The 2025 Grammy Awards occurred on Feb. 2 and aired for three and a half hours. This year, the Grammys started to make some changes. They significantly increased the amount of voters for the Grammys and diversified the voters that were chosen as well. 

Two of the biggest awards, Record of the Year and Song of the Year, were both won by Kendrick Lamar for his song “Not Like Us”. “Not Like Us” spent many weeks on the top charts and has over one billion streams on Spotify alone. While there were many other amazing contenders for these awards, Kendrick was definitely deserving of this award. Some of the other nominees he was competing against were “Espresso” by Sabrina Carpenter, “360” by Charli XCX, “BIRDS OF A FEATHER” by Billie Eilish, “Good Luck, Babe” by Chappell Roan, and “Fortnight” by Taylor Swift featuring Post Malone. All of these Nominees were very successful this year and all would have been deserving of this award. If Kendrick had not won this award, I think that “BIRDS OF A FEATHER” or “Good Luck, Babe” would have been great choices.

Another big category for this year was Best New Artist. The nominees were Benson Boone, Teddy Swims, Sabrina Carpenter, Doechii, Khruangbin, Raye, Chappell Roan, and Shaboozey. These artists really went on the rise this year with songs like “Espresso”, “Good Luck, Babe”, “A Bar Song (Tipsy)”, and “Beautiful Things”. All of these artists also got to perform during the Grammys in a showcase for the new artists and did absolutely amazing. While all of these artists are extremely talented, the winner was Chappell Roan. Roan’s fame and popularity has skyrocketed over the past year and is becoming increasingly popular. She has been in the music industry for about 10 years and has worked extremely hard to get to where she is now. Roan’s stage presence and performances are always amazing and she has an amazing voice. I don’t think there could have been a better choice for the winner of this award.

One of the most controversial awards of the year was Album of the Year. The nominees were “New Blue Sun” by André 3000, “COWBOY CARTER” by Beyoncé, “Short n’ Sweet” by Sabrina Carpenter, “BRAT” by Charli XCX, “Djesse Vol. 4” by Jacob Collier, “HIT ME HARD AND SOFT” by Billie Eilish, “The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess” by Chappell Roan, and “THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT” by Taylor Swift. Beyoncé’s “COWBOY CARTER” took the award home this year. This outcome was extremely shocking to many. Many people, including myself, thought Billie Eilish would have won. While Beyoncé’s album was very successful, Billie’s seemed to skyrocket past Beyoncé’s. Just with one song, Billie was able to obtain 2 billion streams on Spotify for her song “BIRDS OF A FEATHER”, while Beyoncé’s most streamed song on her album did not surpass 1 billion streams on Spotify. I also think Chappell Roan’s “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess” would have been a great choice. While Roan’s album did not have quite as high of popularity that some of these other albums did, the growth of this album from where Roan was even just a year ago is insane.