Beyonce, Taylor Swift, get big mentions

jonathan

December 10, 2014 11:37 AM

The superstar singers have led this year's awards from Apple, with their music selling highly within the year in consideration.

Apple has released the 2014 version of its iTunes Store awards, which highlights the best music, movies, TV shows, apps, books and podcasts of the year.

Beyoncé snatched up the Best Artist award, which should be no surprise given that her album BEYONCÉ became the fastest-selling album in the history of iTunes within weeks of its release. Arriving exclusively on iTunes, the album was given an appropriately bombastic reception by Apple right from the start, which has since used its success to try and persuade other record labels to follow suit with iTunes exclusives.

Sam Smith picked up Apple’s Best New Artist award, while Taylor Swift received Album of the Year with '1989', and Iggy Azalea scored Best Song with “Fancy.” In the movie and TV category, Best Blockbuster movie was Marvel’s tremendous Guardians of the Galaxy, with The LEGO Movie winning the Family Movie category, Richard Linklater winning Best Director, and Obvious Child being Best Discovery.

Fargo was elected Best TV Show, True Detective was home to Best Performances, and The Honorable Woman was Best Discovery.

In other categories, iPhone App of the Year award went to Elevate – Brain Training, while the best iPad App of the Year is the superb graphic editor Pixelmator. Best iPhone and iPad games respectively go to Threes! and Monument Valley.

Check out the full list below.

Apps:iPhone App of the Year: Elevate - Brain TrainingiPhone Game of the Year: Threes!iPad App of the Year: PixelmatoriPad Game of the Year: Monument ValleyMusic:Best Artist: BeyoncéBest Album: 1989 by Taylor Swift Best Song: Fancy (feat. Charli XCX) by Iggy Azalea Best New Artist: Sam SmithMovies:Best Blockbuster: Guardians of the GalaxyBest Family Movie: The LEGO MovieBest Director: Richard LinklaterBest Discovery: Obvious Child TV Shows:TV Show of the Year: FargoBest Performances: True Detective, Season 1Best Discovery: The Honorable WomanBest Breakthrough: Key & Peele, Volume 4Books:Best Fiction: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr Best Nonfiction: The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs