Olivia Rodrigo and Kanye West won big at the 2022 Billboard Music Awards.
The annual ceremony returned to Las Vegas’ MGM Grand Garden Arena on Sunday night (15.05.22), and this year half of the winners were unveiled on TikTok and the other half during a live broadcast on Peacock and NBC in the US.
Teenage pop superstar Olivia, 19, and rap legend Kanye, 44, took home the most prizes.
Olivia won seven accolades for Top New Artist, Top 100 Artist, Top Streaming Songs Artist, Top Radio Songs Artist, Top Billboard Global 200 Artist and Top R B Female Artist, while ‘SOUR’ was crowned Top Billboard 200 Album.
As for Kanye, the ‘Jesus Walks’ rapper dominated the gospel and Christian categories, with ‘Donda’ taking home both Top Christian and Top Gospel Album. He also named Top Christian and Gospel Artist, while ‘Hurricane’ from ‘Donda’ was named Top Christian and Gospel Song, giving him a total of six prizes.
Doja Cat walked away with three prizes for Top R B Artist, Top Viral Song for ‘Kiss Me More’ with SZA and Top R B Female Artist.
The Weeknd was the most-nominated going into the ceremony, with 17 nods, but the ‘Blinding Lights’ hitmaker only walked away with a single prize for Top R B Male Artist.
The star-studded bash was hosted by Diddy and featured performances from Megan Thee Stallion, Silk Sonic, Burna Boy, Florence + The Machine, Ed Sheeran and Machine Gun Kelly.
Before the ceremony started, organisers caused controversy by allowing country star Morgan Wallen to make an appearance despite him being banned last year for use of a racial slur.
The 29-year-old singer-songwriter performed right after civil rights activist Tamika Mallory gave a speech about social justice and anti-racism, which raised a few eyebrows.
Travis Scott also performed, six months after the Astroworld tragedy, which saw 10 people lose their lives in a crowd surge at the rapper’s festival.
Before the event, host Diddy addressed the booking of Morgan and Travis.
