Stephen Thompson on the biggest surprises, trends and questions to be found in the Grammy nominations, plus the most interesting stories to be found beyond the major categories.
The pop music landscape has been awash in superstar juggernauts (Taylor Swift, Beyoncé), headline-grabbing beefs (Drake vs. Kendrick Lamar, et. al.) and a freshly minted gaggle of hit-makers such as Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan, Charli XCX and Shaboozey. Appropriately enough, each of the aforementioned artists — except Drake, who stopped submitting his music for Grammy considerationreceived loads of nominations when next year’s Grammy Awards contenders were announced Friday.
That isn’t to say that everything played out exactly as expected. And there are plenty of subplots and storylines to unpack as we await the Grammys telecast on Feb. 2, 2025:
1. It’s been a massive year for women in pop. Remember back in 2018, when Neil Portnow, then head of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, said that women needed to “step up” after that year’s Grammys were overwhelmingly won by men? Yeah, he sucked. This year, women dominate the major categories: In record of the year, song of the year and album of the year, six of the eight nominees are headlined by women, though several share billing with male counterparts. And, while the best new artist field is split 50-50, the overwhelming frontrunners (Roan and Carpenter) are both women.
2. As expected, Beyoncé leads the field. The two most heavily nominated musicians of all time share a household: Until Friday, Beyoncé and Jay-Z were tied with 88 nominations apiece, while Beyoncé holds the all-time record for Grammy wins with 32. Now, Queen Bey has a stunning 99 nominations to her name, as Cowboy Carter and an assortment of its songs have racked up a field-leading 11 nods. It helps that Cowboy Carter sprawls across multiple genres and brings in loads of collaborators, which made her eligible in more categories than, say, Chappell Roan, who lacks eligible collaborations and didn’t submit in any genres outside pop.
3. Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter join a select group. The Grammys have four general, cross-genre categories, which have collectively come to be known as The Big Four: album of the year, record of the year, song of the year and best new artist. In the history of the awards, only 13 artists have been nominated in all four categories during the same year — most recently Olivia Rodrigo three years ago. (FINNEAS kinda did it that year, too, but it didn’t count; he was nominated for best new artist as a solo act, but his other nominations in that year’s Big Four were headlined by his sister, Billie Eilish.
