I made Sunday Candy, I'm never going to hell. I met Kanye West, I'm never going to fail. He said let's do a good ass job with Chance three, I hear you gotta sell it to snatch the Grammy. Let's make it so free and the bars so hard that there ain't one gosh darn part you can't tweet.
-Chance the Rapper, Ultralight Beam
In light of the Grammy Nominations being announced by last year's Best New Artist, Meghan Trainor on December 6, it's time to focus in on why Chance the Rapper deserves to take home an award for everything that he has done.
In the overall scheme of things, The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences basically changed the rules to allow streaming-only releases to be included in the line-up of nominees. This rule change allows Chance the Rapper, more formally known as Chancelor Bennett , to be included in the list of Grammy nominations. His most recent project "Coloring Book," otherwise known as "Chance three," broke a massive record back in May when it was first released for being the first streaming-only album to chart on the Billboard 200 chart. Launching at number eight on the chart, Chance quite literally changed the game as we knew it.
Only one month after the release of "Coloring Book," The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences made a total of five changes with regards to nominations and distinctions in various genres. Chance spearheaded this change. On February 14, 2016, Kanye took the Saturday Night Live stage to perform "Highlights" and "Ultralight Beam," the latter featuring Chance the Rapper. Kanye, a major advocate for Chance in the music community, had Chance and other featured artists perform alongside him. This was part of the beginning of the call out. In Chance's verse on "Ultralight Beam," he recalls a conversation with his mentor about how Chance three was to go down. The plan from the beginning was to make this Chance's best album yet. Based on the record-breaking sales and rule change, it probably is the best to date.
It came as quite the surprise that Chance was put up for seven Grammy nominations. He has three nominations for Best Rap song for "Famous" by Kanye West, which Chance co-wrote, "Ultralight Beam" which he is featured on, and "No Problem" off of "Coloring Book" which features 2 Chainz and Lil Wayne. "No Problem" is also up for Best Rap Performance. "Ultralight Beam" is up for Best Rap/ Sung Collaboration, "Coloring Book" received a nomination for Best Rap Album and Chance himself is up for Best New Artist alongside The Chainsmokers, 2 female country singers, and Anderson .Paak.
The second track off "Coloring Book" is one of my personal favorites. Clearly, being up for two awards, "No Problem" is one of the most successful songs off of the entire album.
Rolling Stone in June named "No Problem" one of the 30 best songs of 2016 so far. When the article gets to "No Problem," Rolling Stone says "This streaming-only star sounds like he's giving an ultimatum to the record industry: "If one more label try to stop me/ It's gon' be some dreadhead niggas in your lobby." But the gospel choir in the background makes it feel more like an ecstatic celebration of his blessings."
The ultimatum Rolling Stone said Chance was giving the record industry is what lead to the Grammy's rules change. Not only is the song one of my personal favorites, people all across social media began to get behind Chance on his quest to challenge the rules.
This 23-year old from Chicago went from breaking the Chicago hip-hop scene to becoming a name everyone loves. Chance is not only one of my favorite rappers to date, Kanye West has called Chance one of his favorite people:
He's not just someone people look up to in the music industry, though. He is someone that came from the same place as a lot of us and went and changed an entire industry with his words and actions. If that in itself isn't worthy of an award, then I don't know what is.
