CLEVELAND, Ohio – If Sunday night’s Grammy Awards show had been a drinking game that required a shot for every mistake, we’d all have been blotto by the time the final credits rolled.
The two biggest: Adele – for the second year in a row – screws up and this time has to start over (maybe they should broadcast this thing on Groundhog Day?). James Hetfield’s microphone doesn’t work in one of the most anticipated events of the evening, Metallica’s pairing with Lady Gaga.
An aside: As good as Adele is – and she may have one of the best voices on the planet – you NEVER stop a song and start again. I don’t care if you’re playing covers at Billy Joe’s Dive Bar & Laundromat, it’s just not professional. And how a woman with a voice like that could even start a song off-key as she did is byond me.
On the other hand, a clearly angry Hetfield joining the diverse genius known as Gaga at her microphone while technicians struggled to “fix” his non-working one is how it’s done. That, folks, was a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame move.
Another tribute, this one to the BeeGees, went off without a technical glitch but . . . as someone who owned and embarrassingly wore platform shoes and polyester shirts, I did not want to experience “Saturday Night Fever” disco redux. As I put it in a Tweet Sunday night, it felt like trying to pass a memorial kidney stone.
A little subtler – and some may not view it as a mistake per se: Does anybody edit the script beforehand? Beyonce’s performance was into what seemed like its third hour before she sang. Loved Morris Day and the Time to begin the Prince tribute, but come on . . . it was a tribute to PRINCE, not to Morris Day and the Time. “Let’s Go Crazy” was a great launch to a stunning performance by the most well-rounded artist to come down the pike since Prince, Bruno Mars. I wanted to hear “Purple Rain,” “Kiss” or any number of additional hits by the late Purple One.
Then there was the proliferation of artists who weren’t nominated for anything, but had performance slots so they could hype their new records.
Puh-leeze!
Now I confess that I proved myself to be a less than reliable prognosticator. I did OK with a couple of the major awards, but really, was there ever any doubt that Adele would dominate with wins for album of the year for “25” (among others) or that Beyonce would win for best urban contemporary album? Talk about softballs.
I totally blew it in the R&B category, where I had Marvin Gaye, er, BJ the Chicago Kid taking just about everything, and was surprised by Lalah Hathaway and Solange. My guy got skunked. Which means, obviously, that I did. And I went 0-fer in the rap categories.
Willie Nelson is one of my absolute heroes, but his album of Gershwin covers, which won best traditional pop vocal album over Bob Dylan’s “Fallen Angels” was one of the least enjoyable / listenable of his looooooong career. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.
I missed the biggies on my go-to genre, too: country. Maren Morris’ “My Church” beat out Brandy Clark’s “Love Can Go to Hell,” Lori McKenna took best country song for “Humble and Kind,” sung by Tim McGraw, rather than “Vice,” written by Shane McAnally and Josh Osborne and recorded by Miranda Lambert. I also picked Clark’s “Big Day in a Small Town” for country album, and I still think it’s the best, but I can’t find fault with the Academy’s choice of Sturgill Simpson’s “A Sailor’s Guide to Earth.” It, too, is a great album. Ironically, Clark and Simpson have trouble selling out midsized venues – at least here in Cleveland. I fear for what that says about mainstream country fans. But that’s a different story.
My other big miscue – and I really believe this is the RIAA’s miscue and not mine, was Korn’s “Rotting in Vain” losing out to Megadeth’s “Dystopia.” Not. Even. Close. What were the voters thinking . . . or had the gotten a head start on my drinking game idea?
The happiest surprise of the night was Ohio’s own Twentyone Pilots taking home the best pop-duo rock performance for “”Stressed Out.” And the acceptance speech by Ohio boys Tyler Joseph and Josh Dunn, delivered in their boxer briefs to fulfill a promise to each other from their days as nobodies in Columbus, was epic. Its only rival may be Alex Lifeson’s “Blah blah blah” acceptance speech when Rush finally was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame 2013.
I also did OK – or the Academy did, anyway – with picking David Bowie to win best rock song and best alternative album, even if I did come up short picking Panic! at the Disco’s “Death of a Bachelor” over Cage the Elephant’s “Tell Me I’m Pretty” for best rock album.
Clearly, my future does not lie in reading palms and telling fortunes, but I was right on about one thing – and at least in my mind the most important thing:
The dang awards don’t matter.
The entire show was all about spectacle, about glitter, about performances, about selling commercial time. Think a Grammy win really matters any more? Then tell me, when was the last time you saw Robin Thicke? Macklemore & Ryan Lewis? Sam Smith? Figuring out what happened to them is enough to drive a music fan to drink.
Hmmm. Game on!
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