Dua Lipa and Billie Eilish are each up for track of the 12 months for his or her contributions to the Barbie soundtrack
Whisper it quietly… however may the Grammy Awards get it proper this 12 months?
The ceremony, which takes place in Los Angeles on Sunday, is infamous for scoring personal targets, usually rewarding middle-of-the-road heritage acts over cutting-edge, modern pop.
However this 12 months’s nominees are straight-down-the-line populist picks, with R&B star SZA main the sector on 9.
There may also be performances from massive names starting from Dua Lipa and Billie Eilish to Joni Mitchell and U2.
Comic Trevor Noah will host for the fourth 12 months working, overseeing a staggering 94 classes, from greatest modern Christian album to greatest audiobook, the place Michelle Obama will sq. off towards Meryl Streep.
Elsewhere, Phoebe Bridgers’ indie-rock supergroup Boygenius, and pop star Victoria Monét have seven nominations every.
Chart stars Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Miley Cyrus, Lana Del Rey and Ice Spice even have a number of nominations in a female-led discipline.
Listed here are 9 issues to know forward of the occasion.
1) The best way to watch the Grammys
Comic Trevor Noah is internet hosting the present this 12 months
Initially, brew a powerful pot of espresso.
Greater than 80 awards shall be handed out in what’s known as the “premiere ceremony” at 20:30 GMT on Sunday (12:30 in Los Angeles).
It is usually value tuning in. The winners within the extra obscure classes are much less polished and extra enthusiastic about profitable, and the performances are looser and, dare I say it, extra musical than the Hollywood-scale set items you may see later.
You possibly can watch the entire thing on the Recording Academy’s YouTube channel and on live.grammy.com.
The primary present, which can begin at 01:00 Monday GMT, shall be broadcast reside within the US on CBS and streamed on Paramount Plus. Speeches and choose performances are normally uploaded to YouTube the next day.
2) Will Taylor Swift overtake Ol’ Blue Eyes?
Taylor Swift already has 12 Grammys – which is greater than any human can moderately maintain without delay
If Swift wins album of the 12 months for Midnights, she is going to turn out to be the primary ever artist to raise the distinguished trophy 4 occasions.
In the mean time, she’s tied with Paul Simon, Stevie Marvel and Frank Sinatra, who every have three wins.
However the Grammys have usually been much less fascinated about Swift’s pop information than her forays into nation and folks.
Her competitors for album of the 12 months is robust. This is the complete checklist of nominees:
- Boygenius – The File
- Janelle Monáe – The Age of Pleasure
- Jon Batiste – World Music Radio
- Lana Del Rey – Did You Know That There is a Tunnel Beneath Ocean Blvd
- Miley Cyrus – Limitless Summer season Trip
- Olivia Rodrigo – Guts
- SZA – SOS
- Taylor Swift – Midnights
3) Joni and Tracy may put younger stars within the shade
Joni Mitchell will proceed her reside comeback on the ceremony
Trendy-day superstars Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, SZA and Olivia Rodrigo will little doubt placed on lavish performances of their massive hits.
However the present is prone to be stolen by two different feminine artists who’ve largely been out of the general public eye lately.
Joni Mitchell is assured a reception worthy of a dwelling legend when she makes her debut Grammys efficiency on the age of 80.
And Tracy Chapman is closely rumoured to be making a really uncommon public look to affix nation star Luke Combs on her 1988 traditional Quick Automotive, which he took again to the charts final 12 months.
The night time’s different performers will embrace Billy Joel, Travis Scott and Burna Boy.
4) A win for SZA is a win for Scotland
SZA’s second album SOS was one among 2023’s greatest sellers
Within the US, SZA’s second album SOS topped the charts for 10 weeks and marked the singer’s ascension to the most important league.
Born in Missouri and raised in New Jersey, the singer – actual identify Solána Imani Rowe – educated in marine biology earlier than launching her music profession.
If her newest album picks up a Grammy, it would additionally imply a win for a 20-year-old music producer from Scotland.
Blair Ferguson, who writes underneath the identify BLK Beats, wrote the music for her hit single Snooze in his Glasgow bed room, and it went on to promote greater than two million copies within the US.
“SZA is only a genius and she or he’s in a position to rework any report with the best way she comes up with a melody,” he told BBC News. “I do not assume some other artist may have made that observe.”
5) Who’s a much bigger rock star: Mick or Olivia?
