The highs and lows of Grammys 2024 – and why Taylor Swift won album of year

The 2024 Grammy Awards ended with a bang: Taylor Swift taking dwelling her fourth album of the 12 months trophy.

It cements her place because the one of many best songwriters of her period – though she was gracious sufficient to make use of her speech to reward fellow nominee Lana Del Rey, calling her “a legend in her prime” who has set the agenda for a whole technology of feminine artists.

Regardless of Taylor taking the primary title, it was a reasonably even-handed night time by Grammy requirements.

Favoured nominees like Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish, SZA and Boygenius all went dwelling with a number of prizes, whereas one of the best new artist went to R&B star Victoria Monét – the primary time a feminine R&B act has scooped that award since Alicia Keys in 2002.

Alongside the way in which, there have been loads of shock appearances (Celine Dion!) and show-stopping performances (Burna Boy, Dua Lipa).

Listed here are the highlights, lowlights and takeaways from “music’s greatest night time”.

By any metric, it is an unimaginable feat: Taylor Swift has received album of the 12 months 3 times greater than The Beatles, two greater than Adele and yet one more than Stevie Surprise.

Actually, she’s received the prize greater than anybody. Ever.

Her newest honour is for 2022’s Midnights – a hazy, dream-scrubbed assortment of songs about late-night obsessions.

On the time of launch, it was not her best-received album. And for that motive, many individuals thought R&B star SZA or indie band Boygenius had been extra more likely to win.

However the Grammys aren’t merely about musical benefit, and Swift is presently in the midst of an imperial part. Her Eras tour has damaged field workplace information, boosted native economies, prompted a authorities inquiry into Ticketmaster and even caused seismic activity.

The singer has additionally been named Time Journal’s individual of the 12 months, whereas her romance with Travis Kelce brought new eyes to American football.

It is exhausting to argue towards her cultural dominance – nevertheless it all stems from the music.

That is an element the Recording Academy’s 11,000 voters could have been keenly conscious of. They take songwriting extremely severely, which implies they take Swift – who exists on the crossroads of business success and sonic innovation – severely as properly.

So her fourth Grammy win was all however inevitable, even when your most popular Taylor Swift album is Folklore (appropriate reply), 1989 (additionally acceptable) or Lover (we have to have phrases).

Joni Mitchell’s music is sort of a language of its personal. It is uncooked, magical, virtually painfully stunning.

However over the previous 10 years, the singer was virtually robbed of language after a life-threatening mind aneurysm.

Following intensive rehabilitation, she returned to the stage in 2022 on the Newport Folks Competition – and a recording of that live performance earned the singer the Grammy for finest people album on Sunday night time.

Mitchell adopted that up with a efficiency of Each Sides Now, supported by musicians Brandi Carlile and Jacob Collier.

At first, her voice appeared to catch – however because the music continued, she settled right into a wealthy, dusky vocal tone.

“They are saying, Joni, you’ve got modified,” she sang, adapting the lyrics to the event. “Effectively one thing’s misplaced, however one thing’s gained / In dwelling daily.”

Wealthy with expertise, and laden with significance, the efficiency was exceptionally shifting. It rightly introduced the gang to their ft.

For one in every of rap’s most bodily intense performers, Travis Scott’s set was mystifyingly boring.

The star carried out a medley of My Eyes, I Know? and Fein (key lyric: “Fein, fein, fein, fein, fein, fein“) shrouded in shadow, whereas a dancer wandered round on the lookout for one thing to do.

There was a short frisson when Playboi Carti joined him on stage in a burst of pyrotechnics, nevertheless it all fizzled out with Scott flinging round plastic chairs like an escapee from a Nineteen Eighties wrestling match.

I say off-script, however I am unsure Jay-Z even ready a script.

Honoured with the Dr Dre World Affect Award, which recognises black music creators, the rapper used his allotted time to ship a wide-ranging ramble concerning the Grammys typically.

Straight off the bat, he reminisced about utilizing one in every of his earlier Grammy Awards as a “sippy cup” for his daughter Blue Ivy, who this time accompanied him to the stage.

