2024 GRAMMY Awards: Who should win ‘Album of the Year’?

“There’s subtle shade [in Endless Summer Vacation]. There’s, you know, honesty and truth, and there’s some wisdom, and there’s some humor,” Miley Cyrus said in a ‘Backyard Sessions’ interview. The musician’s eighth studio album is a great example of Pop in the modern era -- a moveable rhythm, easygoing synth instruments, and melodies that almost never leave your mind. The self-love anthem "Flowers" broke Billboard chart records with its staying power, and the follow-up hit "Used to Be Young" acts as the perfect, self-reflecting finale to Cyrus’ Endless Summer Vacation.

SZA’s second album, SOS, is a whopping 23-song follow-up to her critically acclaimed debut, CTRL - and it too has made waves. The Alt-R&B album features collaborations with Phoebe Bridgers and Travis Scott, influences from grunge and soft lofi, and of course, the chart-topping hit “Kill Bill.” Amid topics of loneliness, boldness, and self-doubt, SZA’s music swings through her raw emotionality in a profoundly relatable way.

“My pastor told me when you leave, all you take is your memory / And I’m gonna take minе of you with me,” Lana Del Rey sings like a hymn in her single “The Grants.” Her ninth studio album, Did You Know That There's A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, finds the singer contemplating some of life’s biggest blessings and hardships all at once. Through her metaphors of strength despite trauma and streams of consciousness on family lineage and spirituality, Lana is a writer and musician truly in her element. Telling fans she was, “genuinely touched” by the nomination, the musician also joked that she, “only learned this year that you have to [formally] submit your own album if you want to be nominated.” Better late than never!

Described as “the stories of 13 sleepless nights”, Taylor Swift’s album Midnights was released in 2022 and intensified 2023’s Taylor-fueled-frenzy. Hits like “Karma” and “Anti-Hero” saw the musician returning to the pop stage following her folklore and evermore albums, and reigning on top of the charts no less. Should she take home this coveted award, Swift would also walk away as the artist with the most Album Of The Year wins of all time -- adding on to her previous three wins.

Janelle Monáe’s The Age of Pleasure is a musical movement of just that: pleasure. Noting exhaustion from protests and the bleakness of the pandemic, Monáe originally wrote the album to find an escape within her Black joy and sensuality, and ultimately found healing along the way. Songs like “Float” and “Paid in Pleasure” effortlessly blend Afrobeats and disco with her R&B and Hip-Hop style, making the album a strong GRAMMYs contender.

Following his win in 2022, Jon Batiste is making another run for Album of the Year with his genre-defying album, World Music Radio. The 21-track album is a high-energy mix of everything from Latin trap and Afropop to Jazz and hyper-Pop, all the while, featuring huge collaborations with the likes of Lil Wayne, Lana Del Rey, Kenny G, and Jon Bellion. World Music Radio is a lesson in celebrating different cultures while remembering the things that ultimately unite us all.

the record by supergroup boygenius is the only debut nominated for this year’s Best Album - and it’s well deserved. Comprised of indie artists Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus, the band blends its intense songwriting prowess with themes of queerness, unconditional friendship, and a desire for freedom. “This is a thing that is completely not able to be conceptualized,” said Dacus of being nominated. “This is a fake dream, almost. You’re like, ‘One day, I’m gonna hit the big time… And then we got nominated for a GRAMMY.”

Olivia Rodrigo is no stranger to the GRAMMY stage, with her breakout debut album SOUR winning Best Pop Vocal Album in the 2022 ceremony and her scheduled performance in the upcoming show. On top of it all, her second album, GUTS, beat the infamous sophomore slump and granted the 20-year-old 6 nominations in total, including her second nomination for Album Of The Year. Rodrigo’s angry, heartbroken hits like “Vampire” and “get him back!” still manage to have fun while wading through the ups and downs of being an American teenager.