A fairly low key event this year at the Grammy’s missing the usual goosebumps moments the show is known for instead there were too many head scratching moments. Really, the big surprise of the night was Stevie Wonder performing with the Jonas Brothers. And if I am not mistaken, this was the first year they didn’t run the “Awards previously handed out earlier” segment instead opting for a “go to gammy.com” to see those. Granted I am too lazy to do so. Here are some other thoughts from the night:
- Even though they were not up for any award, U2 opens up the show. Hopefully Get on Your Boots isn’t a preview of what is to come on their new album as it is just a Vertigo retread. Then we get our first awkward moment of the night with Bono throwing to Whitney Houston.
- I know they were engaged, but it is hard not to start laughing seeing I Love New York castoff Punk next to Jennifer Hudson, who takes home worst dressed award (M.I.A. gets a pass on account that she is nine months pregnant).
- The biggest showdown in the night didn’t actually take place in any announced category, but between The Rock and Jay Mohr between for most uncomfortable dialogues.
- The Rock throws to the next awkward moment of the evening with Justin Timberlake rambling on about stalking Al Green or something. Granted this performance was rushed together after Rihanna canceled her performance early Sunday after she may or may not have been assaulted by Chris Brown.
- I was a little disappointed that Coldplay didn’t get served during their performance. I actually thought that was Jay-Z was doing before I recognized him. And is Coldplay winning a Grammy for Viva la Vida the musical equivalent of Barry Bonds being the home run king?
- Miley Cyrus should go back to lip-syncing Hanna Montana songs for ten year olds. Singing live just isn’t her strong suit.
- A little part of my soul died watching Stevie Wonder slumming it with the Jonas Brothers. And isn’t Superstition a little too heavy for the teens. Will they be performing Walk on the Wild Side with Lou Reed next year?
- Do we really need a Blink-182 reunion? Certainly their sophomoric rock was fine when you’re twenty-three, but not when you are thirty-three.
- Did I miss the point of My Grammy Moment? Wasn’t it to perform with someone on stage at the Grammy’s, not having your video played on a screen behind someone for about twenty seconds? And one of the Jonas Brothers looked a little too excited during the Katy Perry performance.
- And here is why CBS is the number one network and NBC will be battling The CW soon. During their big event last week, NBC only promoted one night of television, while CBS actually spread out all their shows including upcoming ones. Although if I am Vegas, I setting the Over/Under on Harper’s Island at 5 episodes. That just looks cheesy. And can I go ahead and predict the Bride does it.
- It may be time for a Kanye West intervention. It is never a good sign when you are starting to look and dress like Michael Jackson circa Off the Wall.
- Well at least the Adele / Sugarland wasn’t as bad as when the country band joined Beyoncé onstage for Irreplaceable.
- Why is USC the go to marching band? Certainly being in Los Angeles has something to do with it. But can’t someone give UCLA a little love?
- Shouldn’t T.I. be in jail by now? Since when do we let felons just wonder the country for a couple months before repaying their debt to society? To make maters worse, I have to sit through that horrible Justin Timberlake collaboration. That should add a couple more months to his sentence.
- Holy Neil Diamond sighting. But how do not get an all-star chorus to sing a drunken backup like has happen in every bar for the past thirty years? That could have been the highlight of the show.
- I would like to make it known I am completely against doubling and tripling up the tribute portion of the program.
- And the least surprising part of the night was the Robert Plant & Alison Krauss sweep. And that is your 2009 Grammy’s. Yay.
This is a somber music preview, no not because of a lack of music (well fairly abundant compared to previous first quarters) but this will be the