You and I*

The 20 albums are listed in alphabetical order by the artists’ name on the ballot the committee uses.

Best Urban Contemporary Album
Beyoncé – Homecoming: The Live Album
Chris Brown – Indigo
India.Arie – Worthy
Khalid – Free Spirit
Lizzo – Cuz I Love You

Best R&B Album
Ella Mai – Ella Mai
H.E.R. – I Used to Know Her
Ari Lennox – Shea Butter Baby
PJ Morton – Paul
Raphael Saadiq – Jimmy Lee

The song categories are always a crapshoot; I won’t bother.

8 nominees or not, the trend has long been that country albums only get in when they are either commercial juggernauts (Fearless, Need You Now, Fly, Home, Red) and/or critical darlings (Golden Hour, These Days, A Sailor’s Guide to Earth, Traveller). The one outlier is Taking the Long Way, which was nominated (and went on to win) for obvious…[Read more]

“Speechless” is the biggest country song of the year and “Beautiful Crazy” wasn’t his SOTY submission; “Beer Never Broke My Heart” was. “Beautiful Crazy” isn’t eligible for songwriting categories because the version with Leon Bridges was submitted last year.

Only CMA AOTY winners to receive AOTY nominations at the Grammys:

Johnny Cash at San Quentin (1970)
Behind Closed Doors (1973)
The Gambler (1980)
Fly (2000)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2002)
Fearless (2010)
Golden Hour (2019)

For everyone suddenly jumping the gun on Maren Morris just because of the CMAs.

Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media
Green Book
Rocketman
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
A Star Is Born
Stranger Things 3

Song Written for Visual Media
“Girl in the Movies” (Dumplin’)
“I’ll Never Love Again” (A Star Is Born)
“Spirit” (The Lion King)
“Sunflower” (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)
“Super Cool” (The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part)

“Old Town Road” is not touching SOTY.

Really surprised that “Old Town Road” won Musical Event given that it got no love from country radio and it (somewhat) surprisingly missed on a Single of the Year nomination.

She is #5 in overall site odds for AOTY, #8 in ROTY, and #5 in SOTY.

That’s not a “handful of Swifties,” that’s a consensus agreement. So I stand by saying that she’s being massively overhyped.

Overhyping: Beyoncé, Solange, Lil Nas X, and Taylor Swift

Underhyping: I don’t think anyone obvious is being underlooked.

Best Pop Solo Performance
1. Billie Eilish – “Bad Guy”
2. Lizzo – “Truth Hurts”
3. Lady Gaga – “Always Remember Us This Way”
4. Ariana Grande – “7 Rings”
5. Lewis Capaldi – “Someone You Loved”
(6. Halsey – “Without Me”)
[7. Shawn Mendes – “If I Can’t Have You”]

Best Pop Duo/Group Performance
1. Jonas Brothers – “Sucker”
2. Lil Nas X feat. Billy…[Read more]

Billie Eilish will lead with 7 nominations, everything she submitted.

How are Billie’s chances of winning dependent on where Taylor does and doesn’t get nominated? Taylor is not a factor this year. She won’t win anything.

wishful thinking

Lil Nas X will almost certainly be left out. Lewis Capaldi is possible (the fact that he has the best-selling album of the year in the UK definitely helps his case), but he’s not a lock.

That’s all the more reason she is unlikely to be nominated – she’s had her moment.

Alison Krauss has won AOTY twice and is the most awarded woman in Grammy history, and she doesn’t get automatically predicted in the general field for everything she releases.

I only see Taylor getting nominated for Best Pop Vocal Album and maybe Best Country Duo/Group Performance.

On what planet?

Didn’t you say a few months ago Megan wasn’t happening in BNA?