Like all award shows, the Grammys are a constant source of frustration. The Recording Academy’s voters frequently make decisions that seem to be at odds with the organization’s stated goal to “honor excellence in the recording arts and sciences…not sales or chart positions.” But the Grammys are important, because they make us talk about what makes music “great” and let some very talented people perform on national television. They also get things right, occasionally. This year’s nominations are uncharacteristically strong—if imperfect—and may stage a coronation for one of popular music’s most incisive and ambitious artists.

These are my predictions for the four major categories: Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best New Artist. (Record of the Year recognizes how a song is performed and produced; Song of the Year emphasizes lyrics and melody independent of how they are realized in a live or studio recording.) ­

Record of the Year

Nominees:

“Really Love” – D’Angelo and the Vanguard
“Uptown Funk” – Mark Ronson feat. Bruno Mars
“Thinking Out Loud” – Ed Sheeran
“Blank Space” – Taylor Swift
“Can’t Feel My Face” – The Weeknd

Will win: “Uptown Funk”
Should win: “Really Love”
Should have been nominated: “Loud Places” – Jamie xx feat. Romy

Sometimes, the Oscars tend to be confused by the criteria for certain categories. The supporting actor and actress nominations, for example, seem to take less interest in the amount of time an actor or actress is actually on screen and more on how studios want to position their stars for maximum awards exposure.

The record and song of the year categories have the potential to create a similar confusion. While the former rewards performance and production, and the latter recognizes lyrics and melody, it can be difficult to distinguish the way a song is written from how it is realized in a studio. This year, the Recording Academy appeared to grasp that distinction, evidenced by the nomination of D’Angelo and the Vanguard’s exquisite “Really Love.”

The song presents romance as something tender and intimate, qualities that are more difficult to perform than write. But the song can’t work without a convincing physical expression of D’Angelo’s sparse lyrics. Thankfully, he and his expert band display a deep knowledge of their instruments—D’Angelo’s voice included—as tools of melody, rhythm, texture and feeling. They go beyond mere restraint to finesse, achieving a uniform intensity (or lack thereof) through varied means to create a beautiful consonance. I wish I could live inside it.

“Really Love” should win by about 600 miles, but it probably won’t, because one can only expect so much justice from the Grammys.

Song of the Year

Nominees:

“Alright” – Kendrick Duckworth, Kawan Prather, Mark Anthony Spears and Pharrell Williams (performed by Kendrick Lamar)
“Blank Space” – Max Martin, Shellback and Taylor Swift (performed by Taylor Swift)
“Girl Crush” – Hillary Lindsey, Lori McKenna and Liz Rose (performed by Little Big Town)
“See You Again” – Andrew Cedar, Justin Franks, Charles Puth and Cameron Thomas (performed by Wiz Khalifa feat. Charile Puth)
“Thinking Out Loud” – Ed Sheeran and Amy Wadge (performed by Ed Sheeran)

Will win: “Alright”
Should win: “Girl Crush”
Should have been nominated: “Something More Than Free” – Jason Isbell

Great songwriting often says old things in new ways. Little Big Town’s “Girl Crush” is about a woman who is jealous of another woman who has stolen her man’s heart. But songwriters Hillary Lindsey, Lori McKenna and Liz Rose twist this country trope to take a sly swipe at the genre’s heteronormative tendencies. “I wanna taste her lips, yeah, ‘cause they taste like you/I wanna drown myself in a bottle of her perfume,” the chorus begins, using the language of attraction to convey jealousy. The song is spare and pointed in its imagery, needing just two short verses and a chorus to paint a picture of heartbroken obsession.

Should Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” win, it would be a worthy recipient, but it can’t match “Girl Crush” for economy and invention.

Album of the Year

Nominees:

“Sound & Color” – Alabama Shakes
“To Pimp A Butterfly” – Kendrick Lamar
“Traveller” – Chris Stapleton
“1989” – Taylor Swift
“Beauty Behind the Madness” – The Weeknd

Should win: “To Pimp A Butterfly”
Will win: “To Pimp A Butterfly”
Should have been nominated: “Black Messiah” – D’Angelo and the Vanguard

In recent years, the album of the year category has been notoriously unpredictable (three of the past five winners have been underdogs). But I would like to believe that, when presented with a rare masterpiece (“To Pimp A Butterfly”) from a popular artist that speaks powerfully to its cultural moment, the Recording Academy could make the easy and correct choice.

Even in one of the strongest album of the year fields in recent history, “To Pimp A Butterfly” towers above its competition. It’s a miracle of outrageous ambition and sound execution, tying its thematic and aesthetic strands in breathtaking harmony. The level of difficulty is staggering, but, more importantly, the album is sonically rich and deeply affecting. You can never rely on the Grammys to make the right decision, but the stars appear to be aligned for Lamar’s delayed (he was nominated in seven categories and won none of them in 2014) coronation.

Best New Artist

Nominees:

Courtney Barnett
James Bay
Sam Hunt
Tori Kelly
Meghan Trainor

Will win: Hunt
Should win: Barnett
Should have been nominated: Girl Band

Despite its confusing, somewhat arbitrary criteria (artists who have released multiple albums are eligible, so long as they didn’t establish a “public identity” before their most recent release) the best new artist category tends to resemble a popularity contest, so long as the most popular artist is palatable to a white, middle-aged audience. Meghan Trainor fits that criterion more than her fellow nominees, but I sense a minor upset brewing.

Though Trainor is more talented than she’s given credit for, she inspires more apathy than just about any other major pop star. Her most ubiquitous single (“All About That Bass”) debuted almost 20 months ago, and never captured the public consciousness in the way the past three winners’ (Sam Smith, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Fun.) most popular singles have. Trainor’s enthusiasm void opens room for Sam Hunt, a rare country artist who’s earned attention from commercial audiences as well as highbrow publications like the New Yorker and the New York Times. Combine that with slick, airtight songs which, with a few tweaks, could fit snugly into Top 40 radio, and Hunt seems primed to best Trainor.