In case you, somehow, missed it, The Weeknd’s Blinding Lights album was totally snubbed with zero Grammy nominations. The snub didn’t go unnoticed, with many, including fans, Drake, and The Weeknd himself calling out the awards.
Blinding Lights was obviously huge. Aside from the title track, which did massive rounds on TikTok, ‘Save Your Tears’, ‘Heartless’, and ‘In Your Eyes’ each topped charts and broke records too.
So, when the 2020 Grammy Nominations rolled around and The Weeknd’s fourth studio album wasn’t named. Eyebrows raised and so did questions.
Drake took to his Instagram story, writing, “I think we should stop allowing ourselves to be shocked every year by the disconnect between impactful music and these awards.”
While the ‘Blinding Lights’ singer himself simply tweeted, “The Grammys remain corrupt. You owe me, my fans and the industry transparency…”
Now, he’s spoken in length to Billboard about the snub.
“I use a sucker punch as an analogy,” The Weeknd said, reflecting on the nominations.
“Because it just kind of hit me out of nowhere. I definitely felt … I felt things.
“I don’t know if it was sadness or anger. I think it was just confusion. I just wanted answers. Like, ‘What happened?’ We did everything right, I think. I’m not a cocky person. I’m not arrogant.
“People told me I was going to get nominated. The world told me. Like, ‘This is it; this is your year.’ We were all very confused.”
Of course, something The Grammy Awards are consistently criticised of is racism.
“If you were like, ‘Do you think the Grammys are racist?’ I think the only real answer is that in the last 61 years of the Grammys, only 10 Black artists have won album of the year,” The Weeknd said.
“I don’t want to make this about me. That’s just a fact.”
Tyler, The Creator called out the Grammy Awards last year after he received an award for Best Rap Album.
“I’m very grateful that what I made could just be acknowledged in a world like this,” he said.
“But also it sucks that whenever we — and I mean guys that look like me — do anything that’s genre-bending, or anything, they always put it in a rap or urban category.”
Read the full interview with The Weeknd here. The Grammy Awards are set to go down on Sunday, 14th March.
