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As Grammy Voting Closes, Here Are 12 Races We’re Watching
We’ll find out what the voters decided across 95 categories on Sunday Feb. 1 when the 68th annual Grammy Awards are presented at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.
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Here’s a preview of 12 categories that we’re watching with particular interest. But first, if you’re still in an eggnog-induced holiday fog, we’ll get you back into a Grammy frame of mind by reminding you about last year’s results. Kendrick Lamar was the top winner with five awards, including record and song of the year for the scathing “Not Like Us.” Beyoncé took album of the year (at long last) for Cowboy Carter. Chappell Roan won best new artist, beating Sabrina Carpenter, but Carpenter edged out Roan in two key pop categories. (We’ll call that a split decision.)
Here are 12 key categories on this year’s ballot. We show the three presumed front-runners in each category (in alphabetical order by artist), the rest of the nominees in the category (also in alphabetical order by artist), offer a few thoughts, and cap it with our best guess of who will win. Several of these races appear to be very close, so if you’re a voting member and you haven’t voted yet, be sure to do so. (But finish reading this first!)
Album of the Year
Presumed front-runners: Bad Bunny’s Debí Tirar Más Fotos, Lady Gaga’s MAYHEM, Kendrick Lamar’s GNX
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Other nominees: Justin Bieber’s Swag, Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend, Clipse’s Let God Sort Em Out, Leon Thomas’ Mutt, Tyler, the Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA
Notes: No matter who wins, we’ll see a first-time winner in the category. Bunny’s album would be the first all-Spanish album to win in the category. GNX would be the only the third hip-hop album – and the first by a male solo rapper – to win. A win for Gaga’s album would be her first victory in any of the Big Four categories – album, record and song of the year plus best new artist.
There are many reasons to think Bunny just might take it. The Recording Academy invited members of the Latin Recording Academy to join their ranks, and many took them up on the offer. Bunny is set to headline the Super Bowl halftime show one week after the Grammys. And then there are the culture wars: A win would be seen, in part, as a rebuke to President Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric in the same way that The Chicks’ sweep in 2007 was seen as the voters taking the trio’s side in their war-of-words with President George W. Bush. Will large numbers of Grammy voters vote for Bunny just to spite Trump? Probably not. But in a very close race, small shifts can make the difference.
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But there are also reasons to think Lamar will win, starting with the fact that he has been nominated four previous times in this category as a lead artist and has yet to win. How many times can the voters pass over him? Also, no hip-hop album has won in this category since OutKast’s Speakerboxxx/The Love Below 22 years ago. Both the genre and the artist are overdue for a win here.
Here’s a more detailed breakdown of this category, with the nominated albums fearlessly ranked in predicted order of finish.
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Predicted winner: GNX
Record of the Year
Presumed front-runners: Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra,” Kendrick Lamar with SZA’s “Luther,” ROSÉ & Bruno Mars’ “APT.”
Other nominees: Bad Bunny’s “DtMF,” Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild,” Doechii’s “Anxiety,” Billie Eilish’s “Wildflower,” Chappell Roan’s “The Subway”
Notes: If “APT.” wins, Mars will become the first artist to win four times in the history of the category. He’s currently tied for the lead with Paul Simon, with three wins each. ROSÉ, his partner on this smash, would become the first Kpop artist to win in a Big Four category.
If “Luther” wins, Lamar will become only the fourth artist in Grammy history to win in this category two years in a row. Moreover, he’d become first male solo artist ever to do this. Two female solo artists – Roberta Flack and Billie Eilish – and a group – U2 – have achieved the feat.
A win for either “APT.” or “Luther” would make it the first male/female collab to win in this category since the Gotye/Kimbra smash “Somebody That I Used to Know” 13 years ago. These records are so different, it’s hard to compare them. “APT.” is turbo-charged pop, while “Luther” moves at a leisurely pace and even has a cinematic quality. A win for “Luther” would be a way of honoring not just Lamar and SZA, but also Luther Vandross and Cheryl Lynn, whose “If This World Were Mine” is sampled on the record, and Marvin Gaye, who wrote “If This World Were Mine” and recorded it with his frequent duet partner Tammi Terrell in 1967.
