Macklemore dubbed The Source's Man of the Year

Jan. 7 (UPI) -- Macklemore, along with collaborator Ryan Lewis, created some of last year's most played songs, including "Same Love," "Can't Hold Us," and "Thrift Shop."

Though the duo's independently produced album, The Heist, sold millions of copies outside any traditional promotional model, The Source's Man of the Year said he knows that a Grammy win for Best Hip-Hop Album could prove controversial.

"Then he's got a point," the 30-year-old Seattle native said of any possible objections from rant-prone Kanye West.

"We're up against Kendrick [Lamar], who made a phenomenal album. If we win a Grammy for Best Rap Album, hip-hop is going to be heated," Macklemore told The Source.

Macklemore said he understood initial reservations about his place in the genre.

"People are going to be skeptical. I'm a white dude from Seattle. People are rightfully skeptical of white people making hip-hop," he said.

They're gonna say, 'Let me hear him rap. Let me hear an interview.' Before we sold a million copies of the album, when it was just 'Thrift Shop,' before it became massive, they were putting us in a box," he explained. "The song almost got too big. People weren't able to see the rest of the album for what it was. They put us in the one-hit wonder box. And they didn't give the rest of the project room to live. People didn't do their research.

"I think that it's people that are stuck in a certain mentality, that aren't willing to grow and evolve with hip-hop music, that doubt. The first place that some of the criticism will go is the white boy came in and f***ed up hip-hop. But if you take the race thing out, the success at pop, the varying degrees of parents letting their kids listen to it, you cannot deny the quality of the music.

Macklemore shared a copy of the cover on Instagram captioned, "The Source. Man of the year. Very crazy."

[MTV News]