2023 Grammys wrapped

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The 2023 Grammys brought out new controversies.

Macey Thaxton, Staff Writer

The 65th annual Grammys was held this past weekend, and the controversies have already begun. The Grammys is an award ceremony to honor successful music throughout the past year, 2022. Many controversies have arisen from the show surrounding who received each award.

The show was hosted by Trevor Noah for the third year in a row, and he provided quick commentary in between performances and awards by interacting with the celebrities. Although many of his jokes were hilarious, some were pretty out of line, and included objectifying some celebrities. The show was opened by Bad Bunny, a Puerto Rican rapper and singer who recently gained the title of Spotify’s most-streamed artist for the third year in a row with 18.5 billion streams worldwide last year. 

One of the first awards of the night was for “Best Pop Vocal Album” and the honor went to “Harry’s House” by Harry Styles, which was released in May of 2022. The award for “Pop Solo Performance” went to Adele for “Easy on Me,” totaling Adele’s Grammys to 16 wins. Both rewards were presented to deserving artists that influenced last year’s music industry.

This year Beyonce won the award for “Best R&B Song” for her song “Cuff It.” With this award, she made history with the most Grammys of all time at a whopping 32 awards. She also holds the title for most nominations with a total of 88. 

Soon after, Sam Smith and Kim Petras’s song, “Unholy” won the “Best Pop Duo/Group Performance” Grammy. The award was accepted with an emotional speech from Petras, as she is the first transgender woman to win this award. The song was later performed by the two, and the props for the performance included devil horns, cages and “satanic symbols” which had sparked some controversy especially since it was shown on live TV. While it wasn’t really hurting anyone, the cages were a little much and may have sent a wrong message.

Later in the evening, Lizzo won her fourth Grammy for “Record of the Year” for her song “About [sic] Time.” The song was nominated along with “Easy on Me” by Adele, “As it Was” by Styles, “Break my Soul” by Beyonce and several others. 

Around halfway through the show, the Grammys paid tribute to the hip-hop genre for its 50th Anniversary. Legendary hip-hop artists like Dr. Dre, Queen Latifah, LL Cool J, Questlove and many others gathered on the stage to celebrate the 50th anniversary of hip-hop by rapping parts of their most iconic songs.

The two most prestigious awards of the Grammys are Album and Song of the Year. This year, however, these were also the two most significant controversies of the night. The 2022 “Album of the Year” went to Styles for his album “Harry’s House.”

As Styles was giving his acceptance speech, someone from the audience yelled “Beyonce should have won.” While Beyonce is “the queen” and has had a strong and successful career, that night she broke the record for 32 Grammys. This was Styles’s third Grammy as an individual, and it was deserved. While Styles didn’t acknowledge the person who yelled, it reminded me of the incident at the 2009 VMAs where Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech by saying Beyonce should have won. 

“Song of the Year” went to popular blues singer Bonnie Raitt for her song “Just Like That,” which was a big mistake. “Just Like That” was nominated against much more popular songs like “As it Was” by Styles, “All Too Well (10 Minute Version)(Taylor’s Version)” by Swift, “Break My Soul” by Beyonce and many other deserving songs. After the award was announced, I went to listen to the song and realized I had never heard it before. 

“Song of the Year” is to acknowledge the songwriting of the song that wins the honor, and while “Just Like That” has good lyrics, Swift’s “All Too Well (10 Minute Version)(Taylor’s Version)” was nothing short of a masterpiece of songwriting. Although one of the most prestigious awards of the night was a massive disappointment, most of the other awards went to artists that were extremely deserving of them. 

There are several award shows in the near future like the Kids’ Choice Awards on Mar. 4, the Razzies on Mar. 11 and the Oscars on Mar. 12. Just like The Grammys, the awards shows of this year are sure to keep the audience on the edge of their seats.

Contact Macey Thaxton at [email protected]