The 67th Grammy Nominations Are Out — Here’s What You Need To Know
It’s that time of year again where awards season is quickly approaching. 2024 has been a monumental year for music of all kinds, making the anticipation for this year’s GRAMMY Awards higher than ever. Last Friday, The Recording Academy released their contenders for the most prestigious awards in recorded music, recognizing the hard work from artists both new and old. For the annual award show’s 67th year, most of the Academy’s nominations reflect the recent charts, while some categories have questionable picks and clear snubs.
The nominations feature A-list artists and songs that have swept the nation this year, with musicians like Beyoncé, Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar, and Ariana Grande frequently helping populate categories. These critic-favorites top the charts almost every year, but this seems to be the year for women, as female artists have monopolized nearly every genre. Most notably, with her name in 11 different categories, Beyoncé has the most nominations this year for her country album Cowboy Carter. First time nominees like Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan, and Raye received several recognitions across different categories like Record of the Year and Song of the Year.
The Best New Artist category is highly contested at the moment because of its inclusion of artists like Carpenter, who has had a substantial career in pop for nearly a decade, up against artists like Raye, who has only recently come into stardom. Many believe that the category should be renamed “Best Breakthrough Artist” since the defining characteristics of a "new” artist are broad. The Academy’s official guidelines state that in order to qualify for Best New Artist, a musician must have “achieved a breakthrough into the public consciousness and notably impacted the musical landscape” during the awards cycle.
The nominations for Best New Artist are:
Benson Boone
Sabrina Carpenter
Doechii
Khruangbin
Raye
Chappell Roan
Shaboozey
Teddy Swims
The top contenders in this category have to be Sabrina Carpenter, Raye, Chappell Roan, and Doechii.
In the category for Best Alternative Music Album, Clairo received her first Grammy nomination for Charm — a long awaited and well deserved accolade. Fontaines D.C made a pleasantly surprising appearance in the category Best Rock Album for their fourth studio album Romance. Notorious giants in rock music like Green Day, Pearl Jam, and The Rolling Stones are also in the mix for Best Rock Album.
photo via @recordingacademy on Instagram
Unsurprisingly, Charli XCX’s Brat gained seven nominations, including Record Of The Year, Album Of The Year, Best Pop Solo Performance, Best Pop Duo Performance, Best Dance Pop Recording, Best Dance/Electronic Album, and Best Remixed Recording. Each of these nominations is perfectly placed, and many anticipate her taking home a very large win in February. The success of Brat rang in an era of revival for dance and alternative music, showcasing a unique sound that is unlike any mainstream music out right now.
The Recording Academy consistently misses the mark in both rap and R&B genres, and this year is no exception. Their inclusion of Eminem and J.Cole’s most recent albums as contenders for Best Rap Album is almost a slap in the face to rap artists that turned the world upside down this year. Both of their albums are by no means bad, but they add nothing to the greater rap community– ultimately showcasing the same exact sound that we’ve heard from them for decades. The inclusion of their works while snubbing artists like Flo Milli and Megan Thee Stallion goes to show how The Recording Academy plays favorites and truly doesn’t value the nuances that rap and R&B artists have to offer.
The biggest and most notable category of the entire award show is Album of the Year. Although some of these nominations are seemingly no-brainers because of their popularity, others are questionable. The public has specifically called into question the presence of André 3000’s New Blue Sun, and Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department. The former was regarded as generally missing the mark with the masses, and the latter didn’t really bring anything new or, frankly, memorable to the table.
The nominations for Album of the Year this year are:
New Blue Sun - André 3000
Cowboy Carter - Beyoncé
Short n’ Sweet - Sabrina Carpenter
Brat - Charli XCX
Djesse Vol. 4 - Jacob Collier
Hit Me Hard And Soft - Billie Eilish
The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess - Chappell Roan
The Tortured Poets Department - Taylor Swift
Being the highest accolade that a musician or artist can receive for their work today, the GRAMMY Awards will always be controversial, but it’s important to listen to all of these artists for yourself and decide what you like, regardless of what The Recording Academy has to say.
