Frank Ocean’s two new albums, Blonde and Endless, won’t be able to win any sort of GRAMMY Award this year because they weren’t submitted for consideration before the September 30 deadline.
According to Billboard, a source close to Frank Ocean said his team “was aware of the deadlines and made the decision” to not submit the albums for consideration.
And the fact Frank made that decision on his own is fine — he shouldn’t have to wave for the The Recording Academy’s attention to let them know he dropped multiple albums this year.
It’s the idea that someone has to fill out paperwork (and probably submit some sort of fee) to have an album that’s critically acclaimed and sold more than 300,000 copies considered for an award supposed to recognize the best art in wholeheartedly dumb.
You’d think the process should be, if it’s among the best art, it’ll get nominated. And yes — it’s just paperwork. But I’ll subscribe to the notion paperwork shouldn’t stop someone from getting recognized.
Ocean’s last album, Channel Orange, garnered multiple nominations, eventually winning Best Urban Contemporary Album in 2013 over Miguel’s Kaleidoscope Dream and Chris Brown’s Fortune. He also performed at the award show only after being allowed to play the song of his choice — “Forrest Gump,” which wasn’t nominated for any award.
Ocean has been one to steer away from the spotlight, and GRAMMY Awards are becoming less and less important in artists’ eyes, so it’s not surprising Ocean seemingly doesn’t care.
But hey, at least we still have the potential of seeing Chance the Rapper on the GRAMMYs stage.