Read here for a piece about Vandross’s mixed fortunes at the Grammys. He won eight awards, but it took him nearly a decade to finally win his first.
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Predicted winner: “Luther”
Album of the Year
Presumed front-runners: Bad Bunny’s Debí Tirar Más Fotos, Lady Gaga’s MAYHEM, Kendrick Lamar’s GNX
Other nominees: Justin Bieber’s Swag, Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend, Clipse’s Let God Sort Em Out, Leon Thomas’ Mutt, Tyler, the Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA
Notes: No matter who wins, we’ll see a first-time winner in the category. Bunny’s album would be the first all-Spanish album to win in the category. GNX would be the only the third hip-hop album – and the first by a male solo rapper – to win. A win for Gaga’s album would be her first victory in any of the Big Four categories – album, record and song of the year plus best new artist.
There are many reasons to think Bunny just might take it. The Recording Academy invited members of the Latin Recording Academy to join their ranks, and many took them up on the offer. Bunny is set to headline the Super Bowl halftime show one week after the Grammys. And then there are the culture wars: A win would be seen, in part, as a rebuke to President Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric in the same way that The Chicks’ sweep in 2007 was seen as the voters taking the trio’s side in their war-of-words with President George W. Bush. Will large numbers of Grammy voters vote for Bunny just to spite Trump? Probably not. But in a very close race, small shifts can make the difference.
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But there are also reasons to think Lamar will win, starting with the fact that he has been nominated four previous times in this category as a lead artist and has yet to win. How many times can the voters pass over him? Also, no hip-hop album has won in this category since OutKast’s Speakerboxxx/The Love Below 22 years ago. Both the genre and the artist are overdue for a win here.
Here’s a more detailed breakdown of this category, with the nominated albums fearlessly ranked in predicted order of finish.
Predicted winner: GNX
Record of the Year
Presumed front-runners: Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra,” Kendrick Lamar with SZA’s “Luther,” ROSÉ & Bruno Mars’ “APT.”
Other nominees: Bad Bunny’s “DtMF,” Sabrina Carpenter’s “Manchild,” Doechii’s “Anxiety,” Billie Eilish’s “Wildflower,” Chappell Roan’s “The Subway”Notes: If “APT.” wins, Mars will become the first artist to win four times in the history of the category. He’s currently tied for the lead with Paul Simon, with three wins each. ROSÉ, his partner on this smash, would become the first Kpop artist to win in a Big Four category.
If “Luther” wins, Lamar will become only the fourth artist in Grammy history to win in this category two years in a row. Moreover, he’d become first male solo artist ever to do this. Two female solo artists – Roberta Flack and Billie Eilish – and a group – U2 – have achieved the feat.
A win for either “APT.” or “Luther” would make it the first male/female collab to win in this category since the Gotye/Kimbra smash “Somebody That I Used to Know” 13 years ago. These records are so different, it’s hard to compare them. “APT.” is turbo-charged pop, while “Luther” moves at a leisurely pace and even has a cinematic quality. A win for “Luther” would be a way of honoring not just Lamar and SZA, but also Luther Vandross and Cheryl Lynn, whose “If This World Were Mine” is sampled on the record, and Marvin Gaye, who wrote “If This World Were Mine” and recorded it with his frequent duet partner Tammi Terrell in 1967.
Read here for a piece about Vandross’s mixed fortunes at the Grammys. He won eight awards, but it took him nearly a decade to finally win his first.
