Mark your calendars, the biggest day for music is January 31st, 2022. You can catch the 64th Annual Grammy Awards on CBS or it will be streaming live and on demand on Paramount+ from 8:00–11:30 p.m. EST. Trevor Noah will be returning for another year as host, since he hosted the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards, last year.

While we are still waiting to hear who is performing at the 2022 Grammy Awards, the nominations are officially in. This year, for the first time ever, there are 10 nominees in each of the general field categories: Record Of The Year, Album Of The Year, Song Of The Year, and Best New Artist. The most-nominated artists are Olivia Rodrigo and Billie Eilish with seven; H.E.R, Doja Cat, and Justin Bieber with eight; and the greatest number of nominations goes to Jon Batiste with a whopping eleven nominations.

The most polarizing award every year is Album Of The Year, which went to Taylor Swift last year for her album Folklore, and Billie Eilish the year before for her album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? This year, there are ten nominees in that category: We Are by Jon Batiste, Love for Sale by Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga, Justice by Justin Bieber, Planet Her by Doja Cat, Happier than Ever by Billie Eilish, Back of my Mind by H.E.R, Montero by Lil Nas X, Sour by Olivia Rodrigo, Evermore by Taylor Swift, and Donda by Kanye West. This award, more than the others, is going to create a lot of tension between fans.

Let’s begin with Taylor Swift and Kanye West being next to each other in the same category. Their feud over the years has led to these two fan bases being at each other’s throats. It all started at the 2009 VMAs when Kanye overthrew the stage while Taylor was accepting her award. He took the mic from her, and announced that he believed she did not deserve the award, and Beyonce deserved to win. This occurred over a decade ago, so time has passed, and Taylor has forgiven him, but Kanye has gone so far as to say that he made her famous. There is still tension between the two, but the most hatred is between the fandoms. Having these two artists in the same category will just fuel the tension between fans.

Olivia Rodrigo is definitely going to be all the talk at the Grammy’s considering she has seven nominations after only releasing her debut album less than a year ago. She was nominated for the four biggest categories: Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best New Artist. The other three nominations were for Best Pop Vocals Album, Best Pop Solo Performance, and Best Music Video. Since she rose to stardom so quickly this year, a lot of people are rooting for her to win, but is that really in her best interest?

It is always just an honor to be nominated, but to win seven Grammy Awards for a debut album is unheard of. Although it is unlikely, if she won all seven awards, that is an accomplishment that is very hard to beat. Adele and Beyonce are the only artists to have won six Grammys in one night, and Michael Jackson was the only one to ever win eight. It is near impossible to win that many in one night, but hypothetically, if she did, that is an amazing career achievement that will be hard to ever surpass. So early on in her music career, it wouldn’t be best if she peaked right now.

Between Olivia, Taylor, Kanye, and so many more talented artists, the winner for Album Of The Year will be hard to predict. Who do you think will take home the Gramophone?