JAY-Z is finally sharing his thoughts on Lil Mama’s intrusion of his and Alicia Key’s performance at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. On Tuesday (Dec. 21), while conversing with his “Empire State of Mind’ collaborator and Genius’ Rob Markman on Twitter Spaces, he was asked whether he’d forgiven the “Lip Gloss” emcee for crashing the stage.
“Of course, of course. C’mon. Don’t do that… That’s our sister. Man, we love her,” he said before offering a word of advice. “I wouldn’t recommend people just jumping on other artists’ stages…”
“She’s a New Yorker… She got excited,” Hov continued. “Things happen. Of course, we love her… yes, she’s forgiven. It’s all love, and she was coming from a place of love it’s just… may have been a little too excited.”
JAY’s reaction marks the first time he’s spoken about the incident since it went down. Though he kept mum for 12 years, he was actually the one who told Keys about Lil Mama’s presence on the stage that night.
“In my head, I was such a gorilla at the time and I was like, ‘This is what’s happening. I’m going to destroy this record tonight,'” the “Unthinkable” songstress recalled on “Drink Champs.” “…Somehow, however, she got over here, I didn’t even bear witness to.”
“The whole show, I was iced… so focused on making it amazing. I went backstage and JAY was like, ‘So, you ain’t see that?’ And I was like, ‘What?’ And he was like, ‘Nah, you ain’t just see what just happened?’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, we killed it. That’s what happened.’”
In another interview, Keys, like JAY-Z, forgave Lil Mama, chalking the act to her level of excitement.