Here's who should win album of the year at the 2022 Grammys

Metacritic score: 53/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 1

"Donda" is the 10th studio album by Ye, formerly known as Kanye West.

It was loosely marketed as a tribute to Ye's late mother, Donda West, and his upbringing in Chicago. Live performances have featured a burning replica of his childhood home.

In reality, the album's muddled combination of rap and gospel music has been described as "exhausting," "disappointing," and "almost-unlistenable."

Highlight: At least this one doesn't cost $200 to listen to.

Downfall: Despite receiving several major Grammy nods this year, Ye has been barred from performing at the ceremony due to his "concerning online behavior." The rapper has been habitually harassing his ex-wife Kim Kardashian online, threatening her new boyfriend, and lashing out at anyone who dares to question him.

While it seems unlikely to happen, the next logical step would be to rescind Ye's nominations.

"Separating the art from the artist" requires willful ignorance of how an artist's views bleed into their art. Ye's "Donda" is no exception, particularly when it comes to his enthusiastic embrace of collaborators accused of sexual violence, domestic abuse, and unapologetic homophobia.

There's no question that Ye has created great art in the past, and it's been painful to watch him destroy his own legacy in real-time. But given the ever-increasing severity of his actions, the Recording Academy would be out of line to reward him this year — let alone hand him the evening's top prize.

Metacritic score: 62/100 (Note: This score reflects reviews of the standard edition of "Justice.")

Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 for two nonconsecutive weeks

Justin Bieber's sixth studio album "Justice" is a standard pop showing for the streaming era: lots of songs, lots of cameos, and lots of easy-to-memorize choruses, all designed to land on as many Spotify playlists as possible. 

The deluxe version includes 22 songs and 14 featured artists, including many of Bieber's favorite collaborators, like fellow wife guy Chance the Rapper, teen hitmaker The Kid LAROI, and rap's most willing guest star Quavo.

Highlight: I must admit that "Peaches" and "Hold On" are catchy, though I'm partial to the rare vulnerability that Bieber displays on "Lonely."

Downfall: Bieber has every right to compete in pop categories this year, but "Justice" has no business competing for album of the year. It's an aggressively mediocre tracklist, comprised of formulaic bops at best and performative nonsense at worst.

Metacritic score: 70/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 8

"Love for Sale" is most significant for being Tony Bennett's 61st and last album. The legendary 95-year-old singer recently announced his retirement from music.

For his second collaborative project with Lady Gaga, the unlikely duo reimagined a collection of Cole Porter covers, described as "silk-soft" and "fairly wholesome" with hints of playfulness. Bennett's Alzheimer's diagnosis also lends the listening experience a tender, poignant edge.

Highlight: The album's standard-edition closer, "Dream Dancing," is powerfully nostalgic with a hint of contemporary cheek, particularly in Gaga's delivery of the line: "Baby, if I'm the bottom, you're the top."

Downfall: It makes sense to give Bennet's swan song a respectful nod during "music's biggest night," but it wouldn't make any sense for him to win. "Love for Sale" lacks the modern relevance and creativity that album of the year demands.

Metacritic score: 86/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 for three consecutive weeks

At first glance, "Happier Than Ever" seems like a no-brainer nominee, but in reality, it smells more like low-hanging fruit.

Billie Eilish is already a Grammys darling at the ripe age of 20. She has racked up 17 total nominations and won record of the year twice in a row.

With stats like those, failing to nominate "Happier Than Ever" for album of the year would've been interpreted as a snub. But it actually would've been more than fair.

The tracklist is far too uneven to rank among the year's best releases. While its highs are very high ("Oxytocin," "Halley's Comet," "Male Fantasy"), there are nearly as many forgettable lows ("Getting Older," "OverHeated," "Everybody Dies").

Highlight: The title track is easily one of the best breakup songs of all time. It's so impressive that it makes the rest of the songs, even the great ones, feel weak by contrast.

Downfall: I could nit-pick several details of this rollout, but I mostly wish Eilish had released fewer singles ahead of the album. "My Future," "Your Power," and "NDA" should hit harder, but they get lost in the shuffle and end up feeling gratuitous.

