It is physically impossible to stay seated when a Missy Elliott song comes on. The rapper/producer has been making us shake our asses for decades, and now she’s getting her extremely well-deserved flowers for changing the music game. On Friday, the Virginia native becomes the first female rapper inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
For all the naysayers who don’t believe hip-hop artists should be included in the Hall of Fame, the Grammy winner calls rock & roll a “gumbo of different styles of music.” There’s room for everyone at the table, including hip-hop.
“Words cannot describe…It just hasn’t clicked. When you in the hip-hop world, it seems so far out of reach,” Elliott told Good Morning America’s Robin Roberts. “And it being the 50th year of hip-hop…it’s layers. No matter what people say, the hip-hop world is something special and unique.”
As special as it is for Missy to get into the Hall of Fame, the evening will be memorable for another more important reason. The “Work It” rapper’s mother will be in attendance to see her daughter perform live for the first time.
“She’s never been to a show because I had some little words I didn’t ever want her to hear,” she said. “And so she’s comin’ for the first time.”
Elliott will be inducted by another female rap legend: Queen Latifah. “I owe so many flowers, bouquets. It’s not enough bouquets for those women that came before me. And she’s one of those women,” the “Lose Control” artist said.
After discussing her battles with anxiety and the autoimmune illness Graves’ disease, Roberts held up a photo of a high school aged Missy and wondered what the prolific producer would say to her younger self.
“I would tell her, ‘You know what? There is a bright future for you, and keep goin,’” she said. “That girl knew that she had somethin’ that was different and unique.”
Missy Elliott will be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame alongside DJ Kool Herc; Chaka Khan; Soul Train pioneer Don Cornelius; The Spinners; Rage Against the Machine; George Michael; Sheryl Crow; and others. The ceremony airs live Friday, Nov. 3 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT on DIsney+ and will then become available to stream on demand.