Grammy Nominations:  Snubs, Duds and Flubs

By Maya Mackey

The 2024 Grammy Nominations are in, and the choices are a bit of a headscratcher. To be fair, 2024 has been overly saturated with new music. From Rap to Pop to New Age Jazz to Americana and beyond, it’s been a phenomenal year for music lovers! There’s been so many great albums this year, I’m behind in my listening and there are albums that came out in the beginning of the year that I haven’t had time to revisit.

Nonetheless, The Recording Academy did the tough job of trying to rank which releases were worthy of the controversial but still prestigious Grammy Awards. The Grammys have received lots of flack in recent years for industry politics (namely rewarding “Grammy Darlings” just because someone on the board favors them as opposed to who actually put out better music).  They have been criticized for snubbing Beyonce multiple times for Album of the Year (but using her brand to attract viewers and dangling the promise of a win only for it to be snatched in real time), and of course the controversy around “Best New Artist.” Several winners in the last five years had already released one or multiple albums prior to winning the award. The rule has never made sense because they have competed against artists who are actually new to the industry. 

The Recording Academy has introduced more rules and amendments that may or may not improve the winning pool, such as decreasing the number of songs you have to write to be considered Songwriter of the Year, and reinforcing the traditional sound of R&B in the “Best Traditional R&B Performance” category—a rule that potentially drives a wedge within the R&B community, as people like SZA have adapted and modernized the genre. A seriously head scratching change is moving the “Best Remixed Recording Category” from the engineering/produced category exclusively into the “Dance/Electronic category”. Hip-Hop is notorious for remixing sounds and to place remixes solely in the EDM music lane will inevitably leave out a lot of Black producers and engineers. It will certainly be interesting to see how artists react and speak out against the continued discriminatory process of The Recording Academy. All of these grievances aside, people still look forward to watching and judging the awards come February 2nd. (The 2025 Grammy eligibility period runs from September 16, 2023 – August 30, 2024 and the final votes will be cast December 12, 2024 to January 4, 2025).

Let’s start off with the Big Four categories because here is where all the tears and drama lie…

The Record of the Year category (for the production, arrangement and general performance of a song) includes the usual mix of Pop/Top 40 hits,save for an entry by Kendrick Lamar. Nominees are The Beatles – “Now and Then”, Beyonce – “Texas Hold Em”, Sabrina Carpenter – ”Espresso”, Kendrick Lamar – “Not Like Us”, Charli XCX -”360”, Billie Eilish- “Birds of a Feathe because he feels he’s aged out of rap music, r”, Chappell Roan – “Good Luck Babe” and Taylor Swift ft. Post Malone – “Fortnight”.

The obvious winner here is Espresso, but what a win it would be for us, for L.A. HipHop if Kendrick won.

Things start to get weird in the Album of the Year category. We have Andre 3000 nominated for his flute album, New Blue Sun. When Andre 3000 informed fans this album would be purely instrumental, many fans were disappointed. He explained that he felt he had aged out of rap.  Andre admitted that he’s not exactly an expert flautist, which definitely shows on the track. Why his album isn’t being considered in classic contemporary, jazz or another instrumental-heavy category is confusing.  He’s up against heavy hitters who typically dominate this category such as Beyonce (“Cowboy Carter”), Taylor Swift (“The Tortured Poet’s Department”), and Billie Eilish (“Hit Me Hard and Soft”). Other contenders are Charli XCX for “Brat,” newcomer Chapelle Roan for “Chappell Roan: The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess” and Jacob Collier for “Djesse Volume 4.” 

If Andre 3000 wins, stuff will hit the fan. It will be as outrageous as when Esperanza Spalding won Best New Artist over Justin Bieber in 2010 or when Beck won Album of the Year over Beyonce’s self-titled album. If Beyonce wins, people will claim it’s only because Jay Z gave an impassioned speech at this year’s Grammys, questioning how his wife could be the most Grammy-nominated person in history and yet never win for “Album of the Year.”  If Taylor wins, Beyonce fans will complain that Swift is mediocre at best, yet continues to win awards that they don’t feel she’s earned.  As an occasional Taylor Swift listener, I am confident in stating that The Tortured Poet’s Department is far from her best work. Most people of a certain age (30 and younger) like Billie Eilish so that would be a nice and neutral win. But Sabrina Carpenter, who is nominated for her Short’ n’ Sweet album, dominated the spring and summer and is still actively blazing the charts. It would make the most sense for her to win. No matter how you slice it, this is going to be a contentious award showyet again. 

Song of the Year (an award given to the actual songwriters) includes the most egregious submission yet. Die With A Smile by Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars was released on August 16th (technically making the eligibility deadline) but really only got popular in mid-September. The single has sold less than 90,000 units, which is terrible for artists of their caliber. Its success has mostly come from streaming, but even then, it doesn’t hold a candle to Espresso, the song that will not quit no matter how annoying it is. It also didn’t move pop culture like Kendrick’s “Not Like Us” (another contender in this category). A Bar Song (Tipsy) has been the number 1 song on Billboard Charts for 17 weeks (and it’s only the second Country influence performed by a Black man in history). Even Birds of a Feather by Billie Eilish and Sabrine Carpenter’s “Please, Please, Please” make more sense in this category than Bruno and Gaga.  I suppose the Grammy voters line of reasoning that since this award is about lyrics and composition, they should be honored. It is a touching love song and Bruno and Gaga are both known for their pens but it still hasn’t been out long enough for me. Plus Willow Smith and Megan the Stallion have put out some lyrically adept stuff all year. Even Tori Kelly who released a phenomenal album this year has songs that I feel like make sense for this category. No shade, I love both artists and it goes without saying how talented they are but if they win this one, I’ll know someone on their team is paying off the big wigs.

Rounding out the Big Four drama is the Best New Artist category with Sabrina Carpenter, Doechii, Raye, Chapell Roan, Shaboozey, Teddy Swims, Benson Boome and Khruangbin as contenders. Again, Carpenter is a shoe in, although Chapell Roan is popular with Gen Alpha and Gen Z and Doechii is gaining support and popularity with Black Millennials (She’s also the newest member of TDE – Top Dawg Entertainment—the label that created rap juggernaut Kendrick Lamar). 

The R&B categories also look crazy. In a year where Justin Timberlake, Beyonce, Flo Milli, Tyla, Chloe, Willow, Tori Kelly, Normani and FLO all put out great music, the nominations for Best R&B song looks grim. There are choices that don’t reflect the best of the artist’s work and a lot of deserved people were snubbed.  In fact, Tyla was left out of all the nominations.  It’s truly blasphemous, considering how impactful her lead single, “Water” is. Her entire album received both critical and popular acclaim.  She swept the VMAs and BET Awards, so the Grammys’ silence is deafening.

The Rap categories fared a bit better with recognition of Cardi B’s growth and of course Kendrick Lamar and Future, who started the greatest rap beef in history. Glorilla also gets the props she deserves with two nominations for ”Yea Glo!”. The craziest suggestion on this category is J. Cole’s “Might Delete Later.”  The stain on his name after shooting bullets then tucking his tail during the Kendrick vs. Drake wave should erase this era. He can circle back next year. The other snubs include Willow in the jazz categories (she’s only nominated for the engineering of her groundbreaking album, “Empathogen”). The good news is that Beyonce is nominated several times in the country categories after being threatened out of the category twice in 2016 and again this year. I hope Bey wins them all and pisses off MAGA country fans royally. 

This year’s Grammys will be less enthused as last year’s I imagine, but there is still a chance of some really groundbreaking decisions. Tune in on February 2nd to see how it all unfolds.