The Grammy nominations came out today (an announcement that I had pretty much forgotten about in my single-minded devotion to movieland's award season frenzy) and wow... they suck.
Sure, you can say complaining about the Grammys is like complaining about the weather, but the way I see it the music industry's big awards had actually been making some progress in recent years. They discovered hip hop, they stopped nominating so many easy listening/adult contemporary acts, they threatened to become cool (or at least cooler than they'd ever been before).
This year they blew it. Especially in the top category: album of the year.
I'm not expecting (or even asking for) the category to be filled with the likes of Arcade Fire, Fiona Apple and The New Pornographers. The Grammys, like most big awards, look for a mix of both critical and commercial success and I'm fine with that. Last year's album of the year nominees were: American Idiot (Green Day), The College Dropout (Kanye West), Confessions (Usher), The Diary of Alicia Keys (Alicia Keys) and Genius Loves Company (Ray Charles). A solid bunch.
This year we get:
Chaos and Creation in the Backyard - Paul McCartney
The Emancipation of Mimi - Mariah Carey
How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb - U2
Late Registration - Kanye West
Love. Angel. Music. Baby. - Gwen Stefani
I approve of Kanye.
As for the others: Gwen delivered a fine pop album and the nomination is no worse than Usher last year, so fine I can easily live with that. But... Paul McCartney? Sure, the reviews weren't awful but this smacks of out-of-touch voters (it probably came down to this or Springsteen for the token veteran spot). Sadly, the same can be said of the U2 nomination. I love the group, I really do, but they don't need to be nominated every time out and their spot here clearly should have gone to a more interesting mainstream rock album like The White Stripes' Get Behind Me Satan, or hell even Coldplay's X&Y.
As for the recently emancipated Mimi... you certainly can't cite the critics to support that. She may have strong sales but damn, is it in any way necessary to encourage her like this? I can understand that living in the era of the Simpson sisters and Lindsay Lohan has lowered the bar but come on voters, blindfold yourself and throw a dart at the Billboard chart and you'll hit a better album than this. An obvious substitute nominee: John Legend, who had a deservedly strong showing overall and would've been a much better fit here.
The nominations weren't all bad. Record of the Year (given to a single song) has a couple solid selections in Gorillaz's Feel Good Inc. and Green Day's Boulevard of Broken Dreams (and Kanye's Gold Digger and Gwen's Hollaback Girl are at least fun).
Then there's the "alternative music" album category, almost always a pleasure:
Funeral - The Arcade Fire
Guero - Beck
Plans - Death Cab For Cutie
You Could Have It So Much Better - Franz Ferdinand
Get Behind Me Satan - The White Stripes
Arcade Fire also got a nom for their original song from the final season of Six Feet Under and White Stripes and Franz Ferdinand both received an additional nom.
And Fiona, who mysteriously never gets enough Grammy love, was nominated for "Best Pop Vocal Album" for Extraordinary Machine (where she faces McCartney, Stefani, Kelly Clarkson and Sheryl Crow, what a quintet).
The Grammys aren't American Idol snobs either, nominating Kelly for two awards and Fantasia for three (plus a songwriting nomination for a track from her album that doesn't count as a personal nom for her).
But still, it's hard to believe that just two years ago the album of the year nominees were: Under Construction (Missy Elliott), Fallen (Evanescence), Speakerboxxx/The Love Below (Outkast), Justified (Justin Timberlake) and Elephant (The White Stripes).
Ah, memories.
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