Fictional group HUNTR/X from KPop Demon Hunters and BLACKPINK‘s Rosé are reportedly vying for K-pop’s first-ever Grammy Award.
- READ MORE: Rosé and Bruno Mars’ ‘APT.’ is an addictively flirty and fun intro to the BLACKPINK star’s solo era
The 68th Grammy Awards are set to take place on February 1, 2026, with nominations set to be announced on November 7. With the first round of voting now underway, ‘APT.’ by BLACKPINK’s Rosé and KPop Demon Hunters’ ‘Golden’ have both been submitted to the Recording Academy in hopes of being nominated, per a new report from Yonhap.
Both tracks were submitted in the Record of the Year and Song of the Year categories, with Rosé’s album ‘rosie’ – on which the Bruno Mars-featuring ‘APT.’ appears – and the soundtrack album of KPop Demon Hunters have also been submitted in the Album of the Year category.
EJAE, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami provide the singing voices for HUNTR/X, the fictional group at the centre of the Netflix animation, which recently became the most-watched movie in the streamer’s history.
The trio previously performed an excerpt of the song in a sketch with Bad Bunny on Saturday Night Live, and recently marked their first full televised performance of it on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
As for Rosé’s ‘APT.’, the track marked a milestone recently after garnering over 2billion views on YouTube, the first of her solo material to do so.
That news came shortly after she became the first-ever Korean act to win Song of the Year at the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs). ‘APT.’ broke numerous records and topped charts following its release in October – also becoming the fastest K-pop song to surpass one billion streams on Spotify.
The track was also named one of NME’s best 50 songs of 2024 and clinched the second spot on NME’s list of the best 25 K-pop songs of the year, with Sara Delgado saying that with “a genius interpolation of Toni Basil’s ‘Mickey’ and an infectiously funky chanted chorus, ‘APT.’ will go down in history as the perfect case study on how to launch a solo career.
She joins other K-pop acts that have submitted their work for consideration for the Grammys, including SEVENTEEN, Stray Kids, Ateez, Riize and Tomorrow X Together, as well as BLACKPINK, TWICE, KATSEYE, aespa, IVE and LE SSERAFIM and soloists Jennie, Jisoo, Lisa, Jin, J-Hope and RM.
The Grammys are introducing some changes to its categories ahead of next year, including new rules for Best New Artist and some breakdowns of the country genre.
In June, the Recording Academy announced some tweaks to its rules, including carving out a new stand-alone category for Best Album Cover.
One of the biggest changes is the creation of two separate categories for country music: Best Traditional Country Album and Best Contemporary Country Album. Previously, there had only been one Best Country Album category, which was won by Beyoncé in this year’s awards.
She led the way with 11 nominations in this year’s ceremony, making her the most nominated artist in the awards’ history – she won the biggest award of the night, Album Of The Year, for ‘Cowboy Carter’ marking her first win in the category.
Kendrick Lamar walked away as the biggest winner of the night, clinching five awards including Record of The Year and Song Of The Year for ‘Not Like Us’. He also took home the Grammys for Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song for ‘Not Like Us’, which has also won Best Music Video.
Charli XCX won for Best Dance Pop Recording for ‘Von Dutch’ and Best Dance/Electronic Album for ‘Brat’. Sabrina Carpenter has won Best Pop Solo Performance for ‘Espresso’, while Justice and Tame Impala took home the Grammy for Best Dance/Electronic Recording with ‘Neverender’.