At Monday’s (June 9) 2025 BET Awards, Snoop Dogg stood on the mountaintop whereas accepting the Final Icon Award together with his spouse and Dr. Dre at his facet whereas looking right into a room of among the largest names in R&B and hip-hop.
Coming towards the top of the present, Dre kicked off the Snoop tribute by giving a speech that each praised his frequent collaborator — whom he known as “one of the vital prolific artists in hip-hop” — and lovingly joked at his expense. “Each time I activate the TV, he’s attempting to promote one thing,” the producer quipped as Snoop laughed within the viewers.
When he received onstage to just accept the prize, Snoop squeezed in a retaliatory dig at Dre, thanking him in jest “for permitting me the chance to ghostwrite for you on ‘Deep Cowl’ and ‘Nuthin’ However a G Thang’” — references to among the duo’s earliest collaborations.
Many of the remainder of Snoop’s speech — for which he was joined onstage by spouse Shante Broadus, to whom he’s been married since 1997 — struck a extra severe tone. Shouting out his academics, all the “MCs I battled alongside the best way,” his household at Dying Row Data and former groupmates Warren G and the late Nate Dogg, Snoop additionally praised his kids and 10 grandchildren — “my biggest inspiration,” as he known as them — in addition to his “stunning spouse.”
“This is the reason I’m so rock stable,” he stated, referring to Broadus. “This is the reason I’m capable of take care of all of the issues I’m capable of take care of — once I’ve received God in my life and I’ve received a queen in my life. She’s at all times been my every part.”
Earlier than switching gears to carry out a few of his most iconic songs, the rapper ended his remarks by sharing his concepts of what the title of Icon means to him. “The work speaks for you,” he informed the group gathered at Peacock Theater in Los Angeles. “Hip-hop, it gave me a voice. It gave me a function. It gave me a approach out and a approach in … Being an icon, it ain’t about fame. It’s about legacy. It’s about what you construct, what you allow behind and who you raise up alongside the best way.”
Snoop was one in every of 4 artists introduced with an Final Icon Award on Monday night time. Mariah Carey, Jamie Foxx and Kirk Franklin — every of whom the Doggfather personally shouted out throughout his speech — additionally took dwelling the identical honor, making for emotional moments all through the four-hour ceremony.
After a fast business break, Snoop sealed his Final Icon standing by delivering a high-energy medley of his hits, together with “Unsung Heroes,” Billboard Hot 100 topper “Drop It Like It’s Scorching” and “Nuthin’ However a ‘G’ Thang.” A number of acquainted faces additionally joined him, his backup dancers and his accompanying orchestra on stage, with Charlie Wilson serving to to carry out The Hole Band’s “Excellent,” and Warren G and Kurupt helping in closing out the medley with “Ain’t No Enjoyable (If the Homies Can’t Have None).”
The BET Awards have been hosted this yr by Kevin Hart and honored a few of 2025’s largest feats in popular culture. Kendrick Lamar — who took dwelling album of the yr for GNX together with 4 different prizes — was the highest nominee, incomes 10 nods.
The presentation of Final Icon to Snoop follows greater than 30 years of climbing his approach up the hip-hop ranks, notching 45 entries on the Scorching 100 and three No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200 within the course of. He’s additionally paved the best way as a media persona and because the now-owner of his first label dwelling, Dying Row Data, which he acquired in 2022.
Snoop’s non-fungible token album, Iz It a Crime?, dropped Might 15.