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I must confess I wasn’t excited about this year’s Grammy nominees. Lots of sugary pop and country. Nothing wrong with that, I suppose, but not music to my ears. So I was really glad that I had a DVR to skip the unwatchable moments and that the show didn’t run longer than advertised. On a bright note, it’s worth noting there were more female nominees in prominent categories than I recall seeing in the past, and that was very refreshing (and about time).
The show began with a performance by Lady Gaga. I still don’t get what all the fuss is about. Yes, it was theatrical eye-candy full of Madonna-esque gyrating, but she simply is not as good as the Material Girl. It was striking to see Elton John perform a duet with her on facing pianos. They are both showy, but compared to him, she seems like a student. This is not entirely fair, as she definitely is a compelling performer, and she has almost single-handedly revived what’s left of the music industry. She’s just not my favorite. Or I don’t get it yet (same goes for Ke$ha). I find it amusing that as she composes, she thinks about what outfits she’ll wear while performing on stage.
Thus it was a relief when Stephen Colbert emerged to introduce the night. He was funny as always, poking fun at the industry and the music celebrities. It was a bonus that he later received a Grammy for best comedy album, beating out Spinal Tap and Weird Al.
The Song of the Year award was one of the first to be handed out. It struck me as funny that Beyoncé couldn’t accept the award because she was preparing for a performance in 15 minutes. It reminded me that the Grammys are not really about musicians singing their songs, but about elaborate stage shows, choreographed down the most minute detail. I guess there is nothing wrong with that, but somehow it made me long for the “golden” days, when a performance was judged by the music, not the wardrobe.
Anyway, there were some great moments, so let’s start with some highlights. I’ll focus on the performances, and not the awards or presenters.
Green Day + musical cast performance – The music lent itself to the ‘musical stage treatment’ better than I imagined. The band was in good form, and they didn’t steal the spotlight from the cast members of the forthcoming musical.
Pink’s performance was very good. Yes, it was theatrical, and would not be out of place at a Cirque de Soleil show, but she sang with such conviction and vulnerability that it worked.
Mary J. Blige, Andrea Bocelli, and David Foster performed Bridge Over Troubled Water as a fundraiser for Haiti, and it was great. I’m usually not one for mega-star collaborative charity songs (the causes are great, the music often is not) but this song had passion and real musicality. My litmus test: would this song stand on its own without the charity? In this case, yes.
The ‘in memorium‘ section was moving – musical giants such as Mary Travers, Kate McGarrigle, Hank Crawford, Uriel Jones, Jay Bennett, Ali Abkar Khan, and Les Paul indeed deserve to be honored.
Drake, joined by Eminem, Lil Wayne, and Travis Barker from Blink-182. This was an inspired performance by an up and coming hip-hop star. In fact, there was a camera shot of Jamie Foxx in the audience singing along with every word and capturing the performance on a Flip camcorder. Very funny. However, CBS decided to totally cut off the audio track during obscenities, which really interrupted the performance. Couldn’t they have just cut the vocal track for a second here or there? Jeesh.
Sadly the other 3 hours were pretty miserable. Here are some key lowlights:
Black-Eyed Peas – Bad outfits, bad singing, bad song, bad everything. Disappointing.
Jamie Foxx – Auto-tune has never sounded so dated. And Slash adding a guitar solo didn’t really help.
Taylor Swift – Yes, she is sweet and writes her own songs, but I find her music bland. Seeing her perform with Stevie Nicks made me realize they are in different leagues.
Bon Jovi – Oh my, where to start? They began with We Weren’t Born to Follow which might be sappier than anything performed all night, and that includes a live sing-along tribute to Michael Jackson’s The Earth Song. Their 2nd song was so boring, I’m not sure what it was. The 3rd song was chosen by…drumroll, please…Internet voters! It was of course their 80s smash hit, Living on a Prayer, which was decent, but could have been done just as well by a tribute band.
Jeff Beck and Imelda May did a tribute to Les Paul by performing his signature tune, How High the Moon, but it fell flat. Jeff’s playing was appropriately styled, but Les deserved better.
All in all, it was not a magical night of music. Let’s hope the 2011 Grammy Awards are better. What did you think?
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