According to a tip from an anonymous Bronx-based loverboi, singing sensation / Sesame Street enthusiast / all-around perfect person Janelle Monáe has allegedly been shacked up in the Greenwich Hotel in New York City for the better part of the last month with her new paramour, rap superstar MC Lyte. The pair are said to have met at BET’s Black Girls Rock show, and have purportedly been floating around adorably ever since.
For the uninitiated, the 44-year-old MC Lyte (born Lana Michele Moorer) began her rap career in the late 1980s and is considered one of the first ladies of hip hop, best known for her hits “Keep On, Keepin’ On” and “Cold Rock A Party.” She’s also an entrepreneur, voiceover actor, public speaker and philanthropist, and she was also the first African-American woman to serve as the president of the Los Angeles chapter of the Recording Academy. Just a few weeks ago, she released a special limited vinyl edition of her newest record “Legend” as part of Record Store Day. Although she has never publicly confirmed longstanding rumors about her sexuality, when asked about the possibility of hip-hop embracing openly gay rappers she answered, “I will never say never. Kudos is such a corny word but Kudos to [Frank Ocean and Michael Sam] or being able to live their lives out loud. If that’s what they needed to do in order to feel free, so be it.”
Although the 29-year-old Monáe was rumored to have been involved with both Prince and Big Bird over the course of her career, she’s also kept her sexuality very much under wraps. When questioned about her predilections, she’s always simply answered that she’s attracted to androids, which begs the question: Is MC Lyte an android?!?!?
A couple of years ago, when directly asked by an interviewer whether she prefers men or women, Monáe answered, “You know what, I keep my personal life to myself. I think one of the things about that is that I want everyone to focus on my music and also I don’t want to let anybody down. I want women to still be attracted to me – go get my album! And I want men to still be attracted to me so I have to be political in this. I can’t really tell y’all.” At the same time, she hasn’t shied away from the hard truths that come with being a woman in an industry designed mostly to appease the male gaze — when a fan criticized her fashion choices on Twitter, she awesomely replied:
@mellow_saa sit down. I'm not for male consumption.
— Janelle Monáe👽🚆🤖🚀🪐 (@JanelleMonae) April 13, 2015
With this in mind, we admit that we have very little information on hand to confirm the status of whatever arrangement is going on between Monáe and Lyte, but we can say that both of these women are awesome, and we hope that they’re both enjoying success in their romantic endeavors. They both obviously value their privacy, and without explicit confirmation we can only speculate about how adorable they probably are (or would be) together and how dreamy they (might) look when they hold hands over the table during brunch. Also, if they really are dating, we would like to send them a celebratory gift basket filled with seasonal fruits.
