The Masked Singer: Busta Rhymes unmasked during season 4 premiere

Busta Rhymes was unmasked during The Masked Singer’s season four premiere.

Eleven-time Grammy-nominated musician Trevor George Smith Jr., better known as Busta Rhymes, was the first to be eliminated on season four of FOX’s The Masked Singer. This season, the FOX original series includes 16 masked celebrities. Adding rap flavor to the mix, the “Pass the Courvoisier” rapper threw his name in the hat. He did so performing in a dragon costume on Wednesday.

“I just was in the spirit of wanting to give people, from the second I stepped on stage, a presence that spoken volumes before they even heard my voice,” Busta Rhymes said in a video package on the show. “The dragon costume did it. It just nailed it.”

Making his debut, he performed to the tune of LL Cool J’s hit single “Mama Said Knock You Out.” For fans of the “Touch It” rapper, it did not take too many guesses to realize he was inside the costume, as his distinctive voice bled through the mask when performing. Host Nick Cannon said as soon as the dragon walked on stage he knew exactly who it was and showed proof as he even wrote “my big brother Busta Rhymes” on an envelope before the unmasking.

Noting the dragon costume as a clue, the show’s judge Robin Thicke pointed out Busta Rhymes had released three albums with dragon references. This is true for the “Break Ya Neck” rapper with a studio album titled Year of the Dragon (2012) and two mixtapes named The Return of the Dragon (2016) and The Abstract and the Dragon (2014), a collaboration between Busta Rhymes and Q-Tip.

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To elaborate on the costume choice, Busta Rhymes said it was very symbolic to one of his most unique traits as an artist.

“I’ve been a costume driven artist from the beginning because I was groomed and conditioned to be a showman,” Busta Rhymes said. “Showmanship is a very key ingredient, and key component, to what distinguishes the difference between artist that create careers and legacies, and the artists that don’t.”

The musician has never been shy about branching out as he has acted in John Singleton hit films Higher Learning (1995) and Shaft (2000) and even starred in a Michael Myers slasher film in Halloween: Resurrection (2002). In the past, he was voice actor in video game Def Jam: Fight for NY (2004) and in an episode on Nickelodeon’s Rugrats (1999). Bus-a-Bus also lent his likeliness to a 2003 video game based on MTV’s Celebrity Death Match series.

“Busta you know how much I love you. You are rap royalty. There will never be another artist like you. Thank you for being on our show,” Nicole Scherzinger said.

Who is your favorite character performer thus far on The Masked Singer season four? Do you think Busta Rhymes was sent home too early? Let us know in the comments below.