Kanye West leads Grammy nominations
Usher, Keys, Charles also in top tier
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 Artists announce nominations for Grammy Awards.
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(CNN) -- The Grammy Awards loves newcomers -- witness the success of Alicia Keys and Norah Jones in recent years -- and this year the music awards have smiled on rapper Kanye West.
West, who has steered away from hard-core topics in favor of lyrics about everyday life, led nominations Tuesday for the 47th annual Grammy Awards, earning 10 nods, including song of the year, album of the year and best new artist.
"Ten nominations, that's amazing," West, a nominations presenter at the Music Box Theatre in Hollywood, told The Associated Press. "That's like a perfect score. I'm at a loss for words."
Several artists -- including Keys, Ray Charles, Green Day and Usher -- earned nominations in two of the big three categories: song, album and record of the year.
Usher's hit single "Yeah!" and album "Confessions" are nominated for record of the year and album of the year, respectively, while Keys' "If I Ain't Got You" and "The Diary of Alicia Keys" are up for song of the year (a songwriter's award) and album of the year.
Rounding out the latter category are Charles' "Genius Loves Company," Green Day's "American Idiot" and newcomer West's "College Dropout." West's song of the year nomination is for "Jesus Walks."
Other record of the year nominees are "Let's Get It Started" by the Black Eyed Peas; "Here We Go Again" by Charles and Norah Jones; "American Idiot" by Green Day; and "Heaven" by Los Lonely Boys.
Song of the year nods went to "Daughters," written and performed by John Mayer; "Jesus Walks," written by West and C. Smith; Tim McGraw's "Live Like You Were Dying" written by Tim Nichols and Craig Wiseman; Hoobastank's "The Reason," by Daniel Estrin and Douglas Robb; and Keys' "If I Ain't Got You," which she wrote and performed.
West, Los Lonely Boys, Maroon 5, Joss Stone and Gretchen Wilson are up for best new artist.
The narrower album categories -- R&B album of the year, rock album of the year, country album of the year and rap album of the year -- favored music veterans.
Among the R&B album nominees are Anita Baker ("My Everything"), Al Green ("I Can't Stop") and Prince ("Musicology"), while rock album nods went to Green Day, Elvis Costello & the Imposters ("The Delivery Man") and Velvet Revolver ("Contraband"). Velvet Revolver is made up of former Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland and members of Guns N' Roses.
After years out of the spotlight, Loretta Lynn earned a best country album nomination for her Jack White-produced "Van Lear Rose." Keith Urban ("Be Here") and Tim McGraw ("Live Like You Were Dying") are also represented in the category.
 Ray Charles -- who died in June -- was nominated for his last album, "Genius Loves Company." | |
And rap album nominees include the Beastie Boys ("To the 5 Boroughs"), LL Cool J ("The DEFinition") and Jay-Z ("The Black Album").
"Brian Wilson Presents Smile," the Beach Boys frontman's presentation of the never-issued 1967 "Smile" album, was nominated for best pop vocal album.
Usher and Keys each had eight nominations. Charles, who died in June, had seven, and Green Day received six.
The Grammys will be given out February 13 in Los Angeles, California, during a broadcast on CBS.
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Associated Press contributed to this report.
