On the phone, producer and musician A.G. Cook sounds exactly like his pop creations—cheerful, accessible and eager to race off on a tangent to explore the next new shiny idea that comes his way. Smashing Pumpkins, Cher, and Theodor Adorno chime and dance and spiral around each other as he talks about making music that hooks you with a fuzzy bath of odd angles.

Cook's best known as the founder of the PC Music label, and for producing Charli XCX's last string of critically acclaimed albums. He's mostly been content to let other artists headline his upbeat, eclectic, warped productions. But that's all changed this year with the release of his album Apple (out on Sept. 18), preceded by a seven-CD set (!) called 7G of new songs, covers, experiments and irrepressible everything. We talked about pop music, auto-tune, and what it's like being the headliner for the first time.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

<style>.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }</style><div class='embed-container'><iframe src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/h86aRWFnXhg' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

You've released so much music this year! This seven CD 7G set, the Apple album; the Charli XCX album How I'm Feeling Now. You have a collaboration with Jonsi coming out. How on earth have you managed to do all this?

I actually finished the Apple album about a year ago. And I was just looking for the right way to contextualize it. And then with the 7G stuff, some of it was done kind of recently, but it's really an exploration of all the sounds that went into Apple. It's a time travel look at things I've been exploring since day one, since seven years ago when I was starting to do this full-time.

Obviously I'm fairly prolific and work with different people. But also I just thought it was the most true version of me to be quite saturated and seeing things from many different angles at the same time. That just felt like the right way to  do a debut.

Were you influenced by COVID and being forced to bunker down at home?

Elements of 7G for sure have a bit of this sort of COVID headspace. I've noticed that me and friends of mine—just having our time organized so differently meant getting deeper into weirder music or music that would actually take up more of your time.

You know, normally, I'd be like in an Uber hearing music on the radio and engaging with pop music in that way. But now I'm falling into the more eclectic side of streaming or even classical music. Suddenly, that all seems a little more approachable, and you end up enjoying the escapism of these slightly more epic projects.

So I think that also gave me the confidence to release it all at once. Rather than 7G being a big series or something, I tried to rationalizes this as an actual album. Because I think that's how I'm digesting music at the moment.

<style>.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }</style><div class='embed-container'><iframe src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/X0lzMJufNUk' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

These are your first full-length releases under your own name. Is that very different than collaborating with others on their album?

Not really. A lot of the people I work with I'm fairly close to. And other people feed into my music too, so their voices appear and disappear even if I'm kind of up front. So I definitely try and keep some of the collaborative vibe.

I'm always writing little songs and recording into my computer and doing that with friends and passing the mic around. I've always had this diary-entry form where I'll come back to a thing that reminds me of something or a song file I started a few years ago and be like, "Oh, this still resonates with me. Maybe I need to look into this properly."

It is you singing on most of these tracks, right? On Apple the songs "Lifeline" and "Oh Yeah," that's your voice?

Yeah. "Lifeline" sort of evolves into Caroline Polachek's vocal by the end. But it's mainly my vocal. In a lot of the songs on both albums you hear me playing with my voice and seeing either how polished I can get it or how raw.

The whole notion of recording your own voice or hearing your own voice back I think is sort of fun. I like the freedom that sometimes I've done loads of work to it, sometimes it's sort of just as it is.

On  "Oh Yeah," the vocal is almost ridiculously upfront. It's not meant to be fully humorous, but it's meant to be very human. You can hear my voice sort of trying to catch up with the melodies.

<style>.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }</style><div class='embed-container'><iframe src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/koI7IRSjfxc' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

One of the songs I was surprised to see you cover on 7G was the Smashing Pumpkings' "Today."

There's certain kinds of hooks that I'm just drawn to. I always heard the main riff as a Sigur Ros thing. It's got this interesting thing with the chord shifting—the chords barely repeat in that song.

"Jumper" on Apple seemed to pick up some of the melody of "Today." Was that intentional?

"Jumper" was me thinking about that kind of guitar song and how bendy it could be be. There's a guitar solo on there that's actually a vocal, but it's been produced pretty much like a guitar. We were actually putting this guitar sampler through auto-tune and letting it glitch out. We were swapping all the traditional effects that you'd normally have on guitars and vocals basically in that one.

Is pop a particular genre of music, do you think, or is it just whatever is on the pop charts?

I don't know how I feel about pop being used in a really strict genre sense. I've heard this term pop classicism used to describe, Gaga, Carly Rae Jepsen, Taylor Swift and Charli to some extent. And that does represent a sound. But there's also hip-hop dominating the charts, other things through TikTok—all kinds of genres, really. And all of those, to me still feel like pop music.

I think the thing that actually unites pop is the concise approach. Fitting things into three minutes or less, having a song structure that lends itself to being understood really easily, having hooks and different forms of hooks through sounds and noises.

I don't know if it's to do with songwriting, but it's this idea that the whole song is actually communicating one thing through the mood of the music and what the lyrics are doing and the sounds. It's understood in a really fast way. And then ideally, those things are also popular or designed to be popular or become popular.

I've been reading this wonderful book The Dialectic of Pop by Agnés Gayraud, and she talks about how Theodor Adorno just hated the idea that music should be understood quickly or easily.

Me and my friend Finn Keane, we have been very, very slowly compiling a book called How Music Ruined Music. Because throughout the ages and really stretching back to ancient music, every time there's a new development there's this whole wave of like, "Oh, this is gonna ruin music."

And you can go backwards: the mp3 is going to ruin it, apps are going to ruin it, streaming is going to ruin it, recording studios are going to ruin it, labels are going to ruin it. And then back to 12 tone is going to ruin it, orchestras are going to ruin it.

And that kind of keeps me going sometimes because, you know, it sort of tells you how much freedom there is really and how valuable music as an art form is.

One big thing that people say is going to ruin music is auto-tune.

Yeah, that's my favorite example.

It's funny, lately, I've been challenging myself and doing a few things where there's no auto-tune and I'm just trying to capture good takes. But I'm not doing in a purist sense at all. 

One of the most interesting things about auto-tune, too, is the way it could have started much earlier.

The track "Believe" by Cher, those producers were the first to crank auto-tune to zero latency, you know. But when they were interviewed they just completely lied to avoid giving the trade secret away. They were like, "Oh, we just use like a really meticulous vocoder and did this and that" and everyone was like, "Okay, fair enough."

<style>.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }</style><div class='embed-container'><iframe src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/nZXRV4MezEw' frameborder='0' allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

But if they had just revealed that [they used auto-tune], you would have had this whole auto-tune wave potentially way earlier, rather than starting with the T-Pain era.

I think it's kind of amazing that the technology was actually around for a while before the style of it really blew up.

But for me, like, so many people now have had experience with apps or GarageBand having auto-tune. So for me auto-tune and that kind of computer recording is like as much of a folk instrument as anything else. I think it's pretty authentic.

I don't really see the binary between real and fake that much when it comes to auto-tune. It's a version of an instrument or a version of the voice. But it definitely didn't ruin music.

Noise Experimentalist Evicshen Talks First LP 'Hair Birth,' Crafting Xenomorph Face Masks & More

Editor's note: This article was updated to include the latest information about Kendrick Lamar's 2024 album release 'GNX,' and up-to-date GRAMMY wins and nominations with additional reporting by Nina Frazier.

When the world crowns you the king of a genre as competitive as rap, your presence — and lack thereof — is palpable. After a five-year hiatus, Kendrick Lamar declaratively stomped back on stage with his fifth studio album, Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, to explain why the crown no longer fits him.

Two years later, Lamar circles back to celebrate the west on 2024's GNX, a 12-track release that revels in the root of his love for hip-hop and California culture, from the lowriders to the rappers that laid claim to the golden state.

“My baby boo, you either heal n—s or you kill n—s/ Both is true, it take some tough skin just to deal with you” Lamar raps on "gloria" featuring SZA, a track that opines on his relationship with the genre.

The Compton-born rapper (who was born Kendrick Lamar Duckworth) wasn't always championed as King Kendrick. In hip-hop, artists have to earn that moniker, and Lamar's enthroning occurred in 2013 when he delivered a now-infamous verse on Big Sean's "Control."

"I'm Makaveli's offspring, I'm the King of New York, King of the Coast; one hand I juggle 'em both," Lamar raps before name-dropping some of the top rappers of the time, from Drake to J.Cole.

Whether you've been a fan of Lamar since before his crown-snatching verse or you find yourself in need of a crash course on the 37-year-old rapper's illustrious career, GRAMMY.com answers nine questions that will paint the picture of Lamar's more than decade-long reign.

Who Discovered Kendrick Lamar?

Due to the breakthrough success of his Aftermath Entertainment debut (good kid, m.A.A.d city), most people attribute Kendrick Lamar's discovery to fellow Compton legend Dr. Dre. But seven years before Dre's label came calling, Anthony "Top Dawg" Tiffith saw potential in a 16-year-old rapper by the name of K.Dot.

Lamar's first mixtape in 2004 was enough for Tiffith's Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE) to offer the aspiring rapper a deal with the label in 2005. However, Lamar would later learn that Tiffith's impact on his life dates back to multiple encounters between his father and the TDE founder, which Lamar raps about in his 2017 track "DUCKWORTH."

How Many Albums Has Kendrick Lamar Released?

Kendrick Lamar has released six studio albums: Section.80 (2011), Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City (2012), To Pimp a Butterfly (2015) DAMN. (2017),Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers (2022), and GNX (2024). Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City, To Pimp a Butterfly and DAMN. received both Rap Album Of The Year and Album Of The Year GRAMMY nominations. 

What Is Kendrick Lamar's Most Popular Song?

Across the board, it's "HUMBLE." The 2017 track is Lamar's only solo No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 (he also reached No. 1 status with Taylor Swift on their remix of her 1989 hit "Bad Blood"), and as of press time, "HUMBLE." is also his most-streamed song on Spotify and YouTube.

How Many GRAMMYs Has Kendrick Lamar Won?

As of November 2024, Kendrick Lamar has won 17 GRAMMYs and has received 57 GRAMMY nominations overall, solidifying his place as one of the most nominated artists in GRAMMY history and the second-most nominated rapper of all time, behind Jay-Z. Five of Lamar's 17 GRAMMY wins are tied to DAMN., which also earned Lamar the status of becoming the first rapper ever to win a Pulitzer Prize.

His most recent wins include three awards at the 2023 GRAMMYs, which included two for his album Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, and Best Rap Performance for "The Hillbillies" with Baby Keem. 

Does Kendrick Lamar Have Any Famous Relatives?

He has two: Rapper Baby Keem and former Los Angeles Lakers star Nick Young are both cousins of his.

Lamar appeared on three tracks — "family ties," "range brothers" and "vent" — from Keem's debut album, The Melodic Blue. Keem then returned the favor for Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, featuring on "Savior (Interlude)" and "Savior" as well as receiving production and writing credits on "N95" and "Die Hard."

Read More: Meet The First-Time GRAMMY Nominee: Baby Keem On Inspiring Rap's Next Generation, Why "Producer Artists" Are The Best & The Likelihood Of A Kendrick Lamar Collab Album

Why Did Kendrick Lamar Wear A Crown Of Thorns?

Lamar can be seen sporting a crown of thorns on the Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers album cover. He has sported the look for multiple performances since the project's release.

Dave Free described the striking headgear as, "a godly representation of hood philosophies told from a digestible youthful lens."

Holy symbolism and the blurred line between kings and gods are themes Lamar revisits often on Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers. He uses lines like "Kendrick made you think about it, but he is not your savior" and songs like "Mirror" to reject the unforeseen, God-like expectations that came with his King of Hip-Hop status.

According to Vogue, the Tiffany & Co. designed crown features 8,000 cobblestone micro pave diamonds and took over 1,300 hours of work by four craftsmen to construct.

Why Did Kendrick Lamar Leave TDE?

After five albums, four mixtapes, one compilation project, an EP, and a GRAMMY-nominated Black Panther: The Album, Kendrick Lamar and Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE) confirmed that Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers was the Compton rapper's last project under the iconic West Coast label. 

According to Lamar, his departure was about growth as opposed to any internal troubles. "May the Most High continue to use Top Dawg as a vessel for candid creators. As I continue to pursue my life's calling," Lamar wrote on his website in August 2021. "There's beauty in completion."

TDE president Punch expressed a similar sentiment in an interview with Mic. "We watched him grow from a teenager up into an established grown man, a businessman, and one of the greatest artists of all time," he said. "So it's time to move on and try new things and venture out."

Before Lamar's official exit from TDE, he launched a new venture called pgLang — a multi-disciplinary service company for creators, co-founded with longtime collaborator Dave Free — in 2020. The young company has already collaborated with Cash App, Converse and Louis Vuitton.

Has Kendrick Lamar Ever Performed at The Super Bowl?

Yes, Kendrick Lamar performed in the halftime show for Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles in 2022, alongside fellow rap legends Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg and Eminem, as well as R&B icon Mary J. Blige. Anderson .Paak and 50 Cent also made special appearances during the star-studded performance. As if performing at the Super Bowl in your home city wasn't enough, the Compton rapper also got to watch his home team, the Los Angeles Rams, hoist the Lombardi trophy at the end of the night.

Three years after his first Super Bowl halftime performance, Lamar will return to headline the Super Bowl LIX halftime show on Feb. 9, 2025 — just one week after the 2025 GRAMMYs — at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. 

Is Kendrick Lamar On Tour?

Yes. Kendrick Lamar is currently scheduled to hit the road with SZA on the Grand National Tour beginning in May 2025. Lamar concluded The Big Steppers Tour in 2022, where he was joined by pgLang artists Baby Keem and Tanna Leone. The tour included a four-show homecoming at L.A.'s Crypto.com Arena in September 2022, followed by performances in Europe,Australia, and New Zealand through late 2022. 

Currently, there are no upcoming tour dates scheduled, but fans should check back for updates following the release of GNX.

The members of the L.A. punk band the Linda Lindas are all under 20 years old but, in many ways, they’re already old hands at the music industry. 

The quartet formed back in 2018 for a performance at a music festival called Girlschool USA when guitarists Bela Salazar and Lucia de la Garza were 14 and 13, respectively; bassist Eloise Wong was 12 years old and drummer Mila de la Garza was only 10. It was supposed to be a one-off appearance, but they enjoyed performing too much to stop. 

A 2021 performance of their two minute punk song "Racist, Sexist Boy" at the Los Angeles Public Library went viral, and the next year they released their first album on Epitaph. They hit Outside Lands and other big festivals. A few years later, their song "Growing Up" was featured on the Inside Out 2 soundtrack, and this summer they toured with Green Day, Smashing Pumpkins and Rancid on a highly anticipated national stadium tour.  

Read More: 5 Women Essential To Punk: Exene Cervenka, Poly Styrene, Alice Bag, Kathleen Hanna & The Linda Lindas

That’s a lot of career before for young musicians who have yet to graduate from high school (or from college, in Bela’s case). But the Linda Lindas are done yet: In October the band released their second album, No Obligation, on Epitaph, and are hopeful that they'll head out on their first headline tour. In the venerable tradition of DIY punk bands past, the album is less an evolution from their bare bones debut than it is a continuation, with more crunchy, three-chords-and-a-prayer riffs backing songs about being stressed out, saying what you mean, finding your own path, and telling harassers to cut it out.

The Linda Lindas spoke with GRAMMY.com about recording with Weird Al Yankovic, their songwriting process, and what their cats are up to now. 

The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You’re kind of music veterans now, right? How has that affected the recording of this album?

Eloise: I think we were more confident in our instruments and more confident in the recording process, and also more confident in our songwriting. Because the first record [has] the first songs that we'd ever written.

Mila: We were basically more confident in general!

Eloise: But I'm super excited for it to be out, and I'm super excited to play new music for more people.

Mila: I mean, we've only been around for like, six years, and when we started the band, that's also when we started learning our instruments. So our first record, we knew how to play our instruments, but I would definitely say that we're better at them now.

Lucia: We didn't really fully understand the concept of going through an album, putting the production on it, putting it out. We were kind of just "Oh, we're just gonna record the songs and put them out."

So we’re excited to show off how we have grown. Not necessarily putting down the first album, but just like, you know, showing that we are older, more grown. And that's partly due to all the opportunities that we've gotten since the first one was put out.

On the album, "Yo Me Estreso" is about stress and "Cartographers" is kind of about, indecision, or not being sure what direction to go in. Has making the new album been a stressful or confusing time? 

Bela: I wouldn't say it's been stressful. I think it's just day to day things that happen in life, and like, making music is an outlet to just talk about what's going on in our lives.

Eloise: Yeah, what's great about being in a band is that we have this outlet to express our stress and we have somewhere to put those feelings. And I think that's really special.

"Yo Me Estreso" is in Spanish, obviously; I just wondered how you decide which language to write in? 

Bela: We write mostly in English. I'm the only one that speaks Spanish. So if I write a Spanish song, then maybe there'll be one in there. But if I don't, there's no Spanish song.

Did "Yo Me Estreso" just come to you in Spanish? 

Bela: Yes and no. I mean, I hate talking about my feelings. I have a really hard time doing that. And writing this song in Spanish felt like a way that I could talk about my feelings without  exposing myself to the world and letting everybody know what the heck is going on in my life. It felt a little bit more intimate, rather than putting myself out there.

You collaborated with Weird Al Yankovic on that song. How did that happen? Are you fans? 

Eloise: Oh, my god. 

Mila: How can you not be? 

Eloise: Well, basically, Bela had already written this song, and we were like, "Oh, it would be cool if there was accordion on it." And I guess he was just the first accordion player that came to mind. We were like, "This is not gonna happen." But he said yes! 

And for the music video, he even brought his own suit and his own hat. He was prepared and super pro. 

Bela: He brought a specific accordion that was correct for the genre. I guess he had a bunch of different ones, and he brought the one that was correct. So it was cool. 

Mila: He was very nice and very professional. 

Lucia: He’s going on tour now. We feel like we should try to see him, because I feel like that'd be so fun. Everyone that says they've seen him live, they say it’s a really amazing show.

Since we’re talking about tours, you toured with Green Day. What was that like? 

Eloise: That tour was so fun. Everyone was super nice on the tour. All the bands were super nice, all the crews were super nice. We had catering, and I loved that. Just pile up as much food as we could eat. 

And then the most fun part about the tour was that we only played like, 20 minutes. So then right after our set I could just go wipe the cat whiskers off — because I wear cat whiskers on stage — and then go into the crowd for Rancid and watch that. And we got to watch Smashing Pumpkins, and we got to watch Green Day. IWho else gets to watch those bands every other day, you know? I feel so lucky to have been on that tour, and I had such a great time.

Lucia: It was just a super great environment and such great music every night. It was really an honor to be on that stage, for sure. Cool crowd, too! 

Were you touring over the summer? I’m just wondering how you balanced it with school. 

Eloise: It started in the summer and then it went into some of the school year.

Lucia: We tried to do both. 

Eloise: Yeah, we tried to keep up with the work, because after shelter in place [for Covid lockdowns], a lot of the work is posted online, so it's easier to access than it might have been otherwise. But, yeah, just kind of trying to do both to our best ability. 

So I thought we might talk about some of the other songs on the album. "Stop" is a song about bullying or harassment. Could you talk about how you wrote that? 

Mila: We were just writing, and I think at the time at school, one of my really good friends was being bothered by these other two classmates. And it wasn't cool. So [raises her palm up]…Stop. 

How do you write? Do you write individually? As a group? 

Lucia: That was a group one. 

Mila: I remember this very specifically. We were sitting on the floor in our back house, and we were just songwriting. And then we moved on from one idea to, oh, what should we do next? And I was like, oh, there's this thing that's happening. 

So are most of your songs sort of written collaboratively? 

Lucia: No, we've written in every way. Any combination. We write individually sometimes, and we write together. Sometimes, we start individually and it ends up together. And sometimes it starts together and ends up individually. There's no formula. There's no step-by-step process that we have. It's just kind of whatever happens, happens.

Could you talk about writing "Excuse Me", which is a song that talks about being stereotyped or profiled? 

Eloise: I wrote that. I think it’s about things that people expect you to be. And sometimes, when you don't conform to that, people are uncomfortable, and it just kind of winds up making everyone uncomfortable. 

But it's cool that I have the band to write a song about it and I have an excuse to yell about it to a bunch of people. 

So what's next for you all now that you've released this album? Are you going on tour? 

Lucia: We’ve never really done our own tour for more than five shows or something. We’ve toured a lot with other bands; but for a band that doesn’t tour very much, we do a lot of touring as an opening band. 

Mila: We haven't done a proper headline tour yet, and we really want to. [Crosses fingers.] Hopefully. 

Lucia: It’s going to happen. And we’re excited to have the album out there and see where the songs go from here. Because they're going to evolve now that we're doing them live. They're going to sound different from the studio. And so it'll be cool to see what journeys they all take on their own. 

So where are you planning to tour? In California? Or elsewhere? 

Bela: Anywhere! Wherever they’ll take us! 

Eloise: Invite us somewhere, please! 

Mila: Europe, South America, Asia… 

Okay, it’s kind of silly, but I did want to ask…we have a Siamese cat, so "Monica," your song about your Siamese cat from your first album, is one of my favorite songs. I'm just wondering what's up with Monica these days? 

Bela: She's doing good! She’s kind of old. Both Monica and Nino are pretty old now, but she went on a walk about five minutes ago. That's why I was kind of late. I had to take her to go get some grass. My cats are indoor/outdoor cats but she needed some grass and she likes the sun, so she went outside to sunbathe.

How old is she now? 

Bela: Both Monica and Nino are 13. Well, Nino's 13 and she's 12, turning 13 in March.  So they’re up there. 

Were they the cats in your video for "Growing Up"? 

Bela: No those were fake cats. I mean, not fake cats. Actor cats. 

Mila: They were professionals.

Bela: Though my cats are probably way better behaved than those cats. 

Eloise: Working with those cats was such a weird experience! 

Mila: The trainers would tell the cats, "Stay still!"  But then we wanted them to act like cats, and not just stand there like [sits rigidly]. 

Bela: For that video, a family friend of ours did these wigs for the cats. So my cat, Nino, was the model for all the wigs, and he just was sitting there, just letting her do whatever. And then when she tried to put the wigs on the real cats, they were just knocking them off. It was crazy. 

Mila: One time we played a headline show in Michigan and someone gave us bracelets, and one of them said, "Golden" on them. 

Eloise: Because it's an inside joke that we have from our childhood. We had this game where we were cats. And one of us was named "Golden."

Mila: And yeah, we were freaked out, because it was like, where did you get that from? And then we realized that it was from that video, because we named the cats. 

Is there anything else you’d like people to know about the album?

Bela: Stream it? Please. Buy the record. Buy a CD, anything. 

Eloise: Yeah, we're super excited to have new music out, and we're super excited to play new music, and I don't know. It’ll just be fun.

Sharing an album with the world is an artist’s way of immortalizing a fragment of their life. Though virality can propel music to the mainstream, releasing an album is a profound accomplishment that can have a deep and laying impact. Albums are more than an encapsulation of a musician’s lived and learned experiences: they’re a way to cherish them forever.

The Recording Academy is proud to present the 2025 GRAMMYs nominees for Album Of The Year, honoring both artistic and technical skill of the highest degree in music. The Category is notably dominated by women this season, while several entries see established artists tapping into new genres and sonic arenas. 

Check out the nominees below and read the full 2025 GRAMMYs nominations list ahead of Music's Biggest Night on Sunday, Feb. 2, 2025. 

André 3000 — 'New Blue Sun'

André 3000 might be best known for his role in Outkast, but recently, the Atlanta rapper has been busy carving out a new reputation as André the flutist.

In the years following Outkast’s split in 2007, André 3000 has been spotted wandering everywhere from LAX to Japan with his flute in tow. Now, the opening track of his first-ever solo album amusingly calls out his genre switch: "I Swear, I Really Wanted to Make a ‘Rap’ Album but This Is Literally the Way the Wind Blew Me This Time."

To record improvisations that eventually birthed New Blue Sun, the flutist worked with producer Carlos Niño, keyboardist Surya Botofasina, and guitarist Nate Mercereau to craft a surreal, textured soundscape. Throughout, André 3000 plays the contrabass flute, Maya flute, wood and bamboo flutes, and more wind instruments — harmoniously uniting to create the artist’s first release in over 17 years.

Composed of eight tracks with bizarre, lengthy titles, the lyricless New Blue Sun is labeled as new-age and experimental jazz. It’s fairly shocking that André 3000 is not a trained musician, given the project’s brilliance; led primarily by rhythm, and using his instincts developed from rapping, the expert flutist embeds New Blue Sun with an organic authenticity. The album feels limitlessly atmospheric, dipping into an ambience that teeters between peaceful and precarious.

With Big Boi in the ‘90s, André 3000 undoubtedly helped shape hip-hop, pushing the genre forward with creative integrations of funk, jazz, rock, and gospel. In 2024, he continues to break rules as he champions alternative jazz — all with his flute by his side.

When Beyoncé’s first country song came out in 2016, people questioned if the icon belonged on the country radio — despite the indisputable impact of Black artists on the genre. Eight years later, the genre-bending diva is still drowning out the noise by switching on her very own radio station: COWBOY CARTER’s KNTRY Radio Texas, that is.

The fantasy station is one of the many visionary elements of COWBOY CARTER, an album that honors the cultural contributions of Black artists to American country music. The eighth studio project is Act II of her album trilogy; while the first installment RENAISSANCE (2022) focused on futuristic escapism, COWBOY CARTER looks to the past. It pays vibrant tribute to the Black community’s roots in country music, offering a glorious reimagination of Americana.

Not just championing but also reinventing Southern subgenres, COWBOY CARTER is yet another example of Beyoncé’s revolutionary versatility. From horseshoe steps to boot stomps to Beyoncé’s fingernails as percussion, the album unites bluegrass, zydeco, folk, R&B, and more to craft a majestic testament to Beyoncé’s boundless artistry.

Boasting 27 tracks and five years in the making, the Texas-born legend’s album includes features from Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, Linda Martell, Miley Cyrus, Post Malone, Shaboozey, Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, Reyna Roberts, and Brittney Spencer, embracing country legends as well as making space for up-and-coming Black artists on the scene.

While Beyoncé has yet to take home GRAMMY Gold for Album Of The Year, she remains the artist with the most GRAMMY wins of all time. After all, this isn’t her first rodeo.

"Oh, I leave quite an impression," Sabrina Carpenter croons on Short n’ Sweet, with a nonchalance that’s virtually intoxicating. While the 25-year-old indeed stands at just five feet tall, it’s evident the actress-turned-songstress has enough talent to fill a stadium.

Glowing with lighthearted, honest-to-goodness genius, Short n’ Sweet is the cherry on top of Carpenter’s already extensive discography. Her sixth studio album spawned a trinity of 2024 hits: "Espresso," "Please Please Please" and "Taste." With this remarkable trio, Carpenter became the first artist since the Beatles to chart their first three top five US hits in the same week. Short n’ Sweet's success was boosted by her Coachella debut earlier in the year, and furthered during her first arena tour.

