Morgan Wallen doesn’t desire a Grammy, actually. The nation celebrity’s crew confirmed this week that he is not going to be submitting his newest album, “I’m the Drawback,” or any of its 37 songs for consideration on the upcoming Grammy Awards. The transfer underscores Wallen’s rocky relationship with the music business’s gatekeepers. Regardless of his plain chart dominance, he’s lengthy been met with skepticism or outright rejection from awards our bodies and insiders who’ve saved him at arm’s size. Morgan Wallen is hardly the primary artist to rebuff the Recording Academy. The Weeknd and Jay-Z have each refused to submit their work lately, citing an absence of recognition and frustration with what they see as an out-of-touch establishment.

Morgan Wallen’s strained relationship is mirrored in his awards report. Wallen has solely two Grammy nominations to his title, each from his 2024 collaboration with Put up Malone, and has by no means been acknowledged for his solo work. On the CMA Awards, he’s received simply twice, far fewer than artists of comparable stature.

When he did lastly take residence the coveted Entertainer of the 12 months honor final 12 months, he was noticeably absent from the ceremony. Months later, he casually posted a sideways image of the trophy in an Instagram dump, barely acknowledging the milestone.

Whereas Wallen hasn’t defined why he’s opting out of this 12 months’s Grammy competition, collaborators like Put up Malone, Tate McRae, and Eric Church, who every seem on tracks from the album, nonetheless have the choice to submit their joint songs on their very own. Whether or not they are going to stays to be seen.

Historical past reveals Wallen isn’t alone in pushing again towards the Grammys. In 2024, Jay-Z returned to the ceremony after skipping it on quite a few events, and after calling it out immediately in his 2018 monitor “Apesh-t.”

Whereas accepting the Dr. Dre International Influence Award, the rapper addressed the Grammys’ long-standing points with overlooking Black artists. He particularly highlighted his spouse Beyoncé’s monitor report, claiming that regardless of holding the title because the most-awarded Grammy winner of all time, she has by no means received Album of the 12 months.

“The reality is, we grew up eager to be on the Grammys, and it was our purpose. We simply need them to get it proper. That’s what we would like,” Jay-Z stated in his speech, drawing applause for the candid acknowledgment.

Jay-Z isn’t the one main artist to name out the Grammys.

Forward of the 2021 ceremony, The Weeknd brazenly blasted the Recording Academy after being snubbed from each single class, regardless of releasing his chart-topping album “After Hours,” which included the record-breaking hit “Blinding Lights.”

“I exploit a sucker punch as an analogy,” he instructed Billboard later that 12 months. “As a result of it simply form of hit me out of nowhere.”

For Wallen, the choice could also be much less about defiance and extra about indifference. The singer has turn out to be one of the constant hitmakers in music, not simply nation. He’s a fixture on the Billboard charts, the place his albums and singles linger for months on finish.

That dominance hasn’t been with out turbulence. Wallen’s profession has been marred by scandal. In 2021, he was caught on video utilizing a racial slur, leading to a one-year ban from the CMA Awards. In 2024, he pleaded responsible to misdemeanor reckless endangerment after police accused him of throwing a chair from a rooftop bar in Nashville.