For a rapper who has earned multiple nominations at Ghana’s biggest music awards, never taking home the Rapper of the Year trophy is a record Teephlow finds difficult to understand.
He has admitted that he is surprised he is yet to win the Telecel Ghana Music Awards (TGMA) Rapper of the Year title, despite his unbeatable records.
Speaking in an interview with Kwame Dadzie on Hitz FM, Teephlow said he does not usually keep track of past nominations or make music with awards in mind.
However, he said one thing that has stayed with him is the fact that he remains the only rapper among those nominated alongside him who has never won the category.
“I can say one thing I’m surprised about is the fact that, of all the people who have been nominated, I’m the only one who hasn’t won Best Rapper before. And it’s almost shocking if you really think about it,” he said.
He questioned whether his record meant he had somehow fallen short of the standard expected of a Best Rapper winner, although he added that he no longer allows the issue to weigh on him.
Teephlow also used the interview to question how winners in the category are selected, arguing that streaming numbers should not be the measure of an artiste’s lyrical ability or impact.
For him, the award should look beyond how many times a song is played and consider the quality of an artiste’s body of work, lyrical skill, the message in the music and the influence it has on listeners.
He proposed that the awards scheme could consider having separate judging teams for technical categories such as Rapper of the Year and broader categories such as Artiste of the Year, arguing that the skills required to assess each are different.
Teephlow said he would welcome the opportunity to contribute to such discussions if he were ever invited to be part of the teams responsible for shaping the process.
While he insists awards are not what drive his music, his comments show that the absence of a TGMA Rapper of the Year trophy remains one career milestone he finds surprising.
According to the Telecel Ghana Music Awards, the Best Rap Performance on a solo or collaborative song is adjudged by the Academy and the Board as the best word compositions or lyrical content, structure, rhymes, dexterity, and/or musical presentation reflecting the broad spectrum of rap music style and culture on a song, commercially released in the year under review. The song may not have enjoyed commercial success but must have good artistic value.