57 Artists That Somehow Never Won a Grammy…

grammyWTF

In honor of the 57th Grammy Awards, here are 57 artists that somehow never got honored…

1. Bob Marley

2. Tupac Shakur

3. The Doors

4. Queen

5. Jimi Hendrix

6. Curtis Mayfield

7. The Who

8. Snoop Dogg

9. Björk

10. Chuck Berry

11. The Grateful Dead

12. Diana Ross

13. Nas

14. ZZ Top

15. Queens of the Stone Age

16. Katy Perry

17. One Direction

18. PSY

19. Justin Bieber

20. Janis Joplin

21. Buddy Holly

22. Notorious B.I.G.

23. (Eric B. &) Rakim

24. Rush

25. Run D.M.C.

26. Guns n’ Roses

27. Boston

28. Sam Cooke

29. Talking Heads

30. The Ramones

31. The Everly Brothers

32. Patti Smith

33. Public Enemy

34. Sly & the Family Stone

35. The Sex Pistols

36. Parliament &/or Funkadelic

37. The O’Jays

38. Creedence Clearwater Revival

39. The Stooges

40. Motley Crue

41. Kiss

42. Deep Purple

43. Journey

44. Jackson Browne

45. The Pretenders

46.Toby Keith

47. New Order

48. Depeche Mode

49. Tiesto

Update: Tiesto just won for the first time last night (see the complete winners list here).

50. The Kinks

51. Morrissey

52. The Smiths

53. ABBA

54. Dusty Springfield

55. Teddy Pendergrass

56. Oasis

57. Busta Rhymes

 

(And for fun, try searching a few artists on grammy.com’s ‘Past Winners’ database, here.)

17 Responses

  1. Versus

    Wouldn’t it be nice to have an award program that actually was based on artistic merit, rather than sales?

    • Willis

      That’s an ignorant statement. If you knew anything about the process…
      You only know what you read, and what you believe. Take it from someone who knows the behind-the-scenes.

    • GGG

      Yea, definitely not based on sales. If anything, it makes more sense for it to be rigged in favor of the worse-selling artists, so they get a sales boost from notoriety.

  2. The Ghost Of Jerry Garcia

    59. The Whispers

    60. The Spinners

    61. The Manhattans

  3. [email protected]

    “Artistic merit” is a matter of personal judgement. I do not anticipate agreement on that across a swath of humanity, especially over pop music.

    • Big Swifty

      Agreed.

      Pop music is similar to other Hollywood products in that it is at least 50% marketing. The quality is irrelevant as long as it is marketed properly.

    • Paul Resnikoff

      One Direction is one of the largest selling, and most popular groups of the past decade. As is Justin Bieber. More people care about them than Sam Smith (and that’s not a dig on Sam Smith, just a statement of fact).

  4. Wurd

    Actually the Grammy awards aren’t based on sales. The only people who can vote are creative music professionals. But people who comment on this site probably aren’t actually one or two of those things. The professional part is hard and those who aspire and can’t be just prefer to complain rather than learn anything truthful.
    It’s much easier to say the game is rigged and then bitch about it than it is to work hard and get involved

    If you give enough of a shit to comment about how crap the awards are but you’ve never voted you are either unqualified to vote or you’re too lazy or arrogant to participate

    Some of the artists in this list actually do have lifetime achievement grammy awards too.
    The award doesn’t recognize timelessness,
    It’s about what’s current and it usually takes a few years for the classics to work their way up

    But all you haters and critics don’t have anything better to write about than this stuff

    Go make a record and promote and build your career and learn how the process works before you dismiss it. it would be a much more rewarding use of your time n

  5. John Dudley, Esq.

    I have been a professional in the music industry for now going on 50 years and been a voter member of NARAS for close to 40 years and have served on the board.
    I am also a member of the Producers and Engineers Wing.
    The Grammys were founded and are suppose to be for music excellence and technology but HAS become more of a popularity contest.
    Sales? Well, I have seen some of the crappiest songs become big hits only because of media hype and a huge promotion budget.
    I have worked with talent that was par excellent to many who have won; but never had the means to professionally promote their works or go to a music mecca to further their careers.
    The Grammy Awards is an entertainment show; a good show, but it is just like the CMA, GMA, ACM and others.

  6. Jason

    Hilarious -16 thru 19. Make no mistake, these days the Grammys are a popularity/record sales contest. Shameful that many of these artist have not won.