Nominations Announced for the YouTube Music Awards

Nominations Announced for the YouTube Music Awards, Voting Opens for Fans Around the World

Avicii, M.I.A, Earl Sweatshirt, Tyler the Creator, and Walk Off the Earth added to previously announced performances from Eminem, Lady Gaga and Arcade Fire

YouTube announced nominations for the first-ever YouTube Music Awards, a global event culminating in a live show from New York City on Sunday, November 3. Six categories, including Video, Artist, and YouTube Phenomenon of the Year, are now open for voting to fans around the world.

The lineup of top performers at the YouTube Music Awards continues to grow. Avicii, M.I.A., Earl Sweatshirt, Tyler the Creator, and Walk Off the Earth join previously announced acts Eminem, Lady Gaga, and Arcade Fire for the live show, with YouTube sensations Lindsey Stirling and CDZA also on tap to perform. Actor and musician Jason Schwartzman is joined by comedian and musician Reggie Watts to host this live event presented in partnership with Kia Motors Corporation. Music video visionary Spike Jonze is creative director, with executive producers VICE Media and Sunset Lane Entertainment.

Nominations for the YouTube Music Awards are based on YouTube data over the last 12 months from September 2012, with nominees representing the artists and videos with the highest levels of YouTube fan engagement, including views, likes, shares, comments, and subscriptions. Fans can now vote to determine the winners of each nomination category by visiting youtube.com/musicawards or searching “YTMA” on YouTube, and sharing the official YouTube Music Awards nomination videos across Google+, Twitter and Facebook. 

The six nomination categories and nominees for this year’s YouTube Music Awards are:

• Video of the Year: Honoring the world’s most loved music videos, these nominees represent the videos with the most fan engagement on YouTube over the last year.

‣ Epic Rap Battles Of History - Barack Obama vs Mitt Romney


‣ Demi Lovato - Heart Attack


‣ Girls' Generation - I Got A Boy

‣ Justin Bieber (feat. Nicki Minaj) - Beauty And A Beat


‣ Lady Gaga - Applause


‣ Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (feat. Mary Lambert) - Same Love

‣ Miley Cyrus - We Can't Stop

‣ One Direction - Best Song Ever


‣ PSY - Gentleman

‣ Selena Gomez - Come & Get It

• Artist of the Year: Honoring YouTube’s most-loved acts, nominees represent the most watched, shared, liked, and subscribed-to artists over the last year.

‣ Eminem

‣ Epic Rap Battles of History

‣ Justin Bieber

‣ Katy Perry

‣ Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

‣ Nicki Minaj

‣ One Direction

‣ PSY

‣ Rihanna

‣ Taylor Swift

• Response of the Year: Honoring the best fan remix, parody or response video, these nominees represent the top “unofficial” fan videos on YouTube based on the videos fans watched, shared or liked.

‣ Boyce Avenue (feat. Fifth Harmony) - Mirrors

‣ Jayesslee - Gangnam Style

‣ Lindsey Stirling and Pentatonix - Radioactive

‣ ThePianoGuys - Titanium / Pavane

‣ Walk Off the Earth (feat. KRNFX) - I Knew You Were Trouble

• YouTube Phenomenon: Recognizing the YouTube trends that the world could not get enough of, nominees are based on the songs that generated the most fan videos.

‣ Diamonds

‣ Gangnam Style


‣ Harlem Shake


‣ I Knew You Were Trouble


‣ Thrift Shop

• YouTube Breakthrough: Honoring music’s breakout new acts, nominees represent the artists who experienced the biggest growth in views and subscribers over the last year.

‣ Kendrick Lamar

‣ Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

‣ Naughty Boy

‣ Passenger

‣ Rudimental

• Innovation of the Year:  Starting with videos selected by an international panel of musicians, YouTubers and creative luminaries, we then selected the creative video innovations that resonated most with fans on YouTube, based on views, likes, shares and comments.

‣ Anamanaguchi - ENDLESS FANTASY

‣ Atoms For Peace - Ingenue

‣ Bat For Lashes - Lilies

‣ DeStorm - See Me Standing

‣ Toro Y Moi "Say That"

In the run up to the YouTube Music Awards, five music events will be streamed from around the world on YouTube, culminating in the live awards celebration at Pier 36 in New York City. The shows from Seoul, Tokyo, Moscow, London and Rio will kick off at 5am ET on November 3rd, and fans can tune in at youtube.com/musicawards.