Grammys 2023: Harry Styles wins award for ALBUM OF THE YEAR – and gambles away the laurels

taketonews

British singer-songwriter and pop star Harry Styles has won Album of the Year at the 65th Grammy Awards. His 2022 album HARRY’S HOUSE secured the 29-year-old the most prestigious golden gramophone of the evening. However, during his acceptance speech, he made a faux pas that caused quite a stir on social media.

An almost perfect thank you

“It doesn’t happen very often to people like me,” the star said while holding the award. He then passed it on to Tyler Johnson and Kid Harpoon, who in turn thanked him. Everything was going great for Styles up to this point. The award was presented to him by a 74-year-old self-declared “superfan” of his music, a lady named Reina. Host Trevor Noah invited her and other superfans of the Album of the Year nominees, who were featured in a roundtable segment throughout the live show, to the stage for the final awards ceremony. After reading Styles’ name himself, he left the proclamation to her. The star hugged the lady on stage and she was clearly delighted with him.

people like who?

Now, however, his memorable comment overshadows that moment and his otherwise appropriately reverential speech. On the Internet, especially on Twitter, many voices have been raised that are looking for the exact meaning of the statement or do not understand it. Harry Styles is a white, privileged, handsome man who plays with his gender identity but is definitely cis. In addition, there has been a growing number of voices of late questioning his performance of forward-thinking, unconventional masculinity and accusing it of being more style than substance.

Alongside him, nominees in the category included Beyoncé, Bad Bunny, Kendrick Lamar, Mary J. Blige, and Adele, all of whom, based on their identities, to which a “People Like Me” statement happens to refer, would historically have better reasons to to utter this sentence. For example, Bad Bunny’s UN VERANO SIN TI would be the first Spanish-language album to win the award. Beyoncé would be the first Black woman to receive the award since 1999 (Lauryn Hill – THE MISEDUCATION OF LAURYN HILL). In addition, the R&B icon has been nominated four times in this category and, despite her quantitative dominance at the Grammys, only has one award in a main category (“Song of the Year” for “Single Ladies (Put A Ring on It), 2010 ).

The comments on the incident range from irony to incomprehension or attempts at conciliatory acceptance to outcry.

Some tweets



ttn-29