The 2021 Grammy Awards made history and turned heads – but still failed to win the qualifying game.
The annual CBS music awards on Sunday night saw everything from a record number of Beyoncé wins, an NSFW performance by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion, and killer styles from a mostly remote celebrity list.
But all the twerking in the world failed to increase the numbers for the event so maligned, that it regularly grapples with accusations of racism and fraudulent voting.
Nielsen’s first reviews have the awards attracting just 7.9 million viewers in total, although the numbers are expected to rise slightly when adjustments are made to time zones. Still, they are not expected to do better than the 2020 awards – in fact, they may only be at record levels, according to Wrap. This article will be updated as the final numbers arrive.
Last year, 18.7 million viewers tuned in to the event, broadcast from the Staples Center in Los Angeles in pre-pandemic January. The numbers fell by about 1.2 million compared to 2019, when the program saw an increase in the number of viewers – 19.9 million pairs of eyes – after a particularly poor display in 2018.
Like last year, Billie Eilish won many awards, albeit reluctantly, and BTS continued to make waves with a new American audience.
But this year was different in the challenges posed by the pandemic. The awards were filmed at the much less glamorous LA Convention Center, with some cameos from iconic locations across the country. Although some stars shone on the red carpet, it was not the case with the usual fashion.
Still, performances by women like Eilish, Brittany Howard and the recently established Best New Artist winner Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B – in their first live release of their number 1 hit “WAP” – dominated the night.
The performance exuded sensuality as Cardi and Megan writhed, writhed and rubbed together on a huge bed.
Meanwhile, Taylor Swift won her third Grammy for Album of the Year – the biggest of all women – for her quarantine LP “Folklore”, and Eilish won her second consecutive Gramophone Record of the Year for “Everything I Wanted”.
HER, in an astonishing surprise, captured the Song of the Year for “I Can’t Breathe”, a song written after the assassination of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement that intensified in its wake.