The Rolling Stones are nominated for the primary time in six years
The perfect rock track class is a tradition conflict for the ages, as Olivia Rodrigo’s punky Ballad Of A Homeschooled Woman faces off towards The Rolling Stones’ Indignant, a story of a lovers’ quarrel.
So who’s the face of rock ‘n’ roll in 2024? The Grammys prefer to reward longevity, however possibly they will be swayed by Rodrigo’s rock revivalism, which has helped to ignite the primary resurgence in guitar music in over a decade.
It is a robust discipline, with Foo Fighters, and Queens of the Stone Age additionally within the working. However the true contenders should be Boygenius.
Fashioned by indie songwriters Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker, final 12 months they made an era-defining guitar album, stacked with spectral harmonies and poetic lyrics.
Nominated in all the most important classes in addition to the rock subgenres, it may very well be this 12 months’s runaway winner.
6) A primary for Africa
Nigeria’s Burna Boy has turn out to be one of many world’s greatest stars
A brand new class, greatest African music efficiency, displays the rising prominence of genres like Afrobeats and Amapiano but in addition “Africa’s profound affect on music historical past”, in keeping with the Grammys.
The inaugural nominees – who would beforehand have slugged it out on the planet music class – embrace Nigerian stars Burna Boy, Asake, Ayra Starr and Davido, alongside breakout South African singer Tyla.
“Truthfully, particularly the Grammys is a large accolade,” mentioned Tyla, who scored a world hit with Water on the finish of 2023.
Two different new awards have additionally been launched for 2024 – greatest various jazz album and greatest pop dance recording.
7) Justice for Miley!
Miley Cyrus has by no means received a Grammy
Regardless of her storied profession, Miley Cyrus is but to win a Grammy, and had solely been nominated twice previously.
Nonetheless this 12 months, the SFKAHM (Singer previously generally known as Hannah Montana) has six nominations for her all-grown-up pop album Limitless Summer season Trip.
Lead single Flowers, which was the biggest-selling track within the UK final 12 months and topped the US Billboard charts for eight weeks, is up for report and track of the 12 months, and greatest pop vocal efficiency.
However in a powerful 12 months for unhappy women singing pop songs, she may depart empty-handed once more.
8) Are the Grammys ghosting nation music?
Morgan Wallen’s album offered extra copies than some other final 12 months, however he solely has one nomination
Nation had an enormous resurgence within the US final 12 months. Streams of the style rose 20%, and final August the highest three positions within the Billboard Scorching 100 have been occupied by nation songs for the primary time.
However none of these artists – Morgan Wallen, Jason Aldean and Luke Bryan – are nominated within the Grammys’ greatest, all-genre classes.
In actual fact, no nation album has been nominated for album of the 12 months since Kacey Musgraves’ Golden Hour 5 years in the past (which received the award).
So what is going on on? It appears to be a response to the political and racial undertones of the style’s greatest stars.
Voters are cautious about Wallen due to a headline-making incident in 2021, the place he was caught on digicam utilizing a racial slur.
With Aldean, the politics have been embedded in his track, Attempt That in a Small City – a narrative of vigilante justice that some listeners interpreted as having racial undertones.
Aldean denied these accusations, however apologised when it transpired he’d filmed the video in entrance of a Tennessee courthouse that had been the scene of a brutal lynching in 1927.
Whereas stars like Jason Isbell and Zach Bryan made considerate songs that challenged Nashville’s extra regressive tendencies, they have been additionally shut out of the massive prizes.
It appears the Academy, with typical warning, has determined to steer clear.
9) How new does the perfect new artist should be?
Jelly Roll just lately received greatest new artist on the Nation Music Affiliation Awards
A mere 21 years after releasing his first track, Tennessee singer Jelly Roll is up for greatest new artist.
The musician, whose actual identify is Jason DeFord, is not a conventional contender for the class, however his current transfer from the underground to the mainstream makes him eligible underneath Grammy tips.
A convicted felony and former drug seller, he has served a number of stints in jail and just lately testified earlier than the US Congress in help of anti-fentanyl laws.
His emotional tales of habit and redemption lastly propelled him into the charts final 12 months after a later-career pivot from rap into nation music.
At 39, he could be the oldest-ever winner of the perfect new artist trophy – overtaking Sheryl Crow, who was 33 on the night time of her victory in 1995.
However that is nothing in comparison with the Latin Grammys, which gave a greatest new artist trophy to 95-year-old Angela Alvarez in 2022.