“Blue’s grown up now,” he added. “She would not take a sippy cup and she or he has her personal Grammys.”

However he did not cease there. He joked about boycotting the 1998 Grammys as a result of his pal DMX had been snubbed. After which he went for the jugular – mentioning Beyoncé.

Famously, his spouse has extra Grammys than anybody in historical past, with 32 in whole. However for all that obvious love, the large prizes have eluded her. Of the 16 instances she’s been nominated within the main classes, she has received simply as soon as: music of the 12 months for Single Girls (Put A Ring On It) in 2010.

“I do not wish to embarrass this younger girl, however she has extra Grammys than everybody and by no means received album of the 12 months,” mentioned Jay-Z. “So even by your individual metrics, that does not work. Take into consideration that.”

Celine Dion shocked the viewers when she emerged to current one of the best album trophy, virtually a 12 months after she was pressured to cancel all of her dwell exhibits after being diagnosed with a rare neurological disorder.

Dion was there to announce the album of the 12 months prize, arriving on stage to the sound of her hit single The Energy Of Love.

However the significance of her look was not misplaced on the gang – who gave her an instantaneous standing ovation.

“Thanks all, I like you proper again. Once I say that I am glad to be right here, I actually imply it from my coronary heart,” mentioned the singer, whose situation causes stiffness of the muscular tissues, affecting her limbs and vocal cords.

She not too long ago introduced a documentary about her return to well being, and promised followers she was on the “street to resuming my performing profession”.

Alt-rock supergroup Boygenius had been additionally triple winners, for his or her debut album The Document, which updates the traditional Nineteen Seventies California rock sound with an emphasis on concord, friendship and feminism.

“We had been all delusional sufficient as children to assume this would possibly occur to us,” mentioned Lucy Dacus, selecting up their first prize – finest rock efficiency for the music Not Sturdy Sufficient.

“Phoebe [Bridgers] would sing on the Guitar Middle, hoping that she would get found. Julien [Baker] needed to play bought out stadiums. And I might follow writing an acceptance speech, and thank all of the individuals who’d been good to me – like my bus driver and the man that held the door at church.

“So I really feel sort of like a child, as a result of that was the final time that one thing like this felt doable.”

Feminine artists totally dominated this 12 months, taking dwelling all the key prizes and many extra in addition to.

Kylie Minogue received finest pop dance recording, and South Africa’s Tyla (pictured) picked up the inaugural award for finest African efficiency.

In the meantime, the previously testosterone-soaked rock and various classes had been dominated by Paramore (led by Hayley Williams) and Boygenius.

It is a reflection of a 12 months during which ladies had been extremely profitable within the charts, and a major change for the Grammys. As not too long ago as 2018, the ceremony was embroiled in controversy when former chairman Neil Portnow mentioned ladies wanted “to step up” in the event that they needed a nomination.

So has the hole been closed? Removed from it. By some counts, solely 20% of artists signed to a serious document label are feminine. Final 12 months, solely 19.5% of all songwriters throughout the Billboard Scorching 100 songs had been ladies.

“What we wish is to be seen as equals, not simply on the inventive facet however on the enterprise facet,” mentioned Dua Lipa on the purple carpet. “We’re nonetheless figuring that out nevertheless it’s getting there slowly.”

Six-time Grammy winner Billy Joel was again on the ceremony this 12 months to carry out Flip The Lights Again On – his first new music in virtually 20 years.

Talking on the purple carpet, he defined why it had taken so lengthy to place pen to paper.

“I gotta go into my cave and turn out to be a caveman,” he informed CBS information. “It is not a enjoyable course of for me. It’s totally self-centred. It’s totally lonely. And typically it is torture. However afterwards, I like having written.”

Joel added that he was stunned to be invited again to the Grammys after his final efficiency in 1994.

Again then, he paused his performance of River Of Dreams mid-song in protest at Frank Sinatra’s speech being minimize quick earlier within the present.

“I checked out my watch and I mentioned, ‘There may be a variety of helpful promoting time going by right here’,” he recalled. “I finished for a very long time… So that they nonetheless may be mad at me for that.”

