The 2013 Grammy Awards, Or What I'd Like To Call....
Please finish the blog title sentence.
It seems futile to attempt any rational discussion about the Grammy Awards. But I think that as passion-filled music lovers, it must also be difficult for us to ignore.
The ceremony is about a month away, and I will watch. I always do. It's irresponsible of me, I know. Like a guy with an ulcer who continues to put hot sauce on his eggs.
I'll kickstart this conversation. Take a look at the four categories and nominees below. As usual, I am dumbfounded. Not necessarily in a "this music stinks" way. More in a "are academy members listening to anything other than pop music" way. And by the way, Best New Artist nominee Fun has been around since 2008. Not so new.
I was a member for 8 years and voted. The opportunity exists for members to vote for almost all of those artists you always feel deserve to win over those that actually do. Musicians you love and respect are included on the preliminary ballots. It's not as if there isn't a fighting chance. So how is it that never happens? How is it "Call Me Maybe" gets nominated for Best Song over anything off of the last John Hiatt record? This is more of a scam than the RRHOF.
There is no ultimate goal here. I am just offering you a space to vent.
Record Of The Year
- Lonely Boy - The Black Keys
- Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Kelly Clarkson
- We Are Young - Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe
- Somebody That I Used to Know - Gotye Featuring Kimbra
- Thinkin Bout You - Frank Ocean
- We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together - Taylor Swift
Album Of The Year
- El Camino - The Black Keys
- Some Nights - Fun.
- Babel - Mumford & Sons
- Channel Orange - Frank Ocean
- Blunderbuss - Jack White
Song Of The Year
- The A Team - Ed Sheeran, songwriter (Ed Sheeran)
- Adorn - Miguel Pimentel, songwriter (Miguel)
- Call Me Maybe - Tavish Crowe, Carly Rae Jepsen & Josh Ramsay, songwriters (Carly Rae Jepsen)
- Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Jörgen Elofsson, David Gamson, Greg Kurstin & Ali Tamposi, songwriters (Kelly Clarkson)
- We Are Young - Jack Antonoff, Jeff Bhasker, Andrew Dost & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe)
Best New Artist
- Alabama Shakes
- Fun.
- Hunter Hayes
- The Lumineers
- Frank Ocean
This doesn't interest me in the least. I think the last time I watched the Grammy's was to see Paul McCartney accept an award for "Let It Be" on behalf of the Beatles.
ReplyDeleteTo finish the title sentence:
ReplyDeleteThe 2013 Grammy Awards, Or...."Now That's What I Call Bullshit"
I honestly can't make a valid argument *against* "Call Me Maybe" as being the "song of the year".
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm not being snarky about it.
And the show is usually a lot of fun. I look forward to the musical performances every year -- primarily because it features a bunch of bands/artists I never listen to at any other time.
The Black Keys - rehash of a rehash. don't get it.
ReplyDeleteKelly Clarkson - a middling talent at best
Fun. - aka Son of Mumford and Sons
Janelle Monáe - has promise but needs a few more years in the minors.
Gotye - sounds too much like "goatse". Cannot deal.
Frank Ocean - haven't heard it but every year we get one of these. Kanye, Drake, whatever, I just can't care. He'll be forgotten in an instant and on with the next.
Taylor Swift - still can't sing but that's SOP for country chicks. At least it's guitar music.
Album Of The Year
The Black Keys - ibid.
Fun. - ditto
Mumford & Sons - I guess they're fine but I couldn't take a whole album of it. They remind of those dorky guys with big glasses who would walk 100 miles.
Frank Ocean - Caribbean Queen, fuckers. That was the real Ocean.
Jack White - singles artist and not a producer by my ears. A Willie Horton type, can bang it out of the park but whiffs a lot.
Song Of The Year
The A Team - from the tv show? I can't keep up.
Adorn - eh?
Call Me Maybe - clearly the winner, since I've actually heard it
Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - what doesn't kill you just beats you down a little more. You'll learn this when you grow up kid.
We Are Young - that explains why you can't write a decent song.
Best New Artist
Alabama Shakes - looking backward without also looking forward is pointless
Fun. - not for me. How do you dance to this, march in place?
Hunter Hayes - all in my brain
The Lumineers - I'm told they're all that but my knee-jerk assumption is more lame indie crap. I could be wrong.
Frank Ocean - a frank ocean would say, "quit dumping all that shit in me, and leave the fucking whales alone. you're a bunch of pigs."
Whither Frightened Rabbit? Maybe all the bright lights scared them away.
Nice job. This was fun to read.
DeleteOf course the Gram's are hardly a reflection of what's cool in music in any year. But, they're still fun for me - I don't "take them personally" like some might, b/c they kind of just exist in a separate bubble of their own - what do I care if they have their fun? I'm back here listening to my White Denim, Tallet Man On Earth, Dylan, Dr. John and more, let 'em do their thing...
ReplyDeleteAlso, I am a Child Of The Radio. So I can't begrudge a song as catchy as "Call Me Maybe" any more thatn I could begrudge the Jackson 5's "I Want You Back." They're good pop songs. And "Somebody I Used To Know" is even better.
The mash-ups they do of different acts and different genres is kind of fun to me. Jack White getting nominated for something is good. I'm cool with it all.
- A walk in the woods
Two things:
ReplyDeleteNothing wrong with a harmless pop song like "Call Me Maybe." Nothing at all. My question is, if there is no valid argument against it, that means it's one of the 5 best songs of the year. How is that possible?
The Oscars, whether you're a fan of awards shows or not, seem to get it right, sort of. Why can't the Grammys? The Best Picture nominees are never harmless and funny bromances, or movies with Seth Rogen or Bruce Willis movies? Those are "fun." At least the Oscars try to respect those involved.
Not so much a Grammy comment, but another song quoting Friedrich Nietzsche ("That which does not kill us makes us stronger.")? Man, who would have guessed a nihilistic 19th century German philospher would have had such a profound impact on so many hack songwriters nigh on 100 years later? I recall Tim McGraw's half-assed similar take ("Live Like You Were Dying"), a few other country songs along the same lines, and God knows how many weightlifters, mixed martial art fans and "won't live to see 30" party types espousing the same wrong philosophy.
ReplyDeleteLive long enough, folks, you'll see, that which cannot kill us weakens us in increments that will one day kill us. But I guess this reality doesn't make for snappy t-shirts and bumperstickers, nor work itself into a self-aggrandizing, fist-pumping chorus.
Just youtubed the Clarkson song as I haven't heard it. Christ, what a pile of shit. A pop song sung to an ex-lover who has obviously left deep and lasting emotional scars on the woman singing the song ... yet she believes "what doesn't kill makes you stronger" ... not quite realizing the simple act of directing this song at an ex-lover is the ultimate sign of weakness.
But this is the kind of demented nonsense that passes for pop wisdom these days. Once upon a time you could listen to silly pop songs like "What a Fool Believes" by The Doobie Brothers or even "Margaritaville" by Jimmy Buffett and sense some kind of basic wisdom in the lyrics, some sense that the singer had lost in love, took his lumps, recognized he was an asshole, and learned to live with it. Now we congratulate ourselves for being bitter losers. Progress!
"There are problems in this world, but Wheeee! none of them are mine! I'm beginning to see the light".
DeleteI just had to say that, I don't know why.
William Repsher, you have made another well-wrought point.
Well put. Spot on.
DeleteFor a much better take on this theme than the Clarkson song, check out episode #476 of "This American Life" (from last October). Some harrowing stuff...
Delete"Before you came into my life, I missed you so bad".
ReplyDeleteThere's poetry in that thar disposable pop song!
I just flipped through this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Award_for_Song_of_the_Year
While not the list of the world's greatest songs, it's not a list of *terrible* songs (even roping in the other nominees) either. Sure, there are songs I don't like on that list, but if somebody made a playlist of the winners? I wouldn't turn it off. It's actually a fairly impressive list of pop songs.
My "song of the year" is "Stay Away From Downtown" off the new Redd Kross album. There is no other song I've replayed more often than that (including "Call Me Maybe" which went through surprisingly massive rotation over here) that was released in 2012 -- in fact, I'm going to play it one more time now that I'm thinking of it because it kicks so much goddamn ass, it's mind-blowing... Would I expect Grammy voters to have heard that song? Maybe a handful of them.
Anyway...
Don't hate the player, hate the game...
"...or what I like to call— a good reason to read a book or stream a movie or listen to Sal's last Weekend Mix that I didn't get around to..."
ReplyDeleteI'm with buzzbabyj, no interest at all. I don't care that "good" artists are ignored, or that what I consider crap is celebrated. To me, The Grammys are not about music; they're about music marketing. I view it as is an elaborate publicity event dressed up to be a "merit award" ceremony (the same goes for the Oscars, Globes, Emmys, Choices, ad nauseum).
I can't imagine watching now, but i'm pretty sure i'll be missing something. vividly recall one year when Cyndi Lauper knocked out "True Colors" followed by Sheila E's band killing "The Glamorous Life" complete with tearaway clothes and lace bodysuits underneath.
ReplyDelete…music I never heard, and probably don't want to hear, except for The Black Keys". The Grammys haven't reflected my tastes for years, no big deal really. I might watch some of the show, mainly so I can insult anyone onscreen, in between reruns of Simpsons and Family Guy and the new Walking Dead. Call Me Maybe is a good pop song, Ed Sheeran's a bigger octowussy than John Mayer.
ReplyDelete