56th Grammy Award Nominations

Jay-Z leads the pack of the 56th Grammy nominations with nine as the announcement was also full of typically shocking snubs and head-scratching mentions. Jay-Z’s haul left him entirely out of the general field as was Justin Timberlake, who got seven nominations. Newcomers Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Pharrell (for his worth with both Daft Punk and Robin Thicke on the two biggest songs of last summer) also came away with seven apiece. Kendrick Lamar surprised with seven nominations as well, including a bid for Album of the Year. That category also saw a surprise nomination for Sara Bereilles and her album The Blessed Unrest. Breakout star Lorde scored in Record of the Year and Song of the Year (“Royals”) but was mysteriously snubbed for Best New Artist. Daft Punk, ending the best year of their multi-decade career, snagged four nominations, including Album of the Year, Song of the Year (“Get Lucky”) and Record of the Year (“Get Lucky”).

Top category nominations:

Album of the Year
The Blessed Unrest, Sara Bareilles
Random Access Memories, Daft Punk
Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, Kendrick Lamar
The Heist, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Red, Taylor Swift

Song of the Year
“Just Give Me a Reason,” Jeff Bhasker, Pink & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Pink Featuring Nate Ruess)
“Locked Out of Heaven,” Philip Lawrence, Ari Levine & Bruno Mars, songwriters (Bruno Mars)
“Roar,” Lukasz Gottwald, Max Martin, Bonnie McKee, Katy Perry & Henry Walter, songwriters (Katy Perry)
“Royals,” Joel Little & Ella Yelich O’Connor, songwriters (Lorde)
“Same Love,” Ben Haggerty, Mary Lambert & Ryan Lewis, songwriters (Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Featuring Mary Lambert)

Record of the Year
“Get Lucky,” Daft Punk
“Radioactive,” Imagine Dragons
“Royals,” Lorde
“Locked Out of Heaven,” Bruno Mars
“Blurred Lines,” Robin Thicke feat. T.I. and Pharrell

Best New Artist
James Blake
Kendrick Lamar
Kacey Musgraves
Ed Sheeran
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

Full list of nominees at the Grammy website: http://www.grammy.com/nominees#main

• Author
• Recent Posts

Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Critics Choice Association (CCA), San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

Latest posts by Erik Anderson (see all)

• Golden Globes Set Mid-January Date for 2026 Awards on CBS - April 24, 2025
• Focus Features Sets Thanksgiving Release for Chloé Zhao’s ‘Hamnet’ Starring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal - April 24, 2025
• Cannes 2025: Lynne Ramsay’s ‘Die, My Love’ with Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson Added to Comp; Kristen Stewart’s ‘The Chronology of Water’ Lands Sidebar Premiere - April 23, 2025