Predicted winner: “Luther”
Song of the Year
Presumed front-runners: “APT.” (Amy Allen, Christopher Brody Brown, Rogét Chahayed, Omer Fedi, Philip Lawrence, Bruno Mars, Chae Young Park, Theron Thomas & Henry Walter, songwriters); “Golden” (EJAE, Park Hong Jun, Joong Gyu Kwak, Yu Han Lee, Hee Dong Nam, Jeong Hoon Seo & Mark Sonnenblick, songwriters); “Luther” (Jack Antonoff, Roshwita Larisha Bacha, Matthew Bernard, Scott Bridgeway, Sam Dew, Ink, Kendrick Lamar, Solána Rowe, Mark Anthony Spears & Kamasi Washington, songwriters)
Other nominees: “Abracadabra” (Lady Gaga, Henry Walter & Andrew Watt); “Anxiety” (Jaylah Hickmon, songwriter); “DtMF” (Marco Daniel Borrero, Scott Dittrich, Benjamin Falik, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, Hugo René Sención Sanabria, Tyler Spry & Roberto José Rosado Torres, songwriters); “Manchild” (Amy Allen, Jack Antonoff & Sabrina Carpenter, songwriters); “Wildflower” (Billie Eilish O’Connell & Finneas O’Connell, songwriters)
Notes: If “APT.” wins, Bruno Mars and his frequent co-writer Christopher Brody Brown will become the first three-time winners in the history of the category. They previously won for co-writing “That’s What I Like” and “Leave the Door Open.” (The same would be true if Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell win for “Wildflower.” They previously won for “bad guy” and “What Was I Made For?.”)
If either “Luther” or “APT.” wins, it will set a new record as the song with the most credited writers to prevail here. “Luther” has 10 credited writers. “APT.” has nine. (The current record is held by “That’s What I Like,” which had eight credited writers.) Moreover, if “Luther” wins, Kendrick Lamar will become just the second songwriter (following Dernst “D’Mile” Emile II) to win in this category in back-to-back years. D’Mile won with “I Can’t Breathe” in 2021 and “Leave the Door Open” in 2022.
“Golden” is vying to become the first K-pop smash to win in this category and the second film song to win in this category in the past three years. “What Was I Made For?” from Barbie won two years ago. “What Was I Made For?” also won an Oscar for best original song, a feat “Golden” might well duplicate. “Luther” is a gorgeous track, but the insanely catchy “Golden” is easier to hum when the voter is filling out his ballot.
Predicted winner: “Golden”
Best New Artist
Leon ThomasRaymond Alva
Presumed front-runners: Olivia Dean, Leon Thomas, Lola Young
Other nominees: KATSEYE, The Marías, Addison Rae, sombr, Alex Warren
Notes: Thomas has six total nominations, including album of the year and best R&B album for Mutt. None of the other nominees in this category has more than two nods. But Dean’s album, The Art of Loving, was released after the Aug. 30 eligibility cutoff, so her meager nominations count (she has just this one nod) doesn’t fully reflect her strength. Also, Dean’s hit “Man I Need” was released a mere 16 days before the end of the eligibility year. If it had had more time to register before nominations-round voting closed, it might well have landed nods for record and song of the year and best pop solo performance. Young’s “Messy” landed a nomination in the fiercely competitive best pop solo performance category. It received more votes than Rae’s “Fame Is a Gun,” sombr’s “Back to Friends” and Warren’s “Ordinary,” which were passed over for nods in that category.
Dean’s middle name is Lauryn, inspired by Lauryn Hill, who won in this category in 1999. Dean could easily win, thanks to a stylish single that was on the radio throughout the voting period and to this historical fact: The last eight winners in this category have been female solo artists. Leon Thomas would be the first male solo artist to win since Chance the Rapper in 2017. But he just may do it, thanks to “Mutt,” an old-school R&B ballad that was one of the year’s biggest and best sleeper hits. The four Grammys that were showered on Silk Sonic’s “Leave the Door Open” four years ago shows how Grammy voters feel about songs that are throwbacks to 1970s soul.
