To quote Jay-Z’s “Oceans” lyrics: “See me in sh*t you never saw / If it wasn’t for these pictures you wouldn’t see me at all.’”
On Thursday (December 29), the Compton native Roddy Ricch made headlines for getting into a heated exchange with some paparazzi.
The incident occurred while the “Down Below” rapper was out in L.A., appearing to be loading a baby seat into the trunk of his car. After his security guard warns the paparazzi to back up, he proceeds to cross the street. Roddy doesn’t hesitate to flash him the finger as he’s doing so. After all, he does continue to film the 24-year-old, who evidently isn’t happy upon realizing this. The Compton native subsequently decides to approach the cameraman.
He repeatedly tells the paparazzi to turn his camera off and stop recording. “Turn that off, ’cause I wanna talk to you like a man,” he pleads.
If you follow celebs like Kanye West, and Jay-Z, just to mention a few, they really hate the cameras.
This generation seems to love capturing everything on camera, but Jay-Z isn’t about that life. The media mogul often avoids the camera or prying paparazzi, and he was even spotted politely dismissing a photographer during this year’s Roc Nation brunch. A video of Hov walking through the party went viral, showing him calmly waving his hand at a photographer looking to get that perfect shot.
In a recent interview of Jay-Z, he opened up on why he doesn’t like being filmed without his consent. Interestingly, he gave one solid reason for that.
Why does Jay-Z hate paparazzi?
Elliott Wilson caught up with Jay for an interview with TIDAL, and during the chat, the Rap icon explained why is often avoids the cameras. “Yeah, we don’t come from that school,” he said. “We come from the don’t-you-ever-record-us school. What was the line? [He quoted lyrics from 2013’s “Oceans”] ‘See me in sh*t you never saw / If it wasn’t for these pictures you wouldn’t see me at all.‘”
He added, “We come from that school and we had fights over that. N—as trying to record — ‘Aye yo, don’t record me, champ. I ain’t into that.’ We come from a different world.” Hov further explained that this is “why The Black Album was so special.” He said “it was the first time cameras came into the studios and just lived with us.”
Meanwhile, Jay-Z also joined DJ Khaled, Lil Wayne, Fridayy, John Legend, and Rick Ross for a performance of “God Did.” He shared why he decided to return to the Grammy stage. “This ain’t your traditional song,” said the hitmaker. “It’s not your traditional structure of what you think a song that would be nominated for Song of the Year would sound like.”
It’s not what you expect. And for the culture and for hip-hop, we got to do that. We owe that. This thing changed our lives. We got to do that. A four-minute verse performed at the Grammys. We owe it to the culture, and it ain’t even a burden. It’s a blessing. It’s easy and fun.”
Check out the performance below.
