Anderson .Paak celebrated his two Grammy nominations with a smoke, a toast and some sushi. “The first thing I did [when I heard the news was] we went to the studio, we rolled something up, we toasted something up and then we had sushi,” he tells Billboard. “We told everybody in the sushi bar that we was Grammy-nominated and then we left and didn’t pay the bill.”
Beyond skipping the bill, .Paak made waves last year with his his sophomore studio effort Malibu, which was nominated for best urban contemporary album. Anchored by the ScHoolboy Q-assisted “Am I Wrong” and boasting features from Talib Kweli, Rapsody and BJ The Chicago Kid, the set came from an honest place.
“The reason why I think it had such an impact is because it was truthful, it was from the heart, it was personal. It was a lot of people that were doing the same thing and this kind of stuck out because it was so different from the rest of the things that were out there,” he says of Malibu. “It was my story, it was my band’s story.”
While he says he tries not to think of winning too much, .Paak considers the nomination an honor. “The fact that our album was even considered just means a lot and a lot of respect,” he adds. “It’s huge for us regardless.”
