Beyoncé, Adele, Harry Styles Help Columbia Lead All Labels in Big Four Grammy Nominations

With massive successes from superstars Adele, Beyoncé and Harry Styles, Columbia Records landed the most nominations among labels in the Big Four Grammy categories of album, song and record of the year and best new artist announced Tuesday (Nov. 15). With nine nominations, Columbia was comfortably in first, as all three artists earned nominations for album, song and record of the year.

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Columbia’s noms helped parent company Sony Music to lead the charge among label groups, with 16 nominations, besting the Warner Music Group (13), Universal Music Group (nine) and the indie label sector (two). In addition to Columbia, RCA racked up four nominations — Steve Lacy’s “Bad Habit” for record and song; Doja Cat’s “Woman” for record; and Latto for best new artist — while Epic picked up one (DJ Khaled’s “God Did” for song of the year), Sony’s distribution company The Orchard landed another for Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti, and Arista picked up one, with Maneskin getting a nod for best new artist.

The second-biggest haul of nominations was for Warner-owned Atlantic, which landed five: a trio for Lizzo, an album nod for Coldplay and song of the year for new artist GAYLE. Three other Warner Music labels picked up two nominations apiece: Warner Records, with two best new artist nominees in Anitta and Omar Apollo; 300, which saw Mary J. Blige pick up noms in record and album of the year; and Elektra, with perennial Grammy favorite Brandi Carlile getting nominated for record and album of the year. (Earlier this year, 300 and Elektra were merged into the new 300 Elektra Entertainment.) Nonesuch also picked up a best new artist nomination with Molly Tuttle, while Bonnie Raitt — who got a song of the year nomination for “Just Like That” — put out her latest album through her Redwing label, which is distributed by Warner-owned ADA.

Within Universal, Interscope grabbed the most nominations — a trio for Kendrick Lamar — while ABBA’s nods in record and album of the year landed two for Capitol through ABBA’s Polar Music. Four other UMG labels also scored one nomination: Def Jam (best new artist, Muni Long), Republic (song of the year, Taylor Swift’s “All Too Well (10 Minute Version)”), Verve (best new artist, Samara Joy) and Blue Note (best new artist, DOMi & JD Beck, in partnership with APESHIT Records.)

Finally, two nominations for best new artist went to acts unaffiliated with the big three labels: Wet Leg, which released its debut album on Domino; and Tobe Nwigwe, whose latest album was put out through his own imprint The Good Stewards.

Dan Rys

Billboard