As she returns to the spotlight, the hip-hop icon talks Michelle Obama, collaborations and the truth behind her hiatus
It must have been an eye-opening experience to watch Missy Elliott’s performance at the MTV video music awards last month if you had never encountered her before. Her six-song medley was a thrill-ride of kaleidoscopic visuals, VMAdancers and costume changes: Elliott was a cyberqueen, a B-girl, a scarecrow, an airborne beachball, a one-woman advertisement for what pop music can be. The performance, marking her video vanguard award, instantly went viral, capped a year of honours (an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music, the first female rapper in the Songwriters Hall of Fame) and coincided with the Iconology EP, her first new body of work since 2005. It dazzled the uninitiated while reminding millions of older fans what a vital creative force the 48-year-old was and how much we had missed her.
Two days later, Elliott is still bathing in goodwill. “It’s a blessing,” she says, calling from New York. “A blessing!” She has a throaty southern accent and a brilliant, exclamatory laugh. After a month of planning and two weeks of rehearsals, she says the set went like a dream. “The only time I was scared was when I was backstage and I had to keep changing clothes really fast. I thought: ‘Oh God, I’m not going to have my pants on in time. I might be in my panties!’ Ha ha!”
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