On her delightful summer hit "Espresso," Carpenter explicitly mentions that her "twisted humor" is what makes her lovable, which might remind older fans of her 2022 single "Nonsense." The pop track went viral for its raunchy, often silly outros that Carpenter lovingly tailored to each city she toured in — and on Short n’ Sweet, she taps into her risqué wit much more fully, rocketing her album to another level of memorable.

Undoubtedly, it’s Carpenter’s bright confidence that makes space for her playful pen game on Short n’ Sweet. With her signature plucky yet composed soprano, she balances her soulful ardor with her deadpan humor expertly, allowing her to explore the nuances of romance in new and clever ways — all while maintaining her infectious charisma that earned her her first GRAMMY nominations this year.

Charli xcx knows how to throw a party, and on June 7, 2024, she turned the world into her own nightclub. BRAT, her sixth studio album, gloriously splattered the globe a garish green, with hits like "360," "Apple," and "Von Dutch" soundtracking the summer.

Ten years after scoring her first GRAMMY nominations for "Fancy" with Iggy Azalea, the British queen of "brat summer" continues to crank out bangers about chandelier swinging and driving in the fast lane. Working with producers A.G. Cook, EASYFUN, Cirkut, her fiancé George Daniel, and other longtime collaborators, Charli conjured her own genre: a chic, club-ready pop blend of electroclash and hyperpop.

Though the self-proclaimed 365 party girl sings about dancing until dawn and sipping one too many aperol spritzes, BRAT is also Charli’s most vulnerable album, her long nails gingerly peeling back the sticky layers of fame and womanhood. BRAT makes blunt confessions about jealousy, questioning motherhood, grief, and intergenerational trauma. Brilliantly, she’s dauntless and exposed all at once — and still bumpin’ that at the club.

Her popular co-headlining SWEAT Tour with GRAMMY-nominated collaborator Troye Sivan vroom-vroomed BRAT to arenas across the U.S. Charli xcx might have had her shades on while performing, but make no mistake: she has nothing to hide.

When people think of contemporary jazz, rollercoaster might not be the first word that comes to mind — but Jacob Collier is nothing if not ambitious. As the climax of his four-album project dating back to 2018, Djesse Vol. 4 triumphs as an odyssey through genre.

What makes Collier such a prolific musician is his refusal to distill abundance. He sees the beauty in anything and everything, and Djesse Vol. 4 brings his perspective to life. The project not only centers but celebrates the human voice; in fact, about 150,000 voices feature on Djesse Vol. 4 — many from his own concert audiences that he transformed into improvised choirs. 

Collier has won multiple GRAMMY Awards for Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals, and Djesse Vol. 4 continues to showcase his mastery of sound via genre diversity. The nominated album is modern and sprawling, from the serenity of his audience-choirs to howling of heavy metal. Djesse Vol. 4 is thought-provoking, engrossing, and oftentimes surprising; who else would have aespa and Chris Martin on the same track?

Collier is the first British artist to win a GRAMMY for each of his first four albums, and Djesse Vol. 4 already boasts a GRAMMY-nominated track on it (2022’s "Never Gonna Be Alone," featuring Lizzy McAlpine and John Mayer, which was later announced as the album’s first single). Collier was previously nominated for Album Of The Year for Djesse Vol. 3 and also received a nod at the 2023 GRAMMYs in the same Category for Coldplay’s nominated Music of the Spheres.

Djesse Vol. 4 has redefined Collier’s perspective on life, and in a way, Collier’s album is more than a reflection: it’s an open invitation.

Billie Eilish had a fear of water as a child, yet to capture the album cover for HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, she spent six brutal hours on-and-off submerged underwater with a weight on her shoulders. "A lot of my artwork is painful physically in a lot of ways, and I love it," the 22-year-old told Rolling Stone. "Oh, my God, I live for it."

Eilish delves beneath the surface in more ways than one on HIT ME HARD AND SOFT. As rippling, immersive alt-pop, the album swims through similar topics covered in her first two studio albums, including coping with fame, body image, and post-breakup grief. Yet Eilish is no longer the proudly self-proclaimed "bad guy"; instead she doesn’t tether herself to a persona.

In this way, HIT ME HARD AND SOFT holds dear a newfound, striking level of maturity. Eilish is incontestably true to herself, and lyrically, the album feels especially unbridled and attentive. With its title a paradoxical demand, HIT ME HARD AND SOFT powerfully represents the impossible struggle between intensity and tenderness — both in love and in life.

Though the album cascades as an emotional torrent, it’s as cohesive as it is potent. It’s (unsurprisingly) produced by her brother and day-one collaborator, FINNEAS, whose minimalistic but nevertheless hard-hitting soundscape gives bedroom pop a makeover. Eilish’s third Album Of The Year nomination shows that, once again, she isn’t treading water; she’s plunging straight into the deep end.

In the prismatic world of pop, Chappell Roan knows how to rotate through every color in the rainbow. A kaleidoscope of wistful yet intense romance, Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess churns with the unabashed authenticity that only true superstars can craft — and on a debut album, nonetheless.

Although Roan’s career began 10 years ago on YouTube, the Missouri-born singer skyrocketed to fame in the last year following spectacular festival performances and an opening slot on Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts World Tour. Her 2020 single "Pink Pony Club" pushed the singer toward a massive 2024 breakthrough, the song an open proclamation of queer joy (amid understanding her evolving relationship with religion).

