As we kept discussing during our Grammy coverage – because it was literally the most interesting thing about the Grammys – Kanye West threw some major shade at Beck. Beck won Album of the Year for his album Morning Phase and that meant Beck beat out Beyonce’s self-titled album. Kanye “jokingly” jumped on stage with Beck, like he was going to pull an “Imma let you finish” but ‘Ye laughed and went back to his seat. But it wasn’t over. On the E! post-Grammy show, Kanye spoke about how Beyonce should have won and Beck should have given her the Grammy, saying in part:

“I don’t know what he said, all I know is if the Grammys want real artists to keep coming back, they need to stop playing with us. We ain’t gonna play with them no more. ‘Flawless,’ Beyoncé video. Beck needs to respect artistry and he should have given his award to Beyoncé, and at this point, we tired of it… Because what happens is, when you keep on diminishing art and not respecting the craft and smacking people in the face after they deliver monumental feats of music, you’re disrespectful to inspiration and we as musicians have to inspire people who go to work every day and they listen to that Beyoncé album and they feel like it takes them to another place…Then they do this whole promotional event, they’ll run the music over somebody’s speech, the artist, because they want commercial advertising. Like, no, we not playing with them no more. By the way, I got my wife, my daughter and my clothing line, so I’m not going to do nothing to put my daughter at risk but I am here to fight for creativity. That’s the reason why I didn’t say anything tonight. But you all know what it meant when ‘Ye walks on the stage.”

[From E! News]

Beck handled the whole situation with a surprising amount of grace, discussing how much he loves Beyonce and Kanye, and even calling Kanye a “genius.” Just my opinion: Kanye already looked like a crashing bore and Beck came out of the night looking gracious and kind. But Shirley Manson – best known perhaps as the frontwoman of Garbage and one of the best frontwomen to come out of the 1990s music scene – decided to chime in on the whole situation. She wrote on Facebook:

Dear Kanye West

It is YOU who is so busy disrespecting artistry.

You disrespect your own remarkable talents and more importantly you disrespect the talent, hard work and tenacity of all artists when you go so rudely and savagely after such an accomplished and humble artist like BECK.

You make yourself look small and petty and spoilt.

In attempting to reduce the importance of one great talent over another, you make a mockery of all musicians and music from every genre, including your own.

Grow up and stop throwing your toys around.

You are making yourself look like a complete twat.

Ps.I am pretty certain Beyonce doesn’t need you fighting any battles on her account. Seems like she’s got everything covered perfectly well on her own.

[From Facebook]

Word. I love her for “daring” to tell Kanye that he’s acting like a douchenozzle because he IS. It would have been fine if he had done the stage-rush thing and it would have been fine if he said “I thought Beyonce should have won, but Beck is a great artist too.” I would have even been fine with Kanye talking about racism in the context of the Grammys, like the fact that the Grammys tend to award white artists much more than black artists in general. But, the way Kanye went about it… it was rude and Shirley is dead-on. He does look “small and petty and spoilt.”

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet and WENN.