These past few weeks all of my social media timelines have been filled with discourse on the 67th annual Grammy awards, especially regarding Beyoncé’s huge win in the Album of the Year category for her eighth studio album Cowboy Carter. However, it has not been all that celebratory. Many people believe that Cowboy Carter was not deserving of this award, and instead Billie Eilish’s album Hit Me Hard and Soft should have taken home the prestigious Grammy. I disagree with this popular belief, though—and let me tell you why.

2003: the three members of girlband/trio Destiny’s Child announce that they are going to release solo albums. Beyoncé’s skyrockets to popularity, selling over 300,000 units in the first week of its release (more than both of her ex-band members’ units combined) and it is immediately clear that she is going to be a star in the music industry. Her first solo studio album is called Dangerously In Love, with humongous hits including the title track “Dangerously in Love” and “Crazy In Love” featuring Jay-Z. Fast forward to 2025 and she has released eight studio albums, been on several unbelievable world tours, and has been nominated and has won a huge variety of awards and accolades, including a Peabody award for her album Lemonade. Despite winning multiple Grammys, throughout her career, Beyoncé has never won Album of the Year. Somehow, Lemonade won a Peabody Award—the music industry’s equivalent of a Pulitzer Prize—but not Album of the Year? Year after year, Beyoncé releases albums with number one hits made for everyone that are not just money-grabbing singles, but have incredible depth and artistry, so why is there shock and outrage when she finally gets what she deserves?

Statistically speaking, Cowboy Carter has not done as well as Beyoncé’s other albums. It is definitely not as streamed as the first album in her concept trilogy, Renaissance (which also did not win any major awards at the 2023 Grammys), but I would argue that is extremely deserving, if not more deserving of this recognition. Cowboy Carter takes listeners on a journey where they are told stories about country music’s deep history in Black culture as well as Beyoncé’s personal experiences growing up in the south (Texas specifically) as a Black woman. The opening track “Ameriican Requiem” prepares listeners to expect the unexpected with this album’s themes and explorations. The lyrics “looka here [...] can you stand me?” are, in my opinion, Beyoncé emphatically asking us to pay close attention to what she is about to do, and her constant pushing of genre boundaries in terms of music genres and what she is expected and “allowed” to create. She tells us about how she constantly receives criticism, and how nothing she does is good enough: “They used to say I spoke too country / Then the rejection came, said I wasn’t country ’nough”. Despite this though, she is firm and confident in herself; she gets to define her music, it is her hard work and no one else’s: “If that ain’t country, tell me, what is? / Plant my bare feet on solid ground for years / They don’t, don’t know how hard I had to fight for this / When I sing my song.” In just the opening track, listeners are gripped by Beyoncé’s demanding and overpowering tone. Personally, I always get chills when I listen to this song—it is impossible not to with her vocal fry and outstanding vocals. I could write an analysis like this for every song, but it is a twenty-seven-track album, so we would be here a while...

Cowboy Carter sings not only to Beyoncé’s critics, but also to her fans, her children, her husband and her family—both dead and alive—who have made her who she is today. This album is a photo album of memories, a history, an angry diary entry, and a love letter all at once. It is so much more than music. As much as I adored Billie Eilish’s album Hit Me Hard and Soft, Cowboy Carter is so much more refreshing in its themes, form, craft and artistry. This is not to discredit Billie Eilish, but only to give Beyoncé her much deserved flowers. People need to remember that the Grammys are not based on Spotify streams or the number of weeks an album spends at number one. At the end of the day someone has to lose, and someone has to win—and this year it was finally Beyoncé.