GRAMMYs CEO addresses The Weeknd's snub

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The nominations for the 2021 Grammy Awards were announced on Tuesday. And, as usual, there were plenty of surprising inclusions and exclusions; the most shocking of which was The Weeknd's complete shutout. Harvey Mason Jr., the Recording Academy's interim president and CEO, addressed the snub during a couple of post-announcement interviews, stating the decision simply came down to the number of votes and limited slots in each category.

"For The Weeknd, in every year you only have a certain amount of people you can nominate for each category," Mason told Billboard. "... We are excited about some of the other categories where he was nominated. It’s never easy to tell where people are going to land."

He made similar comments during a Q&A with Variety, explaining the steps of the nomination process, which he described as both fair and arduous.

"... All the records get the fairest of fair shakes. We listen to all the music — even an album, you’re listening to almost the whole album, it takes I don’t know how many hours," he said. "It’s a long, arduous process and people take pride in it. The people in that room care: there's no agendas in there, there's no 'let's snub this person' or that person. It's about. 'Let’s try and find excellence.' Also, you have to remember that committee can't vote on something that's not there."

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[Snow 17,193]

They also asked him about Harry Styles, who was snubbed in the Big Four categories. This was his response, which is basically a non-response:

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"As for Harry, he has some great nominations this year [even though he wasn’t nominated in the top categories]."

He also talked about the two-step voting process:

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Mason went on to briefly explain the Academy's two-step voting process, in which the committees make their decisions based on a shortlist of "the 20 top vote-getters from the general voting field."

He would not, however, say whether The Weeknd's After Hours was on any of those shortlists. Mason also danced around the question of whether he could recall a time when a record as big as After Hours had been completely snubbed.

"I can’t ever remember a time when we’ve had 23,000 entries — that is the most entries we’ve ever had," he told Variety. "I can’t remember a time when we’ve ever had this much range of genres and different types of musicians and music all in the [top four] categories. It’s actually amazing."

 

[GRANDESPOV 300]

abel had one of the biggest albums of 2020 and received zero nominations not even for blinding lights which spent the most weeks in the top 5 ever for a song  this is mess

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20 minutes ago, Snow said:

"... All the records get the fairest of fair shakes. We listen to all the music — even an album, you’re listening to almost the whole album, it takes I don’t know how many hours," he said

wait so they don't even listen to the full albums???  

[GlenCoco 6,300]

ok how much did Scotter Rat payed them to nominate Yucky ?

 

[Royale 70,250]

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The Weeknd was faced with a tough choice -- perform the Grammys or the Super Bowl -- but hammering out a deal to do both could've cost him Grammy nominations.

Sources familiar with the situation tell us The Weeknd's team was in talks for weeks with Grammy brass, who issued the ultimatum -- us or Super Bowl LV. We're told both sides eventually came to an agreement where Abel could do both, but not without negotiations getting very testy.

Our sources say there's growing suspicion Abel's decision to perform at this year's Super Bowl cost him Grammy noms because the bitter back-and-forth talks pissed off Grammy honchos.

It's unclear why the Grammys would play such hardball in trying to exclusively book him for their airwaves. It might be fear of duplicate performances, as CBS is airing the award show AND the game one week apart in February. Still, our sources tell us Abel and co. feel the dispute might have something to do with his exclusion.

Abel wasn't the only one who fans felt got cheated this year, voicing outrage Pop Smoke, Roddy Rich and Lil Baby -- all Black hip-hop artists -- didn't receive more nominations.

If The Weeknd does decide to stick to the deal and perform at both events -- it would be a huge achievement for any artist.

 

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15 minutes ago, Royale said:

 

The Super Bowl and The Grammys are both on CBS - so I’m not sure he was snubbed for agreeing to SB and not the Grammys. 

[Divine 162,849]

1 hour ago, Snow said:

It's about. 'Let’s try and find excellence.'

Ah yes because YUMMY and INTENTIONS is so much more excellent than anything from After Hours...