Predicted winner: Leon Thomas
Producer of the Year, Non-Classical
Presumed front-runners: Cirkut, Blake Mills, Sounwave
Other nominees: Dan Auerbach, Dijon
Notes: Cirkut has seven total nominations this year, more than any of these other nominees. He is one of two producers this year with double nominations for record of the year (for “Abracadabra” and “APT.”) (The only other producer with double nods for record of the year is Jack Antonoff, who is MIA in this category for the second year in a row for reasons known only by the members of the select committee that determines the nominees in this category.) Sounwave has five total nods; Blake Mills has three. Sounwave has only one sample credit on the nominations list, but it’s a big one (GNX). Of this year’s nominees, Auerbach is the only past winner in this category, having won in 2013. But this was his only nomination this year. It would be odd for a producer to win in a year in which none of his projects was nominated.
Predicted winner: Cirkut
Songwriter of the Year, Non-Classical
Presumed front-runners: Amy Allen, Edgar Barrera, Tobias Jesso Jr.
Other nominees: Jessie Jo Dillon, Laura Veltz
Notes: Allen, who won last year, is vying to become the first repeat winner in this four-year old category. She has four total nominations this year, more than any of her competitors. She has two song of the year nominations (for “APT.” and “Manchild”). Jesso is nominated for album of the year for Swag. His credits also include Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need.”
Here’s a 2024 profile of Amy Allen.
Predicted winner: Amy Allen
Best Pop Vocal Album
Lady GagaFrank Lebon
Presumed front-runners: Justin Bieber’s Swag, Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend, Lady Gaga’s MAYHEM
Other nominees: Miley Cyrus’ Something Beautiful, Teddy Swims’ I’ve Tried Everything But Therapy (Part 2)
Notes: Carpenter and Gaga are both past winners in this category. If either wins, they’ll join Adele, Kelly Clarkson and Taylor Swift as the only two-time winners in the category. Carpenter won last year with Short N’ Sweet. If she wins again this year, she’ll become the first artist to win in this category in back-to-back years. Bieber’s appeal is wide, but he has won just two Grammys to date. He’s overdue for another. As one of the presumed front-runners for album of the year, Gaga has the inside track here.
Here’s a ranking of all 14 tracks on MAYHEM.
Predicted winner: MAYHEM
Best Contemporary Country Album
Presumed front-runners: Tyler Childers’ Snipe Hunter, Eric Church’s Evangeline vs. the Machine, Jelly Roll’s Beautifully Broken
Other nominees: Kelsea Ballerini’s Patterns, Miranda Lambert’s Postcards from Texas
Notes: Lambert is the only nominee here who has won a Grammy (three, including two in this category). Childers and Church have each gone 0-11 at the Grammys over the years, so they’re due. Church has won album of the year twice at the CMA Awards and once at the ACM Awards, but has yet to win in any category at the Grammys. Billboard ranked his album No. 1 on its list of the 10 best country albums of 2025. Melinda Newman observed: “Some listeners and critics have questioned if the project, which is nominated for a Grammy for best contemporary country album, is country, but the better way to look at it may be that Church is once again showing us the possibilities of the genre instead of the limits.”
Jelly Roll’s Beautifully Broken is the only album here that reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200. It was nominated for album of the year at the ACM Awards, but was passed over for a nod in that category at the CMA Awards (as were the Church, Ballerini and Lambert albums). This is the first major awards test of Childers’ album, which was released after the end of the eligibility period for the CMA Awards.
Unfortunately, Morgan Wallen decided not to submit his latest blockbuster, I’m the Problem. Wallen has never won a Grammy and has received just two nominations, both for his hit collab with Post Malone, “I Had Some Help.” So, I get why he might have hard feelings about award shows, especially the Grammys. But not submitting doesn’t solve the problem. Morgan, submit! Grammy voters, judge the record, not an artist’s past mistakes.
Predicted winner: Evangeline vs. the Machine
Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album
Presumed front-runners: Elton John & Brandi Carlile’s Who Believes in Angels?, Laufey’s A Matter of Time, Barbra Streisand’s The Secret of Life: Partners, Volume 2
Other nominees: Laila Biali’s Wintersongs, Jennifer Hudson’s The Gift of Love, Lady Gaga’s Harlequin
Notes: Streisand hasn’t won a Grammy in competition in 39 years, which is hard to fathom. (To borrow a line from her 1981 smash “Guilty” – “It ought to be illegal.”) She might win this year, but she faces stiff competition, including Laufey, who won in this category two years ago with Bewitched (and who teams with Streisand to sing “Letter to My 13 Year Old Self,” a lovely song from Bewitched, on Streisand’s album). While Elton & Brandi’s album didn’t live up to expectations, it’s still Elton & Brandi, who, among them, have won 16 Grammys. Their nod for best song written for visual media for “Never Too Late” is another sign of voter support.
Here’s a more detailed look at this category, written before the nominations were announced, and a recap of Laufey’s impressive Sept. 26 show at Crypto.com Arena, the very venue at which this year’s Grammy telecast will be held.
Predicted winner: A Matter of Time
Best Musical Theater Album
Presumed front-runners: Buena Vista Social Club, Just in Time, Maybe Happy Ending
Other nominees: Death Becomes Her, Gypsy
Notes: Maybe Happy Ending won six Tonys in June, including best musical, but the two other front-runners have stronger connections to the music industry. Buena Vista Social Club tells the story of the group whose eponymous 1997 album was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2024. Just in Time is a celebration of Bobby Darin, who won two Grammys at the November 1959 ceremony – record of the year for the electrifying “Mack the Knife” and best new artist (he was the inaugural winner in that category). As noted above, the Recording Academy invited members of the Latin Recording Academy to join their ranks, and many took them up on the offer. That could tip it to Buena Vista Social Club.
Here’s a piece recapping the Tony Awards in June, another previewing this Grammy category before the nominations were announced, another looking at the recording of the Just in Time cast album, and another listing the best Latin-themed musicals in Broadway history.
Predicted winner: Buena Vista Social Club
Best Music Film
Presumed front-runners: Live at The Royal Albert Hall, RAYE; Music by John Williams, John Williams; Piece by Piece, Pharrell Williams
Other nominees: Devo, Devo; Relentless, Diane Warren
Notes: John Williams has won 26 Grammys, a total equaled or topped by just six people in history, so it’s probably foolish to bet against him. Pharrell Williams (no relation) has won just half as many Grammys, but he has three other nods this year (including album of the year) for his work on Clipse’s album, which may boost his chances here. RAYE has yet to win a Grammy, but two years ago she was nominated in three key categories, including best new artist and songwriter of the year, non-classical. Her current hit, the delightful “Where Is My Husband!,” has put a fresh focus on her.
Here’s a piece about Music by John Williams.
Predicted winner: Music by John Williams
Best Album Cover
Bad BunnyEric Rojas
Presumed front runners: CHROMAKOPIA, Tyler Okonma, art director (Tyler, the Creator); The Crux, Jake Hirshland, Joe Keery, Neil Krug, Taylor Vandergrift & William Wesley II, art directors (Djo); Debí Tirar Más Fotos, Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio, art director (Bad Bunny)
Other nominees: Glory, Cody Critcheloe & Andrew J.S., art directors (Perfume Genius); moisturizer, Iris Luz, Lava La Rue & Rhian Teasdale, art directors (Wet Leg)
Notes: As we reported last month, four of the five nominated album covers were art directed (or co-art directed) by the artists themselves. Tyler, The Creator and Bad Bunny served as art directors for their albums (under their real names). Djo (Joe Keery) co-directed his album cover, and Rhian Teasdale of Wet Leg co-directed the indie band’s cover. As album of the year nominees, the Bunny and Tyler albums probably have an advantage here. Bunny’s cover, showing two empty plastic lawn chairs, couldn’t be simpler, but it’s effective. Tyler’s cover depicts him wearing a ceramic mask of his own face, his right hand outstretched.
Predicted winner: Debí Tirar Más Fotos
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