At the 2024 BET Awards on Sunday, Usher received the well-deserved (and arguably long overdue) Lifetime Achievement Award.
Introduced by music legends Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, the latter of which credited the Atlanta artist for getting him out a “creative depression” at one point, Usher was honored by a slew of mostly women artists (and Donald Glover who opened with “U Don’t Have to Call.”
The rest of the tribute included Keke Palmer, who performed “You Make Me Wanna,” which earned an approving scream from Usher himself; Coco Jones who performed “There Goes My Baby;” Chloe Bailey who performed “Good Kisser;” Teyana Taylor who performed “Bad Girl” with Victoria Monet (in the same style that Usher and Beyonce performed the song back in 2004 during his Truth Tour); Tinashe who performed “Nice’n Slow;” Summer Walker who performed her verse off her and Usher’s joint hit “Good, Good;” Marsha Ambrosius who performed “Superstar” and rapper Latto who ended the tribute by (questionably) rapping Ludacris’ verse on Usher’s song “Yeah.”
When it was time to receive the award, Jam and lewis brought up Babyface and L.A. Reid, the two who created LaFace records and introduced the musical world to Usher in ‘94. Met with a thunderous standing ovation, Usher was overcome with emotion before getting into his speech—which was unfortunately mostly censored out due to amount of alleged profanity he interspersed throughout.
From the snippets still aired on TV, the “Love in This Club” singer: declared this year to be the ‘Year of the Fathers,’ claim he’d gotten “fucked over” by some industry people (not including BabyFace or L.A. Reid or any of the folks he thanked in his speech), called out the mother of his eldest children Tameka Foster and claimed he was trying to “take the first step”at things being more cohesive between the two of them; thanked his fans, wife, and children; and reflected on whether or not it was too early for him to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award.
“I’m still running and gunning and I still love this shit like I did when I was eight-years-old,” he said at one point. And from his over 30-year-long career, multiple Grammys, 150 million records sold worldwide—it’s clear Usher’s reign is far from being over. And to that we say “Yeah!”
Congratulations, Usher!
