Segunda-feira 27 Jan 2014, 22h:36

After skipping the 2013 show because well…nothing was interesting (and Mumford & Sons winning album of the year even though it did not with folk album of the year), the 2014 nominees came out. And once I heard Daft Punk was nominated for several awards including 2 of the top prizes that night, I was interested. Performances by Daft Punk, Queens of the Stone Age, Nine Inch Nails, and Metallica quickly grabbed my attention. I was going to watch the award show that had literally no credibility…just to see these guys perform.

And it was worth the wait. Definitely.

But enough said. There are things I need to vent out again.

HIP-HOP IS DEAD? OR ARE WE JUST ALARMED?
First, hip-hop got snubbed…now, most of the hip-hop purists lighted up when Good Kid, M.A.A.D City by Kendrick Lamar got defeated in 3/4 categories by The Heist by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. Now…I haven't listened to either album enough to make a judgement (and I plan to do…well..there is one set of scrobbles for GKMC, but I was not focused when listening to it the first time…things are different this time), but from what I hear, the problem is as follows:
*GKMC was massively praised as a masterpiece in similar fashion to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Many expect this album to stand the test of time.
*The Heist involved corny lyrics and is more pop than hip-hop. Many also criticized Macklemore's flow and called him a hack.

Metacritic ratings showed that GKMC had high praised. The Heist had decent but not as high as GKMC.

A few thing I noticed though were both albums…seem to cater to different audiences. GKMC involves lyrics about his hometown of Compton and the dangerous surroundings he had to go through. The Heist on the other hand, was aimed as positivity as Macklemore was born in the middle-class and not in the hoods. He focused on positive issues/LGBT rights. These are the issues and topics he was more interested in. As a result, GKMC appealed to hip-hop purists while Macklemore crossed over more into pop. It's two different sounds to hip-hop. And if anything, more variety in hip-hop is always good.

So, did the Grammies screw up again in hip-hop? Regarding their choice of hip-hop album/songs, we'll have to let time have it's course. They did however screw the hip-hop awards by having only the rap/sung award in the main broadcast while the other 3 (album, rap song, rap performance). Hip-hop got shafted, but not as much as R&B which had no awards presented during the main telecast.

Hey, at least there were two hip-hop albums up for AOTY.

But IMO, there was a genre that got shafted worse than hip-hop…

ROCK IS DEAD! NO SERIOUSLY

Rock music. It's one of the most popular forms of music. I previously ranted about how the nominees were way too biased towards older acts and it was a huge issue. The grammies proved themselves to be inept by awarding best rock album to Celebration Day by Led Zeppelin which was a live album released in late 2012 of a concert from 2007…as I said…a concert from 2007 literally won 6 years after it was recorded. And with actual new releases from Queens of the Stone Age, David Bowie, and Black Sabbath, there was really no need to just hand the award to Zeppelin. This was actually Zep's first grammy award ever…though all 3 surviving members all had won grammys before so…

Worse though was the Rock Song of the Year award which was literally won by Nirvana + Paul McCartney (minus Kurt Cobain). And The Rolling Stones was up for rock song of the year as well. One would have expected stuff like by Tame Impala and Vampire Weekend…the problem is those bands were trapped in the Alternative category which had just one award.

I really hope some of the reviewers are pointing out this flaw instead of saying "yay, Zeppelin and Sabbath won yay yay yay". By selecting old bands each year, you are literally stating rock is dead. Rock is not dead…Queens of the Stone Age released one of the best albums of 2013…they were up for album of the year. The Black Keys have taken in blues rock influences and created a fresh sound in the last few years.

What needs to be done:
*Revamp the staff who decides the rock categories…get some fresh new faces who can bring in some modern acts to the equation.
*Expand the Alternative genre out…introduce awards for alternative performance and alternative song categories. Might as well split solo/dual performances as well (and possibly for the categories that used to have this as well).
*And please get some alternative awards up during the main telecast.

One last thing, there was a rock performance to close out the program featuring Nine Inch Nails, Queens of the Stone Age, Dave Grohl and Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac. And the producers suddenly cut to commercials near the end of the song unnecessary. Trent Reznor exploded again on twitter…and probably now won't be fooled again to ever come on the Grammys. That's not helping rock out either you know.

I think I'm done venting. Now time for some praise.

DAFT PUNK

Of course my main reason for even watching the show was because Daft Punk was going to perform live. And man they didn't disappoint. The performance with Stevie Wonder along with Pharell and Nile Rodgers was great…and the crowd definitely got into the performance. The performance of Get Lucky featured mashup elements of Le Freak, Another Star, and even other Daft Punk songs as well. Makes you wonder how DP will answer with their next Alive live album.

And Daft Punk managed to win 4 awards that night, including the Best Electronic/Dance album which was a gimme. Each award afterwards became heartstomping for me as the competition got tough and tough. Daft Punk easily won Best Pop/Duo Performance with Get Lucky over the atrocious Blurred Lines (which I feared could have won the award). Then came Record of the Year which experts slated would be won by Royals by Lorde. God that song is so anti-hip-hop. I celebrated loudly once I heard Get Lucky won. But Daft Punk was not going to win the top prize of the night…Album of the Year

All the hotshots and experts had slated the award to go to The Heist. I could live with DP holding record of the year rather than the over-rated Royals…but guess what, AOTY belongs to Daft Punk too. For the first time in my life, I was happy that the album of the year was correct (and rightfully so). Suddenly, Random Access Memories was back in my mp3 player. It'll be the only album I blast out this week.

Despite the huge flaws with the hip-hop/rock categories, Daft Punk made up for it. And also got to see some great performances. Metallica performing [track artist=MetallicaOne with pianist Lang Lang and Kendrick Lamar raising the house with Imagine Dragons. Sure there were cringe performances from Robin Thicke, the mass marriages during Macklemore & Ryan Lewis's run of Same Love, the mostly lackluster country performances (minus Taylor Swift who seemed to do some interesting things during Ken's performance), and of course Katy Perry. Watching the show was worth it.

Too bad Beyonce already has 2015 wrapped up. Ah well