Kirby Is Officially The Only Nintendo Character To Win A Grammy Award

Don’t let your memes be dreams gamers, because last night Kirby, in the year of our lord 2022, won a Grammy.

OK, technically, Kirby himself didn’t win a Grammy. That honor goes to Charlie Rosen and Jake Silverman’s 8-Bit Big Band, a 30-to 65-member orchestra that specializes in jazzy renditions of music from popular video game franchises like “Lonely Rolling Star’’ from Katamari Damacy (the best Katamari song) and “Snake Eater’’ from Metal Gear Solid 3. Last night, they won best arrangement, instrumental, or acapella for their rendition of the 1996 Kirby Superstar song “Meta Knight’s Revenge.” But for the sake of argument, let’s just say Kirby won the Grammy because that’s what he deserves. I await Kirby’s future collaborations with fellow Grammy winners Tyler, The Creator, and Silk Sonic.

This marks the second occasion a video game has won a Grammy, with Civilization IV winning a Grammy for “Baba Yetu” for best instrumental arrangement accompanying vocalist back in 2011. Kirby’s win could’ve been a hat-trick for video game music had Journey won its nomination for best score soundtrack for visual media in 2013, but it was snubbed by Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor for their score in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I highly recommend folks check out Ross and Reznor’s rendition of “Immigrant Song.” It’s a banger.

This award also comes at a stupendous time considering Kirby and the Forgotten Land released just a couple weeks ago. I’ve been chipping away at “Kirby Automata” over the past week, and I’d argue that many of the tracks are absolute heat as well. I’m gonna call my shot like Babe Ruth and say in a year’s time, Kirby will be nominated for yet another Grammy, possibly for someone’s rendition of a song from Forgotten Land. Prayer circle for it being “Cave Theme 2.”