MICHAEL TRAN / AFP
Taylor Swift, here during her Eras Tour at Sofi Stadium in Inglewood, California on August 7, 2023.
MUSIC – This is a first since the creation of the “artist of the year” category at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2017.
This year, it will inevitably recognize a woman during the ceremony which takes place this Wednesday, September 13 in New Jersey, since there are six nominated for six places: Beyoncé, Doja Cat, Karol G, Nicki Minaj, Shakira and Taylor Swift.
It is also the first time that two of the artists nominated in this category come from the world of Latin music. The first Latin artist to be nominated in this category was Bad Bunny, who won the award last year.
Note that women are also present in force in the “video of the year” category, with six representatives for seven places: Attention from Doja, flowers by Miley Cyrus, Super Freaky Girl by Nicki Minaj, Vampire by Olivia Rodrigo, Kill Bill of SZA and Anti-hero by Taylor Swift. Seventh place goes to a historic collaboration: Unholy by Smith & Petras, the first openly non-binary and transgender solo artists respectively to have a number 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100.
35 artists nominated for the first time
In total, Taylor Swift has the most nominations for this edition of the MTV VMAs with a total of eight, followed by SZA (six), Doja Cat, Kim Petras, Miley Cyrus, Nicki Minaj, Olivia Rodrigo and Sam Smith (five), and BLACKPINK, Diddy and Shakira (four).
This year, 35 artists are nominated for the first time at the MTV VMAs, including Kim Petras (five), Metro Boomin and Rema (three), Ayra Starr, GloRilla, Ice Spice, Peso Pluma, Reneé Rapp and Yung Miami (two).
A new category was created this year, that of best afrobeats album. This is the third genre-specific category that the MTV VMAs have added this century, following the Latin category (2006) and the K-pop category (2019). Many of the ceremony’s other categories were created in the last century, such as rock (1989), alternative music (1991), R&B (1993), pop and hip-hop (1999).
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