Lil Wayne Named His Top 5 Rappers, and 1 of Them Responded
Rapper Lil Wayne has been releasing music for over two decades. The New Orleans-bred emcee is regarded by many to be among the best rappers of all time. But when thinking about his own favorite rappers, Wayne always counts Missy Elliott among them.
Lil Wayne has cited Missy Elliott as an influence before
Lil Wayne spoke about how Missy Elliott affected the early days of his music career in the late 1990s. Wayne especially had an appreciation for her iconic ad-libs on her songs. He spoke about his respect for Elliott in a 2021 interview on DJ Khaled‘s podcast The First One.
“[Elliott] was my favorite rapper because that would be why I was making so many sounds. But, you know, Missy was into the whole ‘Brrrt,'” he said. “So when [producer] Mannie Fresh would get you in the studio, he would remind you, ‘Hey, you need to throw that ‘ha ha’ in there.’ I was like, ‘Man, he wants me to do a sound for every damn line!'”
He went on to speak about “Block Burner,” his song with his group at the time, the Hot Boys. He channeled Elliott on the song, and he loved it because of her influence.
“The ‘Block Burner’ song was my best favorite song because my favorite artist was Missy Elliott,” he said plainly.
Missy Elliott showed love to Lil Wayne
Elliott saw Wayne talking about her music on Khaled’s podcast and shared her happiness on Twitter.
“When I first came in the game people laughed at me doing sound effects in my music,” she said in a tweet. “I used to cry when they clowned me but then I kept doing wild sounds/crazy ad-libs in my songs and people began to rock wit it.”
“Years later those same sound effects are big in songs today,” she added.
Wayne was later asked to name his top five favorite rappers in a 2022 interview on What’s Wright. When he named Elliott as his first, host Nick Wright was taken aback.
Elliott responded to Wayne’s latest show of appreciation in a tweet.
“I’ve watched Wayne on many interviews with men who reaction is the same and I believe it’s a shock because men rarely list a women as their inspiration especially when he LEGENDARY and has birthed so many,” she said. “But I preciate that he has stood 10 toes down with his answer.”
“And this happens with many of the males who speak of me as a inspiration,” she said in another tweet. “I see the interviews and yes those male artist who have a GIFT understand my GIFT and what I contributed to the game and as a women they see past all that they understand my ART.”
Missy Elliott is widely respected today
Rappers — including fellow femcees such as Nicki Minaj and Cardi B — have cited Elliott among the most influential hip-hop artists in recent history.
Elliott’s contributions have been recognized in recent years with honors such as the MTV VMA Video Vanguard Award and the Urban One Music Innovation Honoree award.