In a serious coup for the Grammys, Tracy Chapman made her return to the stage to duet with nation star Luke Combs.

The singer, who had a run of profitable albums within the Nineteen Eighties and Nineties, has largely prevented the highlight since her final tour in 2009.

However she was tempted again after Combs coated her signature music Quick Automobile – a haunting folk-rock story about making an attempt to flee poverty – and took it again into the US high 10 final 12 months.

Their efficiency opened with Chapman selecting out the music’s unforgettable riff, then buying and selling verses with Combs earlier than they united on the refrain.

Each singers regarded delighted. Chapman grinned all through, and Combs sang alongside off-mic throughout her solos.

In a video clip forward of the efficiency, Combs mentioned: “Simply to be related along with her in any manner is tremendous humbling for me.”

Within the viewers, Taylor Swift and nation star Jelly Roll sang alongside on the tops of their voices. A easy, however emotional, pleasure.

Look, I am keen on U2. I am from Eire, the place it is virtually a requirement. However typically… oh, man.

The band beamed in dwell from The Sphere, the insane globular Las Vegas venue that is product of 66ft LED screens and was constructed at a value of $2.3bn (£1.83bn).

U2 are enjoying a residency there, and if you happen to dream of a gig the place you spend extra time watching TV screens than watching the band, you then’re welcome to the $750 ticket value.

Their efficiency was principally an enormous advert for the venue, set to Atomic Metropolis – an underwhelming single they put out to coincide with their opening night time final 12 months.

Honest sufficient that the Grammys ought to spotlight innovation in live performance expertise, however every little thing about this was disappointingly mediocre. If solely they’d performed Mysterious Methods.

The Grammys is at all times a blended bag, however this 12 months’s hit price was excessive. Dua Lipa bravely opened the present with a model new music, the pneumatic Coaching Season, whereas gyrating on metallic scaffolding, and SZA recreated the Loopy 88 swordfight from Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Invoice.

Billie Eilish’s rendition of song-of-the-year-winner What Was I Made For? was suitably tear-jerking; and Burna Boy oozed charisma throughout his medley of On Type, Metropolis Boys and Sittin’ On High Of The World.

The In Memoriam part was significantly robust: Stevie Surprise paid touching tribute to his pal Tony Bennett, earlier than Annie Lennox gave a stirring rendition of Sinead O’Connor’s Nothing Compares 2U – backed by Prince’s musical foils Wendy and Lisa.

However it was Fantasia Barrino who stole the present, racing by an electrical efficiency of Tina Turner’s Proud Mary earlier than strolling into the viewers and shimmying with Dua Lipa.

The Queen of Rock ‘N’ Roll would have been proud.

It is Grammy regulation. For those who win a trophy, it’s important to pose awkwardly with it backstage. Bonus factors if you happen to kiss it. Double bonus factors in case you have an armful of the issues.

Who is aware of why at this stage? It is most likely some Illuminati factor.

In her 17-year music profession, Miley Cyrus has had dozens of hits – from Wrecking Ball and The Climb to Nothing Breaks Like A Coronary heart and Midnight Sky.

However she’d by no means received a Grammy… till now.

The singer received two prizes: document of the 12 months and finest pop solo efficiency, each for the instant-classic break-up ballad Flowers.

Cyrus marked the second with a brilliantly tortured metaphor.

“There is a story I wish to inform that sums up this second,” she defined.

“There was a little bit boy and all he needed for his birthday was a butterfly. And so his dad and mom gave him a butterfly web and he was so excited. He simply went exterior, out within the solar, and began swinging and swinging, however with no luck.

“Then he sat down on the bottom, and he lastly let go and he surrendered. He was OK that he wasn’t going to seize this stunning butterfly.

“And proper when he did, is when the butterfly got here and landed proper on the tip of his nostril. And this music, Flowers, is my butterfly.”

Later, Cyrus carried out the music dwell for the primary time, including some parenthetical asides to the lyrics.

“I did not wish to depart you (however I did) / I did not wish to battle (however we did) / Began to cry however then remembered… I simply received my very first Grammy!“

She ended with a mic drop. And rightly so.