Beyoncé‘s dad has weighed in on her daughter’s lack of Album of the Year wins at the Grammy Awards.
JAY-Z called out the Recording Academy on Sunday (February 4) for snubbing his wife in the coveted category over the years, and now Mathew Knowles has weighed in.
Speaking to TMZ, Mathew said he believes his daughter’s record label is at fault for her never winning the award, suggesting Adele is favored by the company.
“People don’t know the process,” Knowles said. “Your record label can only appoint one person in a category, so that means her record label. I’ma call you out, Columbia Records. Her record label has never really put her in that category for consideration.
“When you have Adele and Beyoncé on the same record label, the record label can only support one of those artists. There’s a lot of reasons, I mean, there’s a financial reason. Maybe Adele sold more records worldwide, I don’t know these answers.
“But these are some of the thought processes that they go through. Maybe you say, ‘Beyoncé has her success, here’s an opportunity to push Adele, so let’s push her.’”
After being corrected that Beyonce has been nominated in the Album of the Year category multiple times, Mathew Knowles claimed it’s a mix of the Grammys’ voting process and how much the label is pushing the artist.
“It’s combination of all, but it starts with the label. Again guys, I’ve been 14 years in those rooms supporting the label. I know exactly how this work,” said the 72-year-old, who previously managed Beyoncé and his other daughter Solange.
“We spend a whole day listening to a minute of a song and saying, ‘That’s pop.’ And then pop will listen and they say, ‘Oh, that’s R&B.’ That’s a big deal, the genre of the music. And again, there comes a point in the music industry is the whiting of America.”
JAY-Z targeted the Grammys over their treatment of Beyoncé while accepting the Dr. Dre Global Impact Award at Sunday’s ceremony.
“We want y’all to get it right,” he said on stage. “We love y’all, we love y’all, we just want y’all to get it right. At least get it close to right.
“Obviously it’s subjective because, you know, it’s music and it’s opinion-based, but some things… I don’t want to embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than everyone and never won Album of the Year!”
He continued: “So even by your own metrics, that doesn’t work. Think about that. The most Grammys, never won Album of the Year. That doesn’t work.
“Some of you are gonna go home tonight and feel like you’ve been robbed. Some of you may get robbed. Some of you don’t belong in the category. Nah, nah, nah. When I get nervous I tell the truth!”
Beyoncé has won a record 32 Grammys but has yet to win Album of the Year. She has been nominated for the award four times — in 2010 for I Am… Sasha Fierce, in 2015 for Beyoncé, in 2017 for Lemonade and in 2023 for Renaissance.
