The BET Hip Hop Awards 2011 featured a good number of rappers from the West Coast including singer-songwriter turned rapper Kevin McCall, best known for his verse on “Deuces,” Young Money-signee Tyga and Dr. Dre protege Kendrick Lamar. Also in the mix was southern Cali spitta Dom Kennedy. The Leimert Park, California, native, whose critically acclaimed mixtape From the Westside With Love (2010) drew the hip hop audience’s attention to his charismatic style and nostalgia-inducing classic West Coast tracks, talks to BET.com about participating in the popular cyphers.
“It was my first time really dealing with that whole TV stuff and production stuff,” said Kennedy. “I was really more interested in how it all worked more so than just me rapping, because rapping, I been doing that a long time so I was more interested in how they put it together and how it translates when it comes on TV. I’m excited. I know a lot of people is gone be watching and you know it’s just a good look for me and all the people that work with me. Leimert Park gone be on there."
Dom also shares that one of his favorite competitors in his grouping, which included Lady Rage, Blind Fury, and Skillz, was Top Dawg Entertainment’s Jay Rock. 

“I was chilling with Jay Rock the whole time and he was telling me how excited he was, and I could really see the passion that he really had just for the opportunity,” Dom recalls. “I think that a lot of people will be surprised. Not surprised but whether you know Jay Rock or if you just like know him but never really listened to his s---, I think a lot of people gone like his passion. I think that he probably had the best one in my opinion.”

For more dope performances from the BET Hip Hop Awards 2011 click here.