This article was written by Kenzo Kimura, class of 2019.
With January coming to an end, many of us still reminisce essential playlists from last year. For the past 12 months, artists new and old have been showing off their new talents, live performances and mesmerizing songs. The 2018 Grammy nominations are here, and this Obscura’s edition focuses on R&B, the new soul searching and melancholic sway of musical genre. On Tuesday, Nov. 28, Billboard Hot 100’s reporter Andra Day revealed “the Big 4 categories” – best new artist, record of the year, song of the year, and album of the year – live on CBS This Morning, and shortly thereafter, the Recording Academy announced the nominees in all 84 categories.
When focusing on all categories, this edition took interest in the Hip Hop and specifically R&B field, two genres that have forever been below the “Pop” genre until this year.
Lora Strom from PBS Newshour reported,“the 60th annual Grammy Award nominations offered some surprise snubs, a lack of traditional pop nominees and a strong showing by today’s leading hip-hop artists.” This is a big deal for the Grammy Awards, revealing the notion that R&B and Hip-Hop are climbing the charts and surpassing the average pop songs. With rhythmic tunes and elevated pitches in singing, R&B nominees show great potential in today’s market not only for the Grammy’s, but also for a reformation in American music as well. Leading artists such as Khalid, Daniel Caesar, SZA and other nominees all contribute a new style towards the 2017 form of R&B. Although they all have their different talents, each artist contributes heavily to the music industry, giving off different vibes of tone, chorus and use of electronic or traditional instrument beats. Whether or not you agree with the nominations, you can still agree that R&B is far from talentless.
The 60th Grammy Awards will be hosted at 4:30 pm PST on January 28th, 2018 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Artists attending include Zendaya, Kendrick Lamar, Charli XCX, Bruno Mars and many more.
Here are 2018’s Nominees:
R&B Field Grammy
Category 17 – Best R&B Performance
(For new vocal or instrumental R&B recordings.)
- Get You
Daniel Caesar Featuring Kali Uchis
- Distraction
Kehlani
- High
Ledisi
- That’s What I Like
Bruno Mars
- The Weekend
SZA
Field 6 – R&B
Category 18 – Best Traditional R&B Performance
(For new vocal or instrumental traditional R&B recordings.)
- Laugh And Move On
The Baylor Project
- Redbone
Childish Gambino
- What I’m Feelin’
Anthony Hamilton Featuring The Hamiltones
- All The Way
Ledisi
- Still
Mali Music
Field 6 – R&B
Category 19 – Best R&B Song
(A Songwriter(s) Award. For Song Eligibility Guidelines see Category #3. (Artist names appear in parentheses.) Singles or Tracks only.)
- First Began
PJ Morton, songwriter (PJ Morton)
- Location
Alfredo Gonzalez, Olatunji Ige, Samuel David Jiminez, Christopher McClenney, Khalid Robinson & Joshua Scruggs, songwriters (Khalid)
- Redbone
Donald Glover & Ludwig Goransson, songwriters (Childish Gambino)
- Supermodel
Tyran Donaldson, Terrence Henderson, Greg Landfair Jr., Solana Rowe & Pharrell Williams, songwriters (SZA)
- That’s What I Like
Christopher Brody Brown, James Fauntleroy, Philip Lawrence, Bruno Mars, Ray Charles McCullough II, Jeremy Reeves, Ray Romulus & Jonathan Yip, songwriters (Bruno Mars)
Field 6 – R&B
Category 20 – Best Urban Contemporary Album
(For albums containing at least 51% playing time of newly recorded contemporary vocal tracks derivative of R&B.)
- Free 6LACK
6LACK
- “Awaken, My Love!”
Childish Gambino
- American Teen
Khalid
- Ctrl
SZA
- Starboy
The Weeknd
Field 6 – R&B
Category 21 – Best R&B Album
(For albums containing at least 51% playing time of new R&B recordings.)
- Freudian
Daniel Caesar
- Let Love Rule
Ledisi
- 24K Magic
Bruno Mars
- Gumbo
PJ Morton
- Feel The Real
Musiq Soulchild
