Joyner Lucas' 'Best For Me' nominated for an MTV 'Video For Good' award

The music video for Worcester native and hip-hop artist Joyner Lucas’ song “Best For Me” has been nominated for a 2024 MTV Video Music Award in the “Video for Good” category. The song, which appears on Lucas’ album, “Not Now I'm Busy” features vocals by rapper and singer Jelly Roll.

Other videos nominated in the category include Alexander Stewart’s “If You Only Knew,” Billie Eilish’s “What Was I Made For?” (From The Motion Picture “Barbie”), Coldplay’s “Felslikeimfallinginlove,” Raye’s “Genesis” and Tyler Childers’ “In Your Love.”

The 2024 MTV Video Music Awards are set to air at 8 p.m. Sept. 10 on MTV. The “Video For Good” category was introduced as “Best Video with a Message” in 2011, going through several name changes before adopting its current name in 2017. Last year’s winner was Dover Cameron’s “Breakfast.” Previous winners include Billie Eilish, Lizzo, H.E.R., Childish Gambino and Taylor Swift.

The “Video for Good” category is a fan-voted award and fans can vote 20 times a day at mtv.com/vma/vote/video-of-the-year.

“How can you love someone and learn to let them go?” sings Jelly Roll at the start of “Best For Me.” The vocals are haunting and soulful, setting the heartbreaking tone of both the song and video. “Tell me,” he sings at the end of the first verse, “is it really love if you have to ask if they'll stay?”  The video begins with a shot of Jelly Roll singing on a house's porch, moving inside as his vocals fade to an image of Lucas hunched over the body of a loved one, whom it is revealed has overdosed on drugs.

“Yeah, I got somebody I love,” raps Lucas in a steady, controlled patter. “Someone who's really important to me, but now they addicted to drugs/Someone who not who they used to be and we ain't been keepin' in touch/I ain't gonna say any names at all 'cause I don't want no one to judge/But I wrote this song in hopes when they'll hear it, they'll never forget who they was.”

It’s a heartbreaking song, one which clearly articulates the pain and anger of losing someone to addiction. Indeed, Lucas’ music has long been rife with anti-drug messages. Sometimes, he handles the subject with a light touch, such as on his collaboration with Timbaland, “Ten Rings,” where he raps, “Someone said, 'Love is a drug,'/I don't wanna ever take drugs again.” Other times, drugs figure into far darker pictures, such as on “One Lonely Night,” where he observes, “What you gon do when the party close down/And the drugs run out and your all by yourself/What a lonely night/One lonely night.”

While drugs have a presence in Lucas’ music, he has always been clear about not glorifying them. They’re always presented as a symbol of self-destruction.

“I’ve never been into artists promoting drugs,” Lucas said in 2017 on Hot 97’s “Ebro In The Morning,” “When you say those things, you’re telling the listener to go do the (expletive) ... Anytime I hear an artist promoting drugs … I don’t like that (expletive).”

According to information provided by the Out of Office brand strategist group, the video has garnered more than 15 million views and features a partnership with Shatterproof, a drug addiction awareness nonprofit organization. According to Out of Office, the video reached No. 2 on YouTube’s Trending Now and No. 3 on YouTube’s Trending for Music charts, as well as No. 2 on iTunes Hip-Hop Video chart and No. 22 on the US Rhythm Radio chart.

The VMA nomination is the latest in a string of recent successes for Lucas including an appearance in the film "Bad Boys: Ride or Die,” released in June, and the recent JoynerFest concert at the Palladium that same month.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Joyner Lucas' 'Best For Me' up for an MTV Video Music Award