Why Madonna, The Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney Could Be Grammy Dark Horses
Categoria: Musica
When legacy acts score album of the year nods (and wins), it doesn’t always go over well — but this year, three deserving veterans who generated buzz could be deserving nominees.
Por Billboard | 01/10/2026
New, acclaimed albums by The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney and Madonna could all be Grammy contenders — but this isn’t 1987, the last and only time those three icons were all nominated for Grammys in the same year. Fast forward nearly four decades and each of these artists’ well-received 2026 albums — Madonna’s club world manifesto Confessions II , The Stones’ rock and blues romp Foreign Tongues and McCartney’s folkie nostalgia trip The Boys of Dungeon Lane — are in the conversation for album of the year at the 2027 awards. But considering how the awards have evolved, is this a good year to be a legacy artist at the Grammys? Twenty years ago, legacy artists went on a surprising run at the Grammys, with Herbie Hancock and Robert Plant & Alison Krauss winning album of the year in 2008 and 2009, respectively. (Those wins were somewhat controversial: Hancock’s album of Joni Mitchell covers, River: The Joni Letters , beat out Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black and Kanye West’s Graduation , while Plant & Krauss’ Raising Sand trumped Radiohead’s In Rainbows and Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III .) For legacy acts, this type of later career win can be especially meaningful. “For many artists, the Grammy remains the pinnacle of peer recognition,” says Helen Bruner, a Grammy-nominated recording artist (with Terry Jones), former Recording Academy national trustee and onetime president of its Philadelphia chapter. “An album of the year nomination can affirm that an artist with an extraordinary history is still creating work capable of moving the culture forward.” Related ‘Every Moment Is Massive and Magnificent’: Noah Kahan Reflects on a Monumental Year — And Eyes a Grammys Breakthrough Meet the Producers Who United to Help Noah Kahan Craft ‘The Great Divide’ 6 Artists Who Lost the Best New Artist Grammy Could Be Nominated for Album of the Year at 2027 Awards In 2005, Ray Charles’ Genius Loves Company (the artist’s posthumously released album of high-profile collaborations) won album of the year over major projects by Green Day and Alicia Keys. Going back further, Steely Dan’s Two Against Nature and Bob Dylan’s Time Out of Mind both won the award long after the artists’ most prolific eras. Bruner posits that this recognition is particularly valuable when it comes at that late date, as it signifies that the artist is “still contributing, still evolving and still capable of shifting culture.” Such nominations still happen, even if they haven’t recently yielded wins. In 2023, Swedish pop greats ABBA got a nod for Voyage, its first album of new material in 40 years, while classic crooner Tony Bennett got the nod in 2022 for Love for Sale , his second collaborative album with Lady Gaga. But with a voting body that’s now younger and more diverse, the chances of legacy artists earning nods — much less winning — are slimmer than they once were. According to the Recording Academy, more than 3,800 music creator