez's Hot 97 radio show in New York City a few weeks after the incident. At one point, Hoda Kotb says “We love Lil Mama, too!” and Keys retorts “That’s nice!” in the most devastatingly syrupy tone I have ever heard. On the Today show two days later, Alicia Keys absolutely shut down any possible conversation about the event. But Jay-Z and Alicia Keys were, uh, not pleased. She only meant to honor and respect the Holy Trinity: Jay-Z, Alicia, and the Empire State. What a year!)Įither way, Lil Mama was sorry. (And just like that, we have arrived at our third 2009 musical interruption reference. She also recalled, after the fact, that Jay had muttered “Oh, you’re gonna T-Pain it, huh,” while she was on stage with him-a jab referencing an incident in which T-Pain had joined Jay-Z onstage uninvited earlier in the summer. And noticed him backing away from her instead of reciprocating her vibes. But then.she went home and watched the clip back. She also says she believed that Jay-Z was feeling her in the moment, too. In the interview, she goes on to apologize if either Jay or Alicia were offended by the surprise appearance, and emphasizes that the last thing she’d want is for either of them to feel disrespected. And I got up and I started walking towards the stage, and I got up there, and I was just rooting him on, as a champion, picking up my brother.” I actually got emotional, and I was like, yeah! New York! Jay! And I started to feel him, started to feel myself, and I just felt the energy. And you know, Alicia Keys is like ‘big lights will inspire you’ and really, I got emotional. So, Lil Mama, why exactly did you do it? “Well, I’m sitting in my seat, two rows away from the stage, and Jay-Z is walking through this tunnel, and there’s this whole adrenaline rush that’s just pumping, he comes onstage and he's singing ‘New Yorkkkk’.
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And she went on MTV News the following day to discuss the incident. She was unfairly and mercilessly mocked on Twitter and in the media following her little guest appearance on stage that fateful evening. What we all wouldn’t give today to feel something as hard as what she felt that night.Īt the time, Lil Mama's interruption seemed like a big deal, even amid the West-Swift drama of the night.
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Now is the time to relive, and cherish, Lil Mama's energy in 2009. And it's also one that feels so rare in 2020-a year of pre-recorded Zoom events that lack in any sort of spontaneity.
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It's a moment that with the hindsight of more than a decade is an entirely harmless and even fun moment of pop culture history. But what we are here to reminisce about today is the deeper cut interruption of the night: when Lil Mama was feeling Alicia Keys and Jay-Z’s rendition of “New York State of Mind” so goddamn hard she just absolutely couldn’t help getting up on that stage herself and rocking out with them. It's a moment that would ignite a bitter, years long feud that would have ripple effects throughout the next decade of popular culture. And that's Kanye West taking the mic from a young Taylor Swift, giving his now-infamous “Imma let you finish” tirade. What do you remember? In the canon of collective pop culture consciousness, there is only one moment from the 2009 VMAs that anyone remembers.