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 Jay Z picked up nominations in nine categories across pop and
rap, including best pop duo performance for "Suit & Tie" with
Justin Timberlake, and best rap album for his July release,
"Magna Carta...Holy Grail."
But the 44-year-old Brooklyn, New York-born rapper failed to
land solo nods in the top Grammy categories for record, song,
and album of the year, scoring only one as a producer on Lamar's
"Good Kid, M.A.A.D City" record, nominated in the album of the
year category.
Lamar's album will face off against Sara Barielles' "The Blessed
Unrest," French electro-dance duo Daft Punk's "Random Access
Memories," Taylor Swift's "Red" and Macklemore & Ryan Lewis'
"The Heist" for album of the year.
Seattle rapper-producer duo Macklemore & Ryan Lewis capped their
stellar rise over the past year from the independent music scene
into mainstream pop with seven nominations, including song of
the year for "Same Love," featuring Mary Lambert, and the
coveted best new artist category.
"It feels very, very, very surreal. I don't think it's ever
going to feel normal. ... It's something that we never ever
thought was possible when we were making this album," Macklemore,
whose real name is Ben Haggerty, said backstage.
The duo will be facing off with Lamar, country music singer
Kasey Musgraves and British singers James Blake and Ed Sheeran
for the best new artist accolade, which has been won by Adele
and FUN. in recent years.
California rapper Lamar, 26, also picked up five nominations in
the R&B and rap categories. Singer-producer Pharrell scored
seven nods, including for album, record and song of the year for
his work as a featured artist on Daft Punk's "Random Access
Memories" and Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines."
The record of the year category featured five songs that all
achieved commercial and chart success this year: "Get Lucky" by
Daft Punk, "Radioactive" by alt-rockers Imagine Dragons,
"Royals" by Lorde, Bruno Mars' "Locked Out of Heaven" and
"Blurred Lines" by Thicke, featuring T.I. and Pharrell.
The Grammy Awards are the music industry's top accolades and are
voted on by members of the Recording Academy for more than 80
categories spanning all genres. To be eligible for nominations
this year, artists had to release their music between Oct. 1,
2012, and Sept. 30, 2013.
The nominations for the top awards and main categories were
announced during an hour-long televised concert on Friday from
Los Angeles. The winners will be announced on January 26 at a
live televised ceremony in Los Angeles.
[to top of second column] |
 LORDE REIGNS, BUT MALE ARTISTS DOMINATE
For the second year running, male artists dominated the nominees
for the 2014 awards, while Lorde, Musgraves and Swift led the
female artists with four nominations each.
Lorde, the 17-year-old New Zealand newcomer whose real name is
Ella Yelich O'Connor, is notable for writing her own songs,
including the hit "Royals," which picked up nods for record and
song of the year, as well as best pop solo performance.
"This isn't the kind of thing that happens to people from New
Zealand, so it feels good," the singer said backstage.
Also nominated with Lorde for song of the year, a songwriters'
award, are "Just Give Me a Reason" by Pink and FUN.'s Nate Ruess,
Mars' "Locked Out of Heaven," Katy Perry's "Roar" and Macklemore
& Ryan Lewis' "Same Love."
Timberlake, 32, who made a return to the musical spotlight this
year after a five-year hiatus with the two-part release of "The
20/20 Experience," picked up seven nominations in the pop, R&B and
rap categories, but failed to make the top three categories.
His record "The 20/20 Experience — The Complete Experience," one of
the year's top-selling sets, earned a best pop album nomination.
Swift, 23, who has won seven Grammys, scored nominations in the
country music category, including best country album for "Red."
Texas native Musgraves, 25, nominated for best new artist, will
compete with Swift in the country song and album categories.
Notably absent from the nominees were British boy band One
Direction, which has topped the Billboard 200 album chart with all
three of its albums over the past year, and Grammy-winner Lady Gaga,
whose August song "Applause" was eligible and scored chart success,
but failed to win over Grammy voters.
(Additional reporting by Sue Zeidler and Kelly Furey;
editing by
Peter Cooney)
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