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Busta Rhymes didn’t mince his words as he directed a message to fans using their devices in the crowd at Essence Festival on Friday.
“Ayo, fuck them camera phones, too,” said the legendary rapper, who performed on the festival’s opening night at New Orleans’ Caesars Superdome.
“Let’s get back to interacting like humans. Put them weird ass devices down. I ain’t from that era. Them shits don’t control the soul. Fuck your phone.”
The 52-year-old rapper continued his explicit message as he encouraged the crowd to be attentive.
“I will point every last one of y’all out until y’all asses is up,” said Rhymes, who noted that he’s “not used” to people sitting down at his shows.
He added that he had “zero tolerance for bullshit energy” because it was his first time performing at Essence Festival.
“Make me feel like we home,” the rapper declared.
Rhymes, in an Instagram post on Saturday, appeared to dismiss claims that he was frustrated with the crowd and described his response as “SHOWMANSHIP.”
He went on to write that it was “TRULY AN HONOR” to perform at the festival on its 30th anniversary and thanked the New Orleans crowd for their “INCREDIBLE ENERGY.”
Rhymes, in an interview ahead of the performance, told “The View” last month that he was raised on Essence magazine and he “lived” in its pages while sitting in the barbershop as a child.
“I used to see all of the heroes and I used to see the afros and I used to see the beautiful, natural beauty of our beautiful Black women and queens and kings,” Rhymes said.
He continued, “And I would see these record executives and I would see these artists and I would see athletes and I just was like ‘Yo, I’m gonna be one of these dudes. I’mma be like one of these greats.’ And it kinda started there.”
Rhymes is currently one of the supporting acts on Missy Elliott’s “Out of This World” tour, the “Work It” rapper’s first-ever headlining tour in her career.