Barbie isn’t the only one taking on the patriarchy in 2023 — so is Grammy.
In fact, when the nominees for the 66th annual Grammy Awards were announced on Friday morning, women ruled — make that, owned — the Big 4 categories: Album, Record and Song of the Year, plus Best New Artist.
The diva domination was most drastically disproportionate in what are really the Big 2 categories: Album and Record of the Year. There is only one single, solitary man — former “Late Show” bandleader Jon Batiste, the 2022 Album of the Year winner for “We Are,” who is nominated again for “World Music Radio” — among the 16 nominees. (Maybe there are some dudes now regretting that they cut the Big 4 fields from 10 back to eight this year.)
And you know there is some kind of cosmic shift happening when even an act called Boygenius — up for Album (“The Record”) and Record (“Not Strong Enough”) of the Year — is actually an indie-chick supergroup comprised of Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus.
Oh, the cruel irony.
But the real female power players in the top categories are SZA, Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo and Miley Cyrus, who are each up for Album, Record and Song of the Year.
SZA, who leads all nominees with nine nods, is up for her No. 1 album “SOS” and its long-running hit “Kill Bill”; Swift contends again with her “Midnights” LP and its smash single “Anti-Hero”; Rodrigo made the cut for her sophomore set “Guts” and its chart-topping tune “Vampire”; and Cyrus, who had the real record of the year with “Flowers,” also got full-length love for “Endless Summer Vacation.”
Notching six nods apiece, Swift, Rodrigo, Cyrus and Boygenius are all tied for the third-most nominations with two other women: country singer-songwriter Brandy Clark and seven-time Grammy winner Billie Eilish, whose “Barbie” tune “What Was I Made For?” is also up for both Record and Song of the Year.
But in one of the biggest surprises, all of those women have been trumped by R&B breakout Victoria Monét, who scored seven nominations, including prestigious props for Record of the Year (“Oh My Mama”) and Best New Artist. Although you could argue that Monét — who has written for the likes of Ariana Grande and Chloe x Halle — isn’t exactly new since she released her debut EP, “Nightmares & Lullabies: Act 1,” way back in 2014, it’s hard to begrudge the 34-year-old singer-songwriter this moment.
Add to that the fact that Janelle Monáe’s “The Age of Pleasure” — in another big surprise — and Lana Del Rey’s “Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd” beat out Foo Fighters’ “But Here We Are” and Drake and 21 Savage’s “Her Loss” for Album of the Year nominations, and it feels like the dudes were just doomed.
Drake and 21 Savage were not alone — not one rap act was nominated for Album, Record or Song of the Year, which is certainly disappointing for the 50th anniversary of hip-hop.
Country also got kicked to the curb in the top categories, despite the fact that both Luke Combs and Morgan Wallen rocked the pop charts with “Fast Car” and “Last Night,” respectively.
And Lainey Wilson — who just won Entertainer of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards on Wednesday — was also snubbed in the Big 4 categories that will be presented on Feb. 4 at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. So maybe there wasn’t Grammy justice for all women either.