Overall, if Eilish had left five or six songs on the cutting room floor, we'd be having a very different conversation.

Metacritic score: 75/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 6

Even though "Back of My Mind" is H.E.R.'s official debut album, this marks her third album of the year nod. (In 2019, her eponymous compilation lost to Kacey Musgraves' "Golden Hour," and in 2020, her second compilation "I Used to Know Her" lost to Billie Eilish's "When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?")

The singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist is best known for folding timely messages into a smooth blend of R&B and classic rock — and some critics have praised "Back of My Mind" as her most commanding, multi-faceted project to date.

"'Back of My Mind' [is] me saying, 'This is exactly who I am. This is what I want,'" she told the Los Angeles Times. "I'm a lot more sure. And I'm ready to fully submerge myself in that confidence, in that certainty. And that's just part of life. It's part of growing up."

Highlight: "Damage" and "Hold On."

Downfall: To some, H.E.R. is overdue for an album of the year award. To others, she is disproportionately loved by a group of voters who value traditional musicianship (she plays piano, drums, guitar, and bass) and palatable social consciousness.

The New Yorker's Sheldon Pierce has described her as "an awards-show fixture, despite having a marginal cultural impact."

"Though it would be disingenuous to suggest that H.E.R.'s music doesn't resonate with listeners, it does feel optimized for industry gatekeepers — a class still figuring out what to do with so-called 'urban' music," he wrote last year.

Also, for what it's worth, "Back of My Mind" proudly includes a collaboration with Chris Brown, who pleaded guilty to felony assault after punching and choking Rihanna in 2009. He has since been accused of assaulting several more women, including ex-girlfriend Karrueche Tran, as well as sexual battery and rape.

H.E.R., who has claimed a reputation for speaking out against "hate," has never addressed Brown's controversies.

Metacritic score: N/A

Billboard 200 peak: No. 86

You may know Jon Batiste as the bandleader on "The Late Show With Stephen Colbert," or the brilliant mind behind the soundtrack of Pixar's "Soul."

But the 33-year-old jazz musician is an industry stalwart, racking up 11 Grammy nods this year alone. "We Are" is his eighth studio album and his most unconventional yet.

Batiste's bright fusion of pop, blues, hip-hop, and unmistakable New Orleans soul is buoyed by a strong undercurrent of ancestral respect and artistic solidarity. In his own words, "We Are" explores the connection between "the beginnings of Black music" and the "beginnings of American culture really forming."

"This album is a representation of what that lineage is all about, me just kind of showing people in the world that genres don't exist," he told NPR. "There's no such thing. It's only music."

Highlight: The triumphant title track features the marching band from Batiste's own high school in New Orleans.

Downfall: Ultimately, "We Are" makes little sense as "album of the year," a title that explicitly invites us to judge its quality and cultural impact. It's the lowest-charting album on this list by far, and its release was too low-key to warrant a Metacritic entry.

Batiste is a talented and formidable artist, but it's difficult to argue that he best reflects the current musical landscape.

Metacritic score: 85/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 for four nonconsecutive weeks

Released just five months after Taylor Swift's masterpiece "Folklore," "Evermore" led fans even deeper into the songwriter's fantasy world.

Once again, its 15 songs were largely inspired by phantoms, grudges, fictional characters, and imaginary love affairs: the wannabe movie star with a nostalgic streak; the country girl who'd kill to avenge her best friend; the married woman who's having an affair she doesn't quite regret, wracked with intermingled awe and dread.

Although "Evermore" contains more weak spots than its predecessor ("Cowboy Like Me," "Long Story Short," "Closure"), Swift's lyrical mastery and cavernous stores of empathy have rarely been more potent.

Highlight: You'd be hard-pressed to find a more harrowing stretch of songs than "Champagne Problems" to "Tolerate It" — although "Marjorie" is an absolute killer.

Downfall: "Evermore" is one of Swift's best albums and easily one of the best albums on this list.

However, Swift won album of the year for "Folklore," which inevitably detracts from its little sister's favorability.

Despite the genius of "Evermore," a back-to-back victory for Swift would feel too partisan for a group of voters that's already on thin ice with viewers and artists alike, especially now that she has three such trophies in her possession.

Metacritic score: 85/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 2

Two years after I described Lil Nas X's Grammy-nominated EP as a "rush job," designed to "satiate his fans while he works on his official debut," he proved me absolutely right with "Montero."

The pop star's first full-length project is everything "7" wasn't: energetic, honest, deeply charming, and true album of the year material.

As Insider's music editor Courteney Larocca wrote in our review, "There's nothing one-note about this album. It boasts a kaleidoscopic range of emotion, vocal variety, and production elements. I can't imagine hearing this set of 15 songs, and not coming away with at least one standout favorite."

Highlight: The tracklist is anchored by sublime smash hits "Montero (Call Me By Your Name)" and "Industry Baby," but its crown jewel is "Lost in the Citadel," a confessional emo-pop banger that unpacks feelings of grief and longing.

Downfall: In any ranking, the top three is where it can get especially tricky to discern gaps in quality. For me, Doja Cat's "Planet Her" edges out "Montero" with sheer consistency.

For our first-listen reviews, Insider's music team employs a simple formula to determine an album's final score: 1 point for "Worth listening to," .5 for "Background music," and 0 for "Press skip." 

At the time of writing, when I apply this to "Montero," it earns 8.3 out of 10 (skipping "One of Me" and "Life After Salem," with "The Art of Realization" as background music). The deluxe version of "Planet Her," however, earns 8.7.

Metacritic score: 76/100 (Note: This score reflects reviews of the standard edition of "Planet Her.")

Billboard 200 peak: No. 2

"Planet Her" landed in the top 10 of Insider's best albums of 2021 thanks to Doja Cat's freaky charm and versatility.

The rapper-slash-singer is a natural entertainer, able to shift her flow at a moment's notice and adapt to any terrain, from Afrobeat-inspired funk ("Woman") and glitchy trap ("Need to Know") to smoldering R&B ("You Right") and dreamy '90s pop ("Alone").

The album's deluxe version adds another five tracks, bringing the total to a whopping 19, and practically every one sounds like a hit.

Highlight: "Kiss Me More," which is up for both record and song of the year, still remains unmatched.

Downfall: Just like "Future Nostalgia" before it, "Planet Her" was the best pure-pop album of the year in question — the kind of music that's unpretentious and colorful and never fails to make you dance.

Unfortunately, that does not mean it was the best album of the year overall. "Planet Her" may have deserved to take home the top prize if an obvious winner didn't already exist.

Metacritic score: 83/100

Billboard 200 peak: No. 1 for five nonconsecutive weeks

If you've been paying even a smidgen of attention to popular music culture, which the Grammys ostensibly claim to represent, this shouldn't come as a surprise. Olivia Rodrigo rapidly emerged as 2021's defining artist, and "Sour" was its irresistible soundtrack.

Rodrigo's debut album was met with a knockout combination of acclaim: absolute fan devotion, commercial success, and critical consensus.

The New York Times described "Sour" as "nuanced and often exceptional." NME called it "an almost-masterpiece." Rolling Stone praised Rodrigo for "forging a path into an entirely new realm of pop," while the Los Angeles Times raved, "fully appreciating Rodrigo's skill requires paying close attention."

And for what it's worth, I stand by my assessment that "Sour" is messily, maddeningly perfect, largely thanks to Rodrigo's uncanny knack for cathartic songwriting.

Not only is "Sour" the most deserving victor this year, but it also feels like the most likely.

Rodrigo is up for seven total awards, including all four major categories, and the Recording Academy tends to love a female wunderkind. The 19-year-old would be among the youngest artists ever to win the top prize, including Billie Eilish (who was 18) and her own idol Taylor Swift (who was 20). 

Highlight: "Drivers License," obviously, but also "Deja Vu."

Downfall: Coming at the end of such a strong tracklist, "Hope Ur Ok" is comparatively frail, just because it feels a little too Disney. But the song's intention is so sweet that I'm generally inclined to give it a pass.