There's a longstanding and compelling argument that a important proportion of people that tune into showbiz awards ceremonies achieve this with a sure schadenfreude. They’re much less focused on seeing glitz and glamour or deserving artists being justly rewarded than seeing occasions going improper or wildly off-piste. It’s an argument that has been bolstered over the previous week, with dialogue of Will Smith slapping Chris Rock on the Oscars exhibiting no signal of abating as opinion items and weblog posts on the topic are churned out.
This week’s huge awards ceremony thus finds itself struggling to make itself observed within the aftermath of final week’s huge awards ceremony. The Grammys has valiantly plodded on, making bulletins about what it has in retailer, with out dislodging Smith and Rock from the headlines: what worth the new information that Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak’s retro-soul outfit Silk Sonic are opening the present, that the Foo Fighters’ look has been changed by a unexpectedly convened tribute to their late drummer Taylor Hawkins, or certainly the saga of Korean boyband BTS – two of whom have Covid, and will or could not carry out – in contrast with one Hollywood star lamping one other on reside TV?
Anybody tuning in for that sense of schadenfreude can all the time cling to the prospect of Kanye West attending – barred from performing on account of his newest social media meltdown, he has however obtained 5 nominations for his album Donda – and the truth that the occasion is hosted by Trevor Noah, the topic of a latest Instagram tirade by West that included racial slurs.
Underneath the circumstances, it’s in all probability greatest to attempt to drown out the chatter and focus on the music. The winner earlier than the winners are introduced appears to be Jon Batiste, who has 11 nominations due to his rating for the Pixar animation Soul and his album We Are. That mentioned, it’s price noting that competitors within the album of the yr class is robust and never simply because it contains Taylor Swift touting the follow-up to final yr’s album of the yr winner and the vastly profitable debut by Olivia Rodrigo – herself the recipient of seven nominations, which feels very very like her coronation as the brand new queen of teenybopper and tweenage pop. The earlier incumbent, Billie Eilish, additionally has seven nominations, though her album Happier Than Ever was comparatively coolly obtained, which given how a lot of that album was dedicated to exploring the ghastliness of fame, probably got here as a aid.
Additionally among the many album nominees lurks Love for Sale, the second collaborative effort from Girl Gaga and Tony Bennett: the latter is 95 and dwelling with Alzheimer’s, and you may by no means underestimate the willingness of the Grammys to wax sentimental and deal with an award as a form of long-service medal.
However, Batiste ought to win one thing. He’s an endlessly fascinating artist – his background is in jazz, though he declines to label his personal music as such; his need to attach with a broader viewers has led him to do every part from file whole albums on subway trains to main the home band on The Late Present With Stephen Colbert. And We Are is an distinctive piece of labor: urgently political, full of improbable songs and genre-defying, as evidenced by the truth that his title turns up in classes dedicated to jazz, R&B, conventional R&B and American roots music. HER also needs to be rewarded – one other artist with a number of nominations and an amazing album within the form of Again of My Thoughts. She gained final yr’s music of the yr Grammy for I Can’t Breathe, a feat it’s not inconceivable she may repeat with Combat for You, a music that’s already gained an Oscar.
Elsewhere, it’s powerful luck for Justin Bieber: his sport demand that the Grammys think about him an R&B slightly than a pop artist seems to have fallen on deaf ears. Nevertheless, he has managed to rustle up eight nominations with the meagre album Justice, which ought to carry some comfort.
In the meantime, patriotic onlookers in the hunt for proof that British pop is flourishing throughout the Atlantic have a slightly skinny time of it. Ed Sheeran will get a nomination for the omnipresent single Dangerous Habits and nothing for its accompanying album =, which was topic to a noticeably extra muted industrial reception within the US than elsewhere. Arlo Parks is an outrider in the perfect new artist class, whereas Glass Animals maybe have a greater likelihood: they’re larger within the US than at house, due to the old school expedient of relentlessly touring. That mentioned, the probabilities of them triumphing over the ever-present Olivia Rodrigo look slim – certainly, there’s an honest likelihood she may sweep the board.
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