Inspired by drag queens, Roan’s aesthetic is breathtakingly campy and sparkly — much like her striking debut album. Championing female and queer freedom, The Rise And Fall gushes with yearning in a way that’s both carefree and confessional. From the hungry, heart-shattering "Casual" to the kinky pleasure of "Red Wine Supernova," each track showcases Roan’s sharp dynamism.

The Rise And Fall bursts with radiant '80s-inspired and 2000s synthpop from GRAMMY-winning producer Dan Nigro, all of which only highlights her dynamism. Beyond her vocal flips and cutting lyricism meant for laughing and/or crying, what’s special about Roan’s album is its defiance. Chappell Roan is the definition of unapologetic, and The Rise And Fall is all the evidence anyone needs.

Before it was even released, The Tortured Poets Department had already made GRAMMY history: during her acceptance speech for the 2024 GRAMMY Award for Best Pop Vocal Album, Taylor Swift surprised audiences by announcing the album’s upcoming release. And just one year later, Swift is making history yet again with her seventh Album Of The Year nomination.

Serving as a creative "lifeline" for Swift during the Eras Tour, working on The Tortured Poets Department reminded the star of how integral songwriting is to her wellbeing. Consequently, the 16-track album (plus an additional 15 tracks in an expanded version of the labrum) unveiled some of her most diaristic songwriting yet. Swift's meandering lyrics stand out as particularly candid, dramatic, and whimsical — though it’s far from the first time the prolific songwriter has used or referenced poetry in her work.

For a return to her folksy synthpop sound, Swift turned to her close friends Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner, who most recently helped produce her GRAMMY-winning album Midnights among other projects. Showcasing Swift’s collaborative brilliance, The Tortured Poets Department also features Post Malone on the hauntingly atmospheric opener "Fortnight" and a stirring "Florida!!!" verse from Florence + the Machine.

As the Eras Tour comes to a close (unless, of course, she has another surprise up her sleeve) on Dec. 8 in Vancouver, The Tortured Poets Department’s nomination is one of the many recent reminders of Swift’s staggering legacy. Swift is the first and only person to have won Album Of The Year four times, and The Tortured Poets Department could score her a legendary fifth win — further solidifying her as a breaker of records and rules.

The Record Of The Year Category honors some of the year's biggest recordings — and at the 2025 GRAMMYs, the nominees are hits by a mix of newcomers and superstars.

Throughout the past year, Billie Eilish, Sabrina Carpenter, Charli xcx, and Chappell Roan proved why they're at the top of pop's current class. The Beatles and Kendrick Lamar both cemented their respective legacies, while Beyoncé and Taylor Swift continue to challenge their own musical boundaries.

With a range of unforgettable music moments, there's no telling who will take home the golden gramophone for Record Of The Year — which is awarded to the artist and the producer(s), recording engineer(s) and/or mixer(s) and mastering engineer(s) — at the 67th Annual GRAMMY Awards. But one thing is for sure: the eight nominees make for quite an exciting contest.

Check out the nominees below and read the full 2025 GRAMMYs nominations list ahead of Music's Biggest Night on Sunday, Feb. 2, 2025.

It can take years for an artist to work on their masterpiece. In the Beatles' case, the journey of "Now And Then" took 45 years. John Lennon originally wrote the demo in the late '70s. It's a mournful, piano-backed confession: "I know it's true/ It's all because of you/ And if I make it through/ It's all because of you."

The song remained unfinished long after Lennon's tragic 1980 passing, but — in a powerful act of love — his bandmates completed it for him. Paul McCartney enlisted Giles Martin (the son of Beatles' former producer and longtime collaborator George Martin) as the song's co-producer, using Lennon's original 1977 demo, George Harrison's guitar melodies from the 1995 Anthology sessions, and Ringo Starr's drumming and backing vocals from 2022. "Now And Then," which marked the Beatles' 35th top 10 single on the Billboard Hot 100, is a tearful close to the band's legacy. 

"Obviously, it hasn't been, but it sounds like John's written it for Paul now, in a very emotional way," Martin told Rolling Stone. "It's a bittersweet song, which is very John. But with a combination of happiness and regret." 

McCartney never gave up on the song, which is a testament that true friendship never dies.

Beyoncé — "TEXAS HOLD 'EM"

After shimmying underneath a disco ball for 2022's GRAMMY-winning RENAISSANCE, Beyoncé wanted to keep the dance party going on 2024's COWBOY CARTER — except this time around, she traded Studio 54 for a honky-tonk. But "TEXAS HOLD 'EM," the album's joint lead single alongside "16 CARRIAGES," is much more than an instructional hoedown.

The 32-time GRAMMY winning icon has long incorporated African American history in her music, and "TEXAS HOLD 'EM" is no different. The single, like many tunes on COWBOY CARTER, is rooted in liberation. Country music is the backbone of America, but its roots in Black culture are often hidden. With "TEXAS HOLD 'EM," Beyoncé lifts the veil off the genre's true history by celebrating both her Houston heritage and the Black country artists that paved the way for her.

The song's message is clear, but it's balanced by playful melodies, Beyoncé's signature stacked harmonies and a plucking banjo (played by Rhiannon Giddens, an advocate for the reclamation of country music instruments by Black musicians). While Beyoncé is no stranger to chart-topping hits ("TEXAS HOLD 'EM" is her ninth solo No. 1 single on the Hot 100), she made history as the first Black woman to score a No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart.

Sabrina Carpenter does whimsy so well. Chalk it up to her Disney Channel roots, but the singer's innate ability to craft an earworm is why she's skyrocketed as one of the biggest pop stars of the new generation. "Espresso," the lead single from 2024's Short n' Sweet album and unofficial song of the summer, encapsulates Carpenter's irresistible charm.

"The song is kind of about seeing femininity as your superpower, and embracing the confidence of being that b—," she told Vogue in April. 

That confidence is found all throughout "Espresso," from her cooing vocals to her cheeky songwriting ("I can't relate to desperation/ My give-a-f—s are on vacation"). Topped off by an irresistibly catchy, undulating chorus, "Espresso" helped Carpenter reach several career milestones that kickstarted a year full of them — including her first GRAMMY nominations.

Charli xcx has long been one of the coolest girls in pop, and her sixth album brat cemented that fact. On "360," the album's second single, the British star not only acknowledges her own cool factor, but of those around her. Produced by longtime collaborator A. G. Cook, the song trades in the producer's signature exaggerated hyperpop sonics for more minimalistic synths that complement Charli's auto-tuned vocals.

"I went my own way and I made it/ I'm your favorite reference, baby," Charli xcx exclaims on the cocky opening line before comparing herself to friends like model/musician Gabbriette and actress Julia Fox. "360" is a cheeky reflection of the ever-growing digital era, giving fellow internet "It" girls an anthem for the ages.

Billie Eilish — "BIRDS OF A FEATHER"

The beauty of Billie Eilish's artistry is in her vulnerability. For the nine-time GRAMMY winner's third album HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, she pushed herself into her deeper territories with the assistance of her brother and go-to collaborator FINNEAS.

Second single "BIRDS OF A FEATHER" best exemplifies the album title's meaning in both its tenderness and desperation. It was initially intended to be a traditional love song, but given the siblings' unorthodox track record, they couldn't resist making it slightly untraditional: "I want you to stay/ 'Til I'm in the grave/ 'Til I rot away, dead and buried/ 'Til I'm in the casket you carry," Eilish sings on the opening verse in her signature whisper. 

Even with the juxtaposing lyrics, the song's airy production and wistfully gauzy synths still make for a beautiful, adoring statement piece. And the heartfelt sentiment paired with Eilish's breathy vocals quickly made "BIRDS OF A FEATHER" the biggest hit from HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, already garnering nearly 1.5 billion Spotify streams as of press time.

Branding Kendrick Lamar's "Not Like Us" as merely a diss track would be doing it a disservice. The 17-time GRAMMY winner's tune is not just a rap song, but a cultural phenomenon. A seething finale to his (very public) feud with Drake, "Not Like Us" is a triumphant win for both Lamar and rap music as a whole.

Atop a buzzing sample of Monk Higgins' 1968 "I Believe to My Soul" cover, Lamar delivers slick wordplay and calls out Drake's presumed cultural appropriation of Southern rap: "You run to Atlanta when you need a few dollars/ No, you not a colleague, you a f—in' colonizer."

Following its release, the song took on a life on its own: tennis icon Serena Williams (Drake's alleged former lover) crip walked to the track at the 2024 ESPY Awards, Megan Thee Stallion and Janet Jackson incorporated it into their concerts, and many national sports leagues used it in their game broadcasts.

Drama aside, "Not Like Us" — which also scored a Song Of The Year nomination — is a celebration of West Coast hip-hop. Lamar, a proud Compton native, enlisted Los Angeles-born DJ Mustard to produce the track. The chopped-up sample is inspired by Oakland's "hyphy" rap subgenre, while Lamar exaggerates his already-animated cadence, paying homage to late Los Angeles rapper Drakeo the Ruler. While "Not Like Us" is a targeted diss, it's also a reminder of California's historical impact on rap — and Lamar's place within that legacy.

Chappell Roan grabbed the world's attention with her bombastic interpretation of baroque pop and her knack for highlighting queer romance. "Good Luck, Babe!," April's breakout hit following her 2023 debut LP, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, ushered in a new chapter.

The song discusses compulsory heterosexuality, as Roan sings about a woman she's dating who tries to deny her feelings for Roan: "You can kiss a hundred boys in bars/ Shoot another shot, try to stop the feeling." 

"I knew exactly what I wanted. I wrote it in three minutes," Chappell Roan told Rolling Stone of the song's creation, which she co-wrote alongside Daniel Nigro and Justin Tranter. "I felt so much anger. I was so upset. It all came out and I didn't add anything when I wrote it all done. It was a perfect storm."

The anger definitely explodes on "Good Luck, Babe!," with Roan channeling '80s divas like Kate Bush and George Michael. The singer's goal was to make a "big anthemic pop song," and "Good Luck, Babe!" soared beyond all expectations.

Taylor Swift Feat. Post Malone — "Fortnight"

Despite nailing a formula that has made her one of the biggest pop stars of all time, Taylor Swift is still willing to take risks.

"Fortnight," from the 14-time GRAMMY winner's The Tortured Poets Department, serves as both the LP's first single and opening track. The chart-topping smash introduces the album's moodier tones, telling the story of a woman in an unhappy marriage who is now the neighbor to her ex-lover and his new wife. 

Atop '80s-inspired electropop synths courtesy of longtime collaborator and co-producer Jack Antonoff, the lyrics are unexpectedly dismal for Swift: "I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary/ And I love you, it's ruining my life." Featured artist Post Malone then sweeps in with his melancholic harmonies, giving more emotional weight to Swift's brilliant storytelling.