The 2021 Grammy Nominations have been announced and this year, not only are women’s voices being celebrated, but we’re also hearing the voices of those who have been snubbed of nominations. On November 24, The Academy announced the list of this coming year’s Grammy nominees and it did not come without its share of surprises.
First Timers
First, let’s talk about first-timers. It’s always exciting when an artist gets nominated for their first Grammy, especially if they’re already well known and fan favorites, so the fact that they are first time nominees might come as a surprise.
Noah Cyrus (yes Miley Cyrus aka Hannah Montanna’s) younger sister, was nominated for her first Grammy in the “Best New Artist” category. Despite having multiple chart-topping songs in the past, this is Cyrus’s first nomination.
Another surprise might also be Harry Styles. Former One Direction band member, Styles was nominated for three Grammys this year, including “Best Pop Vocal Album.” It may come as a surprise to most that this is his first nominated season since his debut solo album was such a success. He is also the first member of One Direction to receive a nomination since the band was overlooked for nominations in the past (but we’ll get to “snubs” later.)
Top Nominees
This year’s list had a female takeover. In the lead with nomination counts are Beyoncé, Taylor Swift and Dua Lipa. Beyoncé is in the front with nine nominations this year alone. Now, she has tied with Frank Sinatra for the most “Record of the Year” nominations ever; both have received seven nominations in this category. Swift and Dua Lipa are tied with six nominations each, Swift holding two in top categories of “Album of the Year” and “Song of the Year.”
Snubs: Past and Present
Every year there seem to be one or two snubs, in the big categories, but this year takes the cake. There has been a long-standing history of The Academy “snubbing” or overlooking artists that deserved to be nominated. One of those being the aforementioned One Direction. Despite being a “boy band,” One Direction created a new standard for groups composed of young men performing pop/rock style music. Even though their albums broke records and sat comfortably at the top of just about every chart, the band was never nominated for a Grammy. And they are in good company; other artists that surprisingly were never nominated are The Who, Jason Derulo, Selena Gomez, The Spice Girls and Janice Joplin.
This year, however, seems to be the year that caused the most upset. Starting off with The Weeknd, who was not nominated at all this year. After having a record-breaking year, with his album “Blinding Lights” having the most weeks at number one, his album was overlooked for this year’s nominations. In the past, most artists might have stayed silent when it comes to not being nominated, but not this year. The Weeknd took to social media and posted a long response stating that The Academy “remains corrupt.”
In response to this, other artists started coming forward about being overlooked, as well as their thoughts on their nominations this year. Nicki Minaj recalled being snubbed in the 2012 Grammys for the best new artist category. Justin Bieber posted how he was “flattered” by the nominations but expressed his discontent for not being nominated in the R&B categories, having set out to make an R&B record. The Killers, in a tongue-in-cheek post, denied reality and announced that they had actually been nominated.
Best Reactions
To end on a high note, there were also some great moments captured of the nominees receiving their news. Multiple artists had the moment they found out about their nominations captured by picture or video, and some of them are absolutely amazing. Most notably being the videos of Dua Lipa finding out about her six nominations and Noah Cyrus hearing about her first-ever nomination.
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