America has a problem... saying sorry isn’t enough

From Beyoncé to Kendrick Lamar, the 2025 Grammys were one long apology to snubbed artists, writes Hannah Ewens

- Hannah Ewens

When Beyoncé won Best Country Album at this year's Grammys, she looked surprised. So surprised, there are already memes circulating of her wide-eyed reaction. She is the first Black artist to take home the award, but there is nothing else remotely unusual about her win. Beyoncé always gets the genre prizes, even when she’s dabbling in other spaces, like with her last genre record, 2022’s Renaissance, which won Best Dance/Electronic Album. But when Cowboy Carter was also announced as 2025’s best album winner – the grand prize for which Beyoncé has been snubbed so many times – she merely smiled.

Many fans scanning the list of winners will be asking: why has she won this? And why now? Cowboy Carter was fuelled by a brilliant concept – a sonic ride through contributions of Black pioneers to country music – but compared to her other albums, all of which created seismic shifts in culture, the same could not quite be said for this record. Not only was this album part of a wider country trend in music, but the songs also feel too modest, too small for Beyoncé’s enormous vocals. Given how the Grammys voting works – with a tendency to reward established artists due to their big fanbases, and established network of relationships within the music industry – her win makes sense. Brat, meanwhile, may have been the culturally dominant album in that category this year, but it would never have been Charli XCX’s first Grammy Album of the Year win. Beyoncé is absolutely a deserving winner in this category. But still, why now?