Which heart aches most for song of the year?
Recording Academy voters must’ve been feeling blue when they nominated songs of the year.
The category honors exceptional songwriting, often rewarding a critically adored track rather than smash- hit singles, as opposed to the record of the year, which favors production.
In previous years, heartfelt ballads such as Ed Sheeran’s Thinking Out Loud and Sam Smith’s Stay With Me have won the category. The 2017 field seems to follow that trend, full of songs that tell soaring, emotional stories. It’s hard not to see Adele’s Hello as the front- runner, the lead single from her record- breaking album 25 that reintroduced the British singer, and her soaring tales of heartbreak, to the world. Plus, Adele is a perennial Grammys favorite, taking home the song- of- the- year title in 2012 with Rolling in the Deep.
Her main competitor is Justin Bieber’s Love Yourself, a heartfelt address to an ex- lover that strikes a more sour tone than Hello. Bieber won accolades for his remarkable comeback album Purpose, and the acoustic track, while certainly not a love song, is the best example of the pop star’s storytelling powers.
An upset could come at the hands of Lukas Graham’s 7 Years, an aching tale of growing up that rocketed the Danish band to mainstream success. Rounding out the category is a surprise nomination for Mike Posner’s I Took A Pill In Ibiza; while the acoustic track checks all the storytelling boxes of past winners, it’s eclipsed by buzzier tracks. And then there’s Beyonce’s Formation. A notable exception to the song of the year’s favoring of sappy songs, the singer’s rallying cry won fans and turned heads with its evocative music video and its appearance at the Super Bowl halftime show and is is one of 2016’ s most influential songs. But while Formation’s songwriting is stirring, the record- of- the- year category, where it’s also nominated, may be a better fit.