By Je’Don Holloway-Talley | For The Birmingham Times
Birmingham’s Luke Crowder was in a Homewood gas station with his longtime girlfriend, Arnisha Jordan, on Sunday when he found out he won a Grammy Award for production on mega rapper Killer Mike’s album, ‘Micheal’ in the category of Best Rap Album.
“We were just leaving my studio in Homewood [a small city just outside of Birmingham] and about to head home when one of my friends hit me up and said, ‘congratulations’… we started checking online, and Google said that Killer Mike had won for Best Rap album,” Crowder said. “I called my family and friends, and [numerous] close producer friends and told them this was not a win just for me, but for all of us.”
If you think a huge celebration ensued, think again. Crowder said he kept it “low-key”, bought a bottle of champagne, ordered a take-out meal turned celebratory feast and went home.
“We (Crowder, Jordan and his 8-year-old bonus daughter) went to Creole Connection next to Legion Field and ordered oxtails and grits, lamb chops and dirty rice, and cat fish sliders. We kept it low key, but indulged guilty pleasure foods,” he said. “I had a conversation with my mom [Robbie] she was pleased about it. She told me to continue to ‘keep God first and my ego in check…’”
Crowder, 35, longed to share the moment with his father, Kenneth Crowder Sr., who he lost to a fatal car wreck Thanksgiving weekend in 2018. Instead of being able to share the phone call he’d made to his mother with his father by her side, Crowder spent a moment in solitude with his late father.
“I said, ‘Hey, Dad, I finally won one. …I’ve [received] one of the most prestigious music awards there is, and I attribute that you pulling strings in heaven for me …’,” Crowder said.
The Roebuck native reflected on his journey and recalled past conversations with his dad about why it was taking the son so long to succeed…
“I started questioning what I was doing wrong, why is this not working for me? …and I remembered the verse in Habakkuk [2:2-3], it said, ‘Write the vision, and make it plain’ and I wrote my plan.… and it was so good I said, ‘I’m gonna show this to my father. I showed him and he said, ‘This is good, son, let’s talk more about it when I get back’ and he never made it back.” Crowder recalled.
Also injured in the car wreck were Crowder’s younger brother, Gabriel, and his mother, Robbie who survived the collision. Losing Kenneth Sr., “energized my efforts,” said Crowder, who was 30 at the time of his father’s death. “It was a hard time, but it let me know I needed to go harder on my goals.”
One of those goals was realized Sunday.
