The Rolling Stones have been known as the world’s greatest rock and roll band for six decades, but Grammy voters were shamefully late in getting on board. The Stones weren’t nominated in any category until the 1979 ceremony, when Some Girls was nominated for album of the year.
How could that be? How could such classic albums as Sticky Fingers and Exile on Main St. have been completely ignored – not to mention such landmark singles as “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Honky Tonk Women” and “Brown Sugar”?
One reason is that Grammy voters in ’60s and ’70s were resistant to rock, favoring pop and what we now call traditional pop. (Nowadays, Grammy voters love rock and have been slow to embrace hip-hop. Resistance to the new and different is often a byproduct of institutional voting.)
The Beatles landed five consecutive album of the year nominations in the ’60s, but The Beatles were more in line with Grammy tastes. They were more often on the pop side of pop/rock, and Lennon/McCartney’s songwriting was more rooted in traditional songcraft.
Another reason The Stones were left out for so long was the Grammys didn’t have performance categories dedicated to rock until 1990 – and didn’t have a best rock album category until 1995. (Fittingly, The Stones were the first winner of the latter award.)
Since Grammy voters belatedly discovered The Stones, the band has fared pretty well in the nominations. They won a Grammy (best traditional blues album) for their previous studio album, High & Lonesome. Their three studio albums before that were each nominated for best rock album.
The band’s 2023 album Hackney Diamonds, which was mostly produced by Andrew Watt, has an excellent chance of landing a best rock album nod and an outside chance of landing an album of the year nod. “Angry,” the album’s opening track and lead single, was nominated for best rock song at the ceremony in February. The 2025 nominations will be announced on Nov. 8. The awards will be presented on Feb. 2, 2025.
Watt (profiled here) has his own following in Grammyland – he won producer of the year, non-classical in 2021, which makes him the most recent producer not named Jack Antonoff to win that award. Watt, who is just 33, wasn’t even born when The Stones’ Steel Wheels album was released in 1989.
Look and see how The Stones have fared in the Grammy nominations since 1979, the year Grammy voters first invited them to the party. The year show is the year of the Grammy ceremony.
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1979: Some Girls
Producer: The Glimmer Twins (Mick Jagger and Keith Richards)
Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 (two weeks)
Grammy nomination: Album of the year
Note: This is The Stones’ only nod in a Big Four category to date. The blockbuster Saturday Night Fever soundtrack won the award.
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1981: Emotional Rescue
Producers: The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 (seven weeks)
Grammy nomination: None
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1982: Tattoo You
Producer: The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 (nine weeks)
Grammy nomination: Best rock performance by a duo or group with vocal
Note: This was The Stones’ longest-running No. 1 album.
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1985: Undercover
Producers: The Glimmer Twins, Chris Kimsey
Billboard 200 peak: No. 4
Grammy nomination: none
Note: The following year, The Stones were awarded a lifetime achievement award by the Recording Academy. They didn’t come to the ceremony in Los Angeles to pick up their award (who could blame them?), but accepted it via satellite from the Roof Garden Club in London. Mick Jagger was appropriately irreverent in his remarks: “I’d like to say thank you to all the people that have stuck by this band through thick and thin. And to all the people that took the piss, the joke’s on you.”
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1987: Dirty Work
Producers: Steve Lillywhite, The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 4
Grammy nomination: Best rock performance by a duo or group with vocal (“Harlem Shuffle”)
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1990: Steel Wheels
Producers: Chris Kimsey, The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 3
Grammy nominations: Best rock performance by a duo or group with vocal (“Mixed Emotions,” 1990; “Almost Hear You Sigh,” 1991)
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1995: Voodoo Lounge
Producers: Don Was, The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 2
Grammy wins: Best rock album; best music video, short form (“Love Is Strong”)
Note: In addition to The Stones’ wins, Was won for producer of the year, non-classical. His award acknowledged his work on The Stones’ album as well as Bonnie Raitt’s Longing in Their Hearts, The B-52’s “(Meet) The Flintstones,” Patty Smyth’s “You Hung the Moon,” Felix Cavaliere’s Dreams in Motion, Khaled’s N’ssi N’ssi, the BackBeat soundtrack and the Various Artists album Rhythm, Country and Blues.
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1998: Bridges to Babylon
Producers: Don Was and The Glimmer Twins with Rob Fraboni, Danny Saber, Pierre de Beauport and The Dust Brothers
Billboard 200 peak: No. 3
Grammy nominations: Best rock album; best pop performance by a duo or group with vocal (“Anybody Seen My Baby?”)
Note: This is The Stones’ only nod in a pop category to date.
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2006: A Bigger Bang
Producers: Don Was, The Glimmer Twins, Matt Clifford
Billboard 200 peak: No. 3
Grammy nomination: Best rock album
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2018: Blue & Lonesome
Producers: Don Was, The Glimmer Twins
Billboard 200 peak: No. 3
Grammy win: Best traditional blues album
Note: The Stones are the only act to win Grammys for both best rock album and best traditional blues album.
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2025: Hackney Diamonds
Producers: Andrew Watt, Don Was
Billboard 200 peak: No. 3
Grammy nominations: Best rock song (“Angry,” 2024); 2025 nominations TBD
