CANADIAN rap superstar Drake asked for his two Grammy nominations to be withdrawn this year, a request honoured by the Recording Academy, multiple sources told AFP yesterday.

Drake had been up for two rap awards at the ceremony next year, but his mega-hit album Certified Lover Boy was conspicuously left out of the general field categories last month, resulting in the artist clashing with the Academy multiple times.

He is also facing multiple suits over a rap concert in Texas last month, during which 10 fans were killed by a lethal crowd surge.

His representatives did not provide any explanation for his request.

A source close to Drake said the singer and his management made the decision, which has been honoured by the Grammys.

A source familiar with the request confirmed the details to AFP, saying that the nominations have been removed from the official website, just as final-round ballot voting began.

Drake, one of the top-selling and most influential musicians in the world, has won four Grammys.

He had accused the awards show of pigeonholing him as a rapper because he is black in an interview in 2017.

“The only category that they can manage to fit me in is in a rap category, maybe because I have rapped in the past or because I am black,” he said on Apple’s Beats 1 radio.

Drake again vented his frustration that black hip-hop artists are not always given their due at the Grammys in 2019.

“We play in an opinion-based sport, not a factual-based sport,” he said, as he accepted his lone award for Best Rap Song for God’s Plan.

“This is a business where sometimes it is up to a bunch of people that may not understand what a mixed-race kid from Canada has to say.”

Other top black artists, including The Weeknd, Frank Ocean and Jay-Z, have all slammed the Grammys as irrelevant in recent years, especially citing its failure to recognise black artists.

Last month, Drake was sued for having “incited mayhem” after he participated in the closing of Travis Scott’s headline set at the Astroworld festival – well after authorities had declared an emergency.

The 64th Grammy Awards ceremony is due to take place in Los Angeles on January 31. – AFP, December 7, 2021.