Grammys 2020: Female artists rule the nominations

The Grammys are screaming ‘Cuz I Love You’ to Lizzo: the breakthrough singer-rapper scored a whopping eight nominations, including bids for the top four awards, making her the show’s top-nominated act. Lizzo picked up nominations for album of the year with her major-label debut, ‘Cuz I Love You’ song and record of the year with her anthemic No. 1 hit, ‘Truth Hurts’ and best new artist. Lizzo’s road to the Grammys has been a long one: The 31-year-old, who performed with Prince on his ‘Plectrumelectrum’ album, grinded as an independent and touring artist for years before signing a major-label deal, releasing her first album in 2013. But Lizzo has also had her fair share of critics: Some felt she shouldn’t qualify for best new artist at the Grammys since she’s been on the music scene for years. Others thought since ‘Truth Hurts’ was originally released in 2017, it shouldn’t qualify for the 2020 Grammys. The Recording Academy said ‘Truth Hurts’ qualified because the song was never submitted for contention in the Grammys process and it appears on an album released during the eligibility period for the upcoming show.

Like Lizzo, other new artists dominated with Grammy nominations: Billie Eilish earned six nominations. Eilish also scored nominations in the top four categories, making the 17-year-old the youngest artist in the history of the Grammys to achieve the feat. Her noms include Album of the Year for ‘When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?’ and Song of the Year with ‘Bad Guy’. Eilish is also facing off Lizzo in the Best New Artist category, along with Best Solo Performance.

Lil Nas X, 20, is up for three of the top four awards, including album and record of the year for ‘Old Town Road’, featuring Billy Ray Cyrus. He is also up for Best New Artist and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance.

Twylor Swift earned three nominations, including a Song of the Year nomination for ‘Lover’, which featured her as a songwriter. She also made the cut for the Best Pop Solo Performance for ‘You Need To Calm Down’, along with Best Pop Vocal Album for ‘Lover’.

Beyonce — who was shut out of the top three categories — scored four nominations. While her groundbreaking ‘Homecoming’ documentary earned a nomination for best music film, its album version didn’t pick up any nominations. Instead her ‘The Lion King: The Gift’ project — which features songs inspired by ‘The Lion King,’ for which she voiced the character Nala — is up for Best Pop Vocal Album, competing with projects from Ed Sheeran, Swift, Eilish and Grande. Beyonce’s ‘Spirit’, from ‘The Lion King’ which is being pushed for Oscar consideration, is up for best pop solo performance along with Swift’s ‘You Need to Calm Down’, ‘Truth Hurts’, ‘Bad Guy’ and Ariana Grande’s ‘7 Rings’.

Overall, female acts out-performed their male counterparts in the top four categories: Five of the eight album-of-the-year contenders are women, while seven of the eight song-of-the-year nominees are by women. Female musicians also rule in the best new artist category, though record of the year is evenly split. Grande, who won her first Grammy earlier this year, scored five nominations, as did H.E.R. and Finneas, Eilish’s older brother who co-wrote, co-produced and engineered her debut album. Finneas’ nominations include producer of the year (non-classical) and best engineered album (non-classical).