The Grammys’ Best New Artists: Were They?

Sixty years ago this month, The Beatles took home the Best New Artist Award from The Recording Academy of the United States at the 7th Annual Grammy Awards. They, of course, had one of the most monumental careers in music history, but the Best New Artist Award hasn’t always been the most accurate predictor of longevity. Here’s a look at five they got really right, five they got wrong, and a couple of pushes (where it could have gone either way).

Five They Got Right

“When the Party’s Over” by Billie Eilish at the 2021 Grammy Awards (Uploaded to YouTube by Billie Eilish)

1. Bobby Darin (1960)
Other nominees: Edd Byrnes, Mark Murphy, Johnny Restivo, Mavis Rivers

The inaugural winner for Best New Artist, Bobby Darin was a talent who performed in wildly diverse genres. He was as comfortable with rock as he was with country or even swing. Darin was only 37 when he died of sepsis that preyed upon a preexisting heart condition, but he left behind a strong body of work in music and film. In terms of singles, he had four indisputable classics: “Dream Lover” (which he wrote), “Splish Splash” (co-wrote), and two covers that are the most recognizable versions of each song, “Beyond the Sea” and “Mack the Knife.”

2. The Beatles (1965)
Other nominees: Petula Clark, Astrud Gilberto, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Morgana King

At the time, this might have seemed like a risk. In hindsight, it’s perhaps the ultimate music award no-brainer. The Beatles are, well, THE BEATLES. The blueprint for every rock band and every songwriting partnership that came after them, the influence of the Fab Four remains unassailable. When the band’s music became available on streaming platform Spotify in 2016, their songs logged 24 million hours of playtime in the first 100 days.

3. Mariah Carey (1991)
Other nominees: The Black Crowes, The Kentucky Headhunters, Lisa Stansfield, Wilson Phillips

Mariah Carey remains the only artist to have her first five singles hit #1 on Billboard’s Hot 100, so it was pretty easy to predict success in the early going. However, even that gaudy stat didn’t predict that her career would climb like her five-octave range. She’s since added another 14 to her list of #1s, has sold 220 million records worldwide, and emerges from her post-Halloween slumber annually to re-conquer the world with “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”

4. Adele (2009)
Other nominees: The Jonas Brothers, Duffy, Lady Antebellum, Jazmin Sullivan

To be fair, everyone nominated that year has been successful (and, in the case of Duffy, overcame a harrowing ordeal to return to entertainment). But Adele is just Adele. A generational voice who has cut across demographics to be loved by any number of age and cultural groups, Adele has 16 Grammys and is one Tony away from an EGOT. A sales and critical titan, her 21 album from 2011 was #1 on the Top 200 for a record-shattering 24 weeks. Munich had to custom-build a concert hall to accommodate her 2024 shows there. Though she’s taking a break for the foreseeable future, her 120 million albums sold and counting give her the room to take all the time off she wants.

5. Billie Eilish (2020)
Other nominees: Black Pumas, Maggie Rogers, Lil Nas X, Lizzo, Rosalía, Tank and the Bangas, Yola

The first Best New Artist Winner born after 9/11, Billie Eilish was also the first artist born in the 21st century to hit #1 on the Hot 100 and sell 10 million copies of one song (“Bad Guy;” she did it again with “Lovely” in 2023). If Adele has a voice that cuts across generations, Eilish’s voice is defiantly of her generation. Co-writing much of her material with her brother, Finneas O’Connell (who performs as FINNEAS), Eilish has also won two Academy Awards for songs from Barbie (“What Was I Made For?”) and No Time to Die (er, “No Time to Die”). So, no disrespect to the other artists who were nominated, but Eilish is a phenomenon.

Five They Got Wrong

Milli Vanilli performs “Girl You Know It’s True” and wins the Best New Artist (Uploaded to YouTube by Milli Vanilli Rare Videos)

1. Starland Vocal Band (1977)
Other Nominees: Boston, The Brothers Johnson, Dr. Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band, Wild Cherry

Though the four-member band won in 1977 and hosted their own variety show that year, they broke up by 1981, and both couples within the group divorced. “Afternoon Delight” experienced a resurgence in the 2000s thanks to its hilarious deployment in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, but outside of a few reunions, their impact was minimal.

Who Should Have Won: The clear answer here is Boston. One of the best-selling and best-loved debut albums of all time, Boston contained three immediate hits (“More Than a Feeling,” “Piece of Mind,” “Foreplay/Long Time”) and five other songs that have, for the most part, never left rock radio. Even in its first year, Boston was one of the biggest selling debuts in history. One might point to the category’s very unbalanced tilt toward solo winners versus bands, but, in this case, Boston lost to another band. Starland may have won, but in 2025, when you hear that old song, baby, it’s “More Than a Feeling.”

2. Debby Boone (1978)
Other Nominees: Stephen Bishop, Shaun Cassidy, Foreigner, Andy Gibb

Boone’s victory rested primarily on the back of her recording of “You Light Up My Life,” which was from a film with the same name. The song went utterly bonkers on radio and spent ten weeks atop the Hot 100, making it the longest lasting #1 of the 1970s. Though she had country and Christian contemporary hits that followed, nothing matched the success of “Light.”

Who Should Have Won: That’s Foreigner. Their self-titled first album boasted “Feels Like the First Time” and “Cold as Ice” and has been certified 5x platinum in the States. Just 14 months later, they dropped Double Vision, which featured the title track, “Blue Morning, Blue Day” and the all-time banger “Hot Blooded.” Their first six albums were multiplatinum Top Ten hits in the U.S. This is a serious “no contest.”

3. A Taste of Honey (1979)
Other Nominees: The Cars, Toto, Elvis Costello, Chris Rea

A Taste of Honey had spectacular chart success with their #1 disco classic “Boogie Oogie Oogie” in 1978. They would only hit the Top 40 one more time (with a cover of “Sukiyaki” in 1981). A version of the band does still play today.

Who Should Have Won: That’s sort of a three-way tie. You have The Cars, with their effortless New Wave cool. You have Elvis Costello, who exists at the intersection of several genres on top of world-champion lyrics. And you have Toto, who met the world with “Hold the Line” and delivered one of the most popular songs of all time in “Africa.” Take your pick.

4. Milli Vanilli
Other Nominees: Indigo Girls, Neneh Cherry, Tone Lōc, Soul II Soul

Milli Vanilli famously lost their Best New Artist Grammy when it was revealed that Rob and Fab (Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan) didn’t actually sing on their album.

Who Should Have Won: It would have been a hard call at the time and it’s a hard call now. The other four acts all still record and perform, and all have had degrees of long-lasting success. Indigo Girls probably have the longest-running, most consistent following, and they continually headline expansive tours.

5. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Other Nominees: James Blake, Kendrick Lamar, Kacey Musgraves, Ed Sheeran

This one might be controversial, as the duo has had massive success. And “Thrift Shop” is an indisputable classic. But out of their crazy fellow nominees, were they the best?

Who Should Have Won: Ed Sheeran is a global superstar. Kacey Musgraves is one of the leading lights of country and an awards magnet. But Kendrick Lamar is something else. A phenomenon within hip-hop, he’s the only artist of his genre to win a Pulitzer Prize for his lyrics. His work on the Black Panther soundtrack showed his affinity for collaboration. And his overall consciousness-raising subject matter and mind-blowing verbal dexterity make him a leader of his generation.

PUSH

Amy Winehouse plays two from London during the 2008 Grammys (Uploaded to YouTube by Memories Mar My Mind…)

1. Christina Aguilera/Britney Spears (2000)
Other nominees: Macy Gray, Kid Rock, Susan Tedeschi

At the time, Aguilera’s win over Spears was considered something of an upset. Tedeschi, of course, remains terrific, and Gray is ramping back up both in the studio and on the road. Kid Rock’s last Top 40 hit and platinum album were in 2008 on the strength of the Warren Zevon/Lynyrd Skynyrd-sampling “All Summer Long,” but he tours regularly.

But Aguilera and Spears, who performed together as kids on The Mickey Mouse Club, provided the engine for a worldwide teen pop resurgence. With combined worldwide albums sales of 250 million, it’s tough to call who has been bigger in the long run.

2. Amy Winehouse/Taylor Swift (2008)
Other Nominees: Feist, Paramore, Ledisi

This one is tempered by tragedy, because although Winehouse won Best New Artist in 2008, her 2011 passing robbed the world of the heights that she could have hit. In her short time on Earth, she left behind classics like “Rehab,” “You Know I’m No Good,” and “Back to Black” (and those were on the same album). The eternal question for an artist like Winehouse is, “What if?”

And then there’s Swift, a pop phenomenon whose touring apparatus changes the local economies for the cities that she visits. All of her achievements are superlatives. Perhaps ironically at the time, Swift said in an interview that she was certain Winehouse would win, and supported Winehouse’s choice to perform on the Grammys remotely from London as better for Winehouse’s health. (Swift has also been known to toss “Rehab” into the odd set.)

3. Sheryl Crow/Green Day (1995)
Other Nominees: Counting Crows, Crash Test Dummies, Ace of Base

This is one of those weird entries where the nominations hinge on the Grammy rules definition for the category as “a new artist who releases, during the Eligibility Year, the first recording which establishes the public identity of that artist.” Dookie was Green Day’s third studio album. Crash Test Dummies released the successful The Ghosts that Haunt Me in 1991, which featured the widely-played “Superman’s Song.” Ace of Base had an international dance hit with the title track from 1992’s Happy Nation. Technically, the real newbies were Counting Crows with their debut, August and Everything After, and Sheryl Crow, who though well-established as a back-up singer for the likes of Michael Jackson and Don Henley, hadn’t broken out before Tuesday Night Music Club. Based on the overall realm of consistent success, Crow, the winner and eventual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, could have just as easily been swapped with Hall-mates Green Day, who admittedly weren’t quite new, but did adhere to the spirit of the rules as written by having two under-the-radar discs and one epic breakthrough.