Will rock bands perform at the Grammys again soon?
The Grammys have a history of bringing pop music’s top stars to the stage for a live, televised performance every year. However, metal and rock artists are notorious for being left out.
Following an interview with the Recording Academy’s Head of Awards, Bill Freimuth, Loudwire expressed the possibility of metal and rock artists returning to the Grammys in the distant future. In the end, the outcome depends on fans’ demand and the interest of artists that are nominated.
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In the interview, Freimuth explains the Academy doesn’t really know what artists are going to be televised until only a few days before the broadcast. They usually gauge potential performers by who RSVPs to the award ceremony.
“There are a lot of different factors, one of which is, we send out invitations to all the nominees and they respond letting us know whether they’re going to be there or not,” Freimuth says. We don’t want to put a category on the telecast in which we know that several of the nominees aren’t even going to be in the audience. Having the presenter accept on behalf of somebody from the stage doesn’t make for very good television.”
However, according to Loudwire, only one metal performance nominee didn’t show up to the Grammys last year. While Meshuggah missed the ceremony in 2018, other bands (Between The Buried And Me) have moved around their tour schedule just to be in the audience for the forthcoming Grammy awards.
Additionally, in order to televise metal bands, people have to be talking about it on all corners of social media.
“We wait to see what categories people are talking about, where the interest is from the television viewer, the music fan, what’s buzzing on social media… all those factors,” Freimuth says. “We want to put what we hope most people would consider to be the most interesting and exciting competitions to be revealed on the telecast.”
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However, in comparison, hard rock performances happen much less than other genres. In fact, the last time the genre scored a live performance was with Metallica and Lady Gaga at the 59th Grammys. Prior to that, AC/DC performed at the 57th Academy Awards.
Here’s to hoping we see more of this in the future.
As a refresher, check out all of the nominations under the “Rock” category below. You can check out a full list off of 61st Academy Awards nominnees in other genres here.
Best Rock Performance
“Four Out Of Five” — Arctic Monkeys
“When Bad Does Good” — Chris Cornell
“Made An America” — The FEVER 333
“Highway Tune” — Greta Van Fleet
“Uncomfortable” — Halestorm
Best Metal Performance
“Condemned to the Gallows” — Between The Buried And Me
“Honeycomb” — Deafheaven
“Electric Messiah” — High On Fire
“Betrayer” — Trivium
“On My Teeth” — Underoath
Best Rock Song
“Black Smoke Rising” —Jacob Thomas Kiszka, Joshua Michael Kiszka, Samuel Francis Kiszka & Daniel Robert Wagner, songwriters (Greta Van Fleet)
“Jumpsuit” — Tyler Joseph, songwriter (Twenty One Pilots)
“Mantra” — Jordan Fish, Matthew Kean, Lee Malia, Matthew Nicholls & Oliver Sykes, songwriters (Bring Me The Horizon)
“Masseduction” — Jack Antonoff & Annie Clark, songwriters (St. Vincent)
“Rats” — Tom Dalgety & A Ghoul Writer, songwriters (Ghost)
Best Rock Album
Rainier Fog — Alice In Chains
M A N I A — Fall Out Boy
Prequelle — Ghost
From the Fires — Greta Van Fleet
Pacific Daydream — Weezer
Who would you like to see perform at the Grammys in the future? Sound off in the comments below.
