I was thinking about the GRAMMYs and the artists they nominate for best new artist—so many of them have like, four major-label albums already lol

and while those artists might not be "new", they still are unknown to so many people. because we have a lack of a monoculture

it just makes me wonder what the hell a "new" artist could even be in 2026. artists make music in their bedrooms at 13, blow up at 21, are they "new"?

long story short they should rename it Breakthrough Artist of the Year. Raw thoughts 5th listen

Didn’t Chance win best new artist in 2017

Sabrina carpenter got nominated last year with her 6th studio album

It’s whenever they blow up in the mainstream. Been like this for at least ten years.

What does that even mean in 2026 at this point tho

Charting singles

That's fair. I guess the mainstream still exists by virtue of there being a list of 100 songs updated every week

but I feel like the percentage of those songs that an average person on the street would know is much lower than it was even like ten years ago

You'd be surprised. I've come to realize that a lot of people still know this garbage from Tik Tok and what not. I'm the weird one who doesn't just baby bird autoplay!

They can't take up space on my fyp I need to find out that Clavicular almost caught a CAREER-ENDING cortisol spike after a LARPMAXXED stacy tried jesterfying him on stream by calling him a good boy while he was mid-mog between 2 LOW-TIER NORMIES at ASU😭

Live streaming is the political battleground of the dumbest generation since the Great Depression.

Good video idea

It means when I personally discovered them regardless of how early or late I am to them

Facts