It can be easy to think of the Grammys as a music event, because those awards are the ones that get the most press; Uproxx’s headline about the full list of nominees that was revealed this morning mentions Kendrick Lamar, Jay-Z, And Lorde, for example. But really, the Grammys are a broader audio media event, since there are also Grammys for things like album notes, comedy albums, album packaging, and spoken word albums.
This year, the latter is where things get interesting: Because the category includes poetry, audiobooks, and storytelling, Bernie Sanders is up for a Grammy, and even more oddly, one of his competitors is Bruce Springsteen.
The full list of nominees for Spoken Word Album (Includes Poetry, Audiobooks & Storytelling) also includes astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and Star Wars actress Carrie Fisher, and is as follows:
Astrophysics for People in a Hurry — Neil deGrasse Tyson
Born to Run — Bruce Springsteen
Confessions of a Serial Songwriter — Shelly Peiken
Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In — Bernie Sanders and Mark Ruffalo
The Princess Diarist — Carrie Fisher
Both Sanders and Springsteen released audio versions of their books that came out in the past year: Sanders’ Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In lays out and explains the political positions he ran on in the most recent presidential election, while Springsteen’s Born To Run is an autobiography and a companion piece to his 2016 album Chapter and Verse.
Find the full list of this year’s Grammy nominations here.
