Visiting LA rapper Xzibit calls Rove McManus "racist" in a new myspace blog.
The blog, titled "ROVE THE RACIST!" and posted on June 24, relates Xzibit's proposed appearance on McManus' Sunday night variety show. Xzibit claims in the blog that he was asked to perform in a "rap-off" segment with crooner Michael Buble over his track 'Family Values'.He claims that he didn't want his song "to be butchered" and proposed another beat. When the time came to perform, Xzibit wrote that a production assistant on Rove said "We only have 42 seconds for the entire thing, our demographics on our show won't allow one minute of rapping".
Xzibit claims he thanked them for their time and left. Buble went on to perform an ad hoc rap to beatboxing by 'Knocked Up' actors Seth Rogan and Paul Rudd. Rogan joked of their amateur efforts, "A black man just started crying for no reason somewhere." Sounds like it was Xzibit.
We can only assume that Xzibit misinterpreted a comment that he attributes to the production assistant: "You know we came a long way just having you on the program". It's less a statement on race than the Australian mainstream media's ignorance and uneasiness with hip hop in general.
