Credit: Mary McCartney | MPL / Capitol
The Boys of Dungeon Lane is in the running for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album, where McCartney could face Barry Manilow and Josh Groban.
Paul McCartney wrote “Yesterday,” “Hey Jude” and “Let It Be.” At the 2027 Grammys, he could be competing with Barry Manilow and Josh Groban.
According to Billboard, McCartney’s latest album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane, is in the running for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. A win would be his 20th Grammy, by Billboard’s count.
The category is meant for albums that stand apart from contemporary pop: Great American Songbook standards, classic pop and show tunes. But in recent years, the Recording Academy has let in more rock and singer-songwriter names. Elvis Costello & the Imposters won in 2020 with Look Now, James Taylor won the next year with American Standard, and Bruce Springsteen was nominated in 2024 for his soul covers album Only the Strong Survive.
McCartney has already won the category once: in 2013, for Kisses on the Bottom, his album of standards. This time, it’s his own songs.
The Boys of Dungeon Lane came out on May 29 on Capitol Records, produced by McCartney and Andrew Watt. It’s his first album in five years, a nostalgic look back at his Liverpool childhood. It went to No. 1 in the U.K. and No. 5 on the Billboard 200, and it holds a Metacritic score of 84, which means “universal acclaim.”
The likely competition includes Barry Manilow’s What a Time, his first album of almost entirely original songs in nearly 15 years, made with collaborators including Babyface, Dave Cobb and Gary Barlow. Josh Groban enters with Cinematic, a collection of songs from the movies that includes “Can You Feel the Love Tonight.”
Laufey, meanwhile, has won the category twice in the last three years, with Bewitched in 2024 and A Matter of Time in 2026 – proof that the newcomers have shown they can beat the legends.
Grammy nominations will be announced on Nov. 16, and the 69th Grammy Awards take place on Feb. 7, 2027, at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. They will air on ABC and Hulu, the first time in more than 50 years the show isn’t on CBS.
Sixty years after the Beatles changed pop, McCartney might win in the category that celebrates the pop that came before them.
Sources: Billboard · Wikipedia, The Boys of Dungeon Lane · Wikipedia, Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album · Barry Manilow · Rock Shot Magazine, Josh Groban · Variety Australia
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