Celebrities Who Got Snubbed From The Grammys 2025 In Memoriam Tribute
In addition to dispensing awards every year, the Grammys composes its in annual memoriam list for musicians who've recently died. As the Grammys website shows, 2025's full in memorium record is hundreds of people long and includes standouts familiar to the wider public, like producer Quincy Jones and One Direction's Liam Payne. Being as long as it is, music fans might naturally assume that the list covers everyone, including their personal favorites. But like 2024 and years prior, some of the recently deceased got snubbed.
Bear in mind that the Grammys' in memoriam segment doesn't typically include musicians who died the previous year. The 2025 video excluded people like David Lynch, who in addition to his groundbreaking repertoire of films wrote music for decades, and Whitesnake and Thin Lizzy guitarist John Sykes, who died in 2024 but whose death wans't announced until 2025. Meanwhile, individuals like 1960s English singer Marianne Faithful died in 2025 but were nonetheless featured behind Coldplay's Chris Martin as he sang "All My Love" in tribute to those who've died.
It's this video compilation, more than anything, that serves to memorialize musicians who've died, and certain omissions stand out. Four-time Grammy winner Zakir Hussain, for example, and the Replacements guitarist Slim Dunlap. And then there's Mister Cee, DJ and producer who helped discover the Notorious B.I.G., and the original singer for Iron Maiden, Paul Di'Anno.
Paul Di'Anno was on Iron Maiden's first two albums
Metal fans ought to recognize the name Paul Di'Anno. He was the original lead singer of the legendary metal band, Iron Maiden, from 1978 to 1981. The vocalist performed on the band's first two albums, 1980's self-titled debut and 1981's "Killers," before Maiden mainstay Bruce Dickinson stepped in. Di'Anno has been cited as an influence by bands like Pantera, Sepultura, and Metallica.
Di'Anno told Metal Hammer he was fired from Iron Maiden and said he didn't blame them for doing so. As the BBC puts it, "success had led him to a dark place." In a 2024 interview with Stonedead Festival near the end of his life, though, he suggested he was on good terms with the band. "Everyone thinks that we hated each other, which is b*******," he said. "That's the press for you."
In the decades after leaving Maiden, Di'Anno continued to perform music at shows, including Maiden tracks. He also showed up in solo projects in bands like Praying Mantis, Gogmagog, and Battlezone. In fact, he maintained a rigorous tour schedule right until his death, doing over 100 shows across 2023 and 2024. He even performed in a wheelchair that entire time despite having a diagnosis of lymphedema, which causes tissue to swell up with fluid.
After Di'Anno died, Iron Maiden released a statement on X. "Paul's contribution to Iron Maiden was immense and helped set us on the path we have been travelling as a band for almost five decades," they wrote. Besides simple oversight, it's not clear why Di'Anno didn't appear in the 2025 Grammys' in memoriam segment.
Mister Cee helped Biggie Smalls get famous
Mister Cee, born Calvin LeBrun, earned a spot in music history by helping to bring Biggie Smalls — the Notorious B.I.G. — to the public. As the underground-to-limelight tale goes, Cee met Biggie through Kevin "DJ 50 Grand" Griffin, who collaborated with Biggie on the demo that would draw the attention of Diddy, who kicked off the rapper's career. Cee gave this demo a once-over to improve the quality and later got an associate executive producer credit on Biggie's debut 1994 album, "Ready to Die." Even before all of this, the producer made an appearance on Big Daddy Kane's 1988 debut album, "Long Live the Kane."
In an interview with WBLS 107.5, Cee provided insight into those early days in Biggie's career. "Big was very shy," the producer said. "He would always talk with his head down and say, 'Yo man, don't be promising me nothing, man. If you say you're going to do something, do it.'" That's when Cee insisted that he have a look at Biggie's demo.
AllHipHop.com reports that Cee died from "diabetes-related coronary artery and kidney disease," as New York City's medical examiner determined. He was only 57. "It's a huge loss for our entire family, the borough of Brooklyn, and the entire Hip-Hop Community," his family said in a statement. Like Di'Anno, there's no clear reason why the Grammys excluded Cee from the 2025 memoriam segment.