Linkin Park, Bring Me the Horizon, Bad Omens, and Sleep Token Amongst Nominees for Billboard Music Awards
Music awards ceremonies are mostly bullshit, particularly the biggest one of them all The Grammys which largely ignored rock artists even when they were popular in the 90s. The Billboard Music Awards are kind of stupid, too, but at least they’re a little more objective than other awards, with their awards being based on performance metrics on their own charts, so that means they factor in things like sales, streaming numbers, social media engagement, etc. Meanwhile, I think the criteria for the MTV Video Music Awards boil down to breast size.
The Billboard Music Awards announced their nominees today, and there are a good number of metal artists on it simply by virtue of the fact that rock gets its own categories. One of the biggest names in this year’s nominees is Linkin Park, who are up for Top Duo/Group, Top Rock Artist, Top Rock Duo/Group, and Top Hard Rock Group, amongst others. I really don’t understand why Top Rock Artist and Top Rock Duo/Group have to be separate categories, but what do I know?
Some of the other big names in metal that appear in the nominations are Bring Me the Horizon and Sleep Token who are both up for Top Hard Rock Album, and Bad Omens, who are up against Linkin Park for Top Hard Rock Artist. Grunge legends Pearl Jam are apparently up for Top Hard Rock Album, too, which is news to me that Pearl Jam are even active let alone putting out albums. I always found them to be the dullest of the original Seattle grunge bands, so it makes sense that they’re the amongst the only ones still doing stuff. Nirvana burned out, and Pearl Jam is slowly fading away.
The full list of nominees can be found at Billboard’s website, but here’s the list of the relevant categories:
Top Duo/Group:
blink-182
Coldplay
Fuerza Regida
Linkin Park
Stray Kids
Top Rock Artist:
Zach Bryan
Hozier
Jelly Roll
Noah Kahan
Linkin Park
Top Rock Duo/Group:
Good Neighbours
Linkin Park
The Red Clay Strays
Top Hard Rock Artist:
Bad Omens
HARDY
Linkin Park
Top Hard Rock Album:
Bring Me The Horizon – “POST HUMAN: NeX GEn”
Falling In Reverse – “Popular Monster”
HARDY – “Quit!!”
Pearl Jam – “Dark Matter”
Sleep Token – “Take Me Back To Eden”
Top Hard Rock Song:
Falling In Reverse – “All My Life” (feat. Jelly Roll)
Falling In Reverse – “Ronald” (feat. Tech N9ne & Alex Terrible)
HARDY – “Psycho”
Linkin Park – “The Emptiness Machine”
Superheaven – “Youngest Daughter”
Top Rock Touring Artist:
Coldplay
The Rolling Stones
Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band
Top Rock Song:
Zach Bryan – “Pink Skies”
Zach Bryan – “I Remember Everything” (feat. Kacey Musgraves)
Djo – “End of Beginning”
Hozier – “Too Sweet”
Noah Kahan – “Stick Season”
