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Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. has issued a lengthy response after BTS announced they wouldn’t be submitting their music for Grammy consideration this year, giving his support to the group over their decision while also addressing critique toward the organization’s newly-created best Asian pop music performance category.

“I am saddened to hear that BTS has chosen not to participate in the Grammy Awards process this year, but as a music creator, I understand and respect their decision,” Mason Jr. wrote. “I do want to clarify something that seems to be getting lost in the conversation. The Asian Pop category was created to celebrate the depth, diversity and extraordinary growth of pop artistry coming out of Asia. The spirit of this new category is to shine a dedicated spotlight on these important artists.”

BTS first announced their decision on Tuesday night, sharing posts on Instagram where they said they “hope that music can be heard and loved for what it is, rather than being divided by region or language.”

The move came just over a month after the Recording Academy first introduced its new Asian pop category, which, per the Academy, “recognizes artistic excellence in Asian pop music performances originating from or widely recognized within Asian markets, including but not limited to K-pop, J-pop and C-pop, with meaningful use of one or more Asian languages. Awards are presented to the performing artist(s).”

The award had received a mixed response from fans, with some arguing the award could keep Asian acts from getting properly recognized in the general categories. In his statement, Mason Jr. said the genre categories don’t”exclude an artist from also submitting and being considered in the General Field.”

“Recognition in a genre category and recognition in the General Field are not mutually exclusive,” Mason Jr. said. “An artist can absolutely pursue both.”

Mason Jr. further wrote that the Academy adds new categories “never to divide, but to expand who is recognized by our 15,000 Grammy voters.”

“The Grammy organization is here to serve music and all the people who make it,” Mason Jr. wrote. “As we continue to expand the reach, our membership and our awards, regardless of geography or language, I want to emphasize that we will continue to listen to the global music community and work to honor and celebrate all the artists whose music moves the world.”

BTS isn’t the first act to rebuke the Grammys, as other major stars including The Weeknd, Drake and Morgan Wallen have all decided in recent years not to have their music considered as well.

Read Mason Jr.’s full statement below:

I am saddened to hear that BTS has chosen not to participate in the Grammy Awards process this year, but as a music creator, I understand and respect their decision.

I do want to clarify something that seems to be getting lost in the conversation. The Asian Pop category was created to celebrate the depth, diversity and extraordinary growth of pop artistry coming out of Asia. The spirit of this new category is to shine a dedicated spotlight on these important artists. More categories mean more artists’ work is recognized. It’s never to divide, but to expand who is recognized by our 15,000 Grammy voters.

I also want to be very clear: submitting music in a genre category such as Asian Pop, or Jazz or Country does not exclude an artist from also submitting and being considered in the General Field categories, including Record of the Year, Album of the Year and Song of the Year. Those categories remain open to any eligible recording, regardless of genre. Recognition in a genre category and recognition in the General Field are not mutually exclusive. An artist can absolutely pursue both.

The Grammy organization is here to serve music and all the people who make it. As we continue to expand the reach, our membership and our awards, regardless of geography or language, I want to emphasize that we will continue to listen to the global music community and work to honor and celebrate all the artists whose music moves the world.”

Spider-Man: Brand New Day looks to close out the month with a big swing, as Sony Pictures‘ latest superhero feature with Tom Holland and Zendaya eyes an astronomical opening weekend at the box office.

With Universal’s The Odyssey having enjoyed quite the successful box office journey without major new competition for the past two weeks, Peter Parker and his pals are poised to land the year’s biggest debut and potentially one of the top-grossing openings ever. The studio is projecting a domestic opening of $195 million from 4,300 North American theaters, which is also in line with third-party tracking services.

This would top last month’s launch for Disney‘s Toy Story 5, which opened to $159.6 million domestically, to make Spider-Man: Brand New Day the biggest debut of 2026. This would also put it in the top 10 for domestic opening weekends, topping 2019’s photorealistic The Lion King remake, which holds the No. 10 launch at $191.7 million. The last time a title opened above $200 million domestically was two years ago with Deadpool & Wolverine at $211.4 million. (The record goes to Avengers: Endgame’s wild 2019 opening of $357.1 million.)

Sony projects Spider-Man: Brand New Day to add $270 million from international markets for a global start of $465 million, including a strong showing in China. This would give it the studio’s second-best launch behind Spider-Man: No Way Home‘s heroic opening of $600.5 million in 2021, and it would best Spider-Man 3′s $381.6 million start from 2007.

Exhibitors are certainly clamoring to show director Destin Daniel Cretton‘s new Spider-Man film, which centers on the title hero living a lonely existence without his loved ones before a dangerous new foe targets him. Hailing from Sony and Marvel Studios, Brand New Day accounts for 49 percent of this weekend’s showtimes as of Wednesday, according to the Boxoffice Company, as opposed to the 22 percent that The Odyssey held when it opened two weekends ago to $124.5 million domestically for the third-biggest 2026 launch to date.

Word of mouth could push the Brand New Day opening much higher, as the film is already off to a flying start with critics. Also starring Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal and Mark Ruffalo, it holds a 91 percent approval rating from reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes. That puts it within similar range of the franchise’s other recent offerings, including 2018’s animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse at 97 percent and Spider-Man: No Way Home at 93 percent. In his review for The Hollywood Reporter, chief film critic David Rooney writes that Brand New Day “foregrounds the humanity that has always been Spidey’s greatest strength,” and he praises “a never-better Tom Holland.”

Indeed, some analysts are predicting that the buzz around the release will carry Spider-Man: Brand New Day far beyond $195 million. It remains to be seen whether the $260.1 million domestic opening sum for No Way Home, the previous live-action Spider-Man release, could potentially be within reach. Granted, that one had the benefit of the buzz surrounding the return of previous Peter Parkers in Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, not to mention that the release faced no real competition and marked the first post-COVID theatrical visit for many moviegoers who were starved for entertainment experiences.

Notably, there has been recent debate about audiences tiring of franchise offerings, given the underperformance of titles from both the superhero variety (June’s Supergirl) and otherwise (May’s The Mandalorian and Grogu). And yet, this weekend is poised to prove that the filmmaking teams have done an admirable job of handling Marvel Comics’ crown-jewel hero. As Fandango director of analytics and Box Office Theory founder Shawn Robbins tells THR, “Tom Holland, Sony and Marvel Studios’ run of films has remained remarkably fresh, thanks to thoughtful timing and stories that continue to connect with audiences in both new and familiar ways.”

He continues, “They’ve consistently met — and often exceeded — expectations, anchored by the kind of character-driven storytelling and big-screen spectacle audiences want from Spider-Man. It’s as much a gold standard as any for how to keep a massively popular character relevant and endearing to multiple generations of moviegoers.”

As for Holland, whose first leading role as the character came with 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming, it appears likely that Sony will have more chances to continue its winning streak. “It has been the gift of my life,” the actor — who also appears in The Odyssey — told THR at the Brand New Day premiere in Los Angeles about playing Spidey. “I will do it for as long as they’ll have me. So if this movie does good, I guess we’ll see!” Yes, we will.