Kanye West‘s ‘DONDA’ and Taylor Swift‘s ‘Evermore’ were reportedly nominated for Album of the Year at the 2022 Grammy Awards at the last minute.
According to a new report by The New York Times, the two artists were added to the list of nominees after a meeting took place on Monday night (November 22), where it was decided the Recording Academy would expand the number of nominees for the award from eight to 10.
This meeting took place the day before the nominees for the 2022 awards were made public, meaning West and Swift were only officially nominated in the category at the 11th hour.
The other eight acts nominated for Album of the Year are Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish, Jon Batiste, Lil Nas X, H.E.R. and Justin Bieber, as well as Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga for their joint album ‘Love For Sale’.
The expansion to 10 nominees was made across all four of the big categories at the ceremony – Record and Song of the Year, as well as Best New Artist. ABBA‘s ‘I Still Have Faith In You’ and Lil Nas X’s ‘Montero (Call Me By Your Name)’ were added to Record of the Year, Doja Cat and SZA‘s ‘Kiss Me More’ and Brandi Carlile‘s ‘Right On Time’ were added to Song of the Year and Baby Keem and Arooj Aftab were added to Best New Artist.
The New York Times claims that this wasn’t the original list of nominees, as a ‘final nominations list’ document obtained by the publication circulated days prior to the announcement, with only eight nominees in each of those categories.
The Recording Academy’s chief executive, Harvey Mason Jr., said that those added were the artists and releases that received the ninth and 10th most votes in each category, determined by Deloitte who collect and tabulate votes for the ceremony.
“For us, this is all positive movement,” Mason Jr. said. “This is us honouring more great artists, more great music, giving artists an opportunity to shine and showcase.”
Swift’s nomination for ‘Evermore’ is her only nomination of the evening, with the exception of a writing credit on Rodrigo’s ‘Sour’. She took home Album of the Year at this year’s ceremony for ‘Folklore’, making her the first woman to win the award three times.
West earned three other nominations outside of Album of the Year, with ‘DONDA’ also being nominated for Best Rap Album. ‘Hurricane’, with The Weeknd and Lil Baby, is up for Best Melodic Rap Performance, and he and Jay-Z‘s ‘Jail’ is up for Best Rap Performance. Jay-Z’s nominations for his work on ‘DONDA’ makes him the most Grammy-nominated artist in history, surpassing the previous record-holder, Quincy Jones.
The 2022 ceremony will be broadcast live from Los Angeles on January 31, 2022.
The post Kanye West and Taylor Swift reportedly added to Album Of The Year Grammy nominees at the last minute appeared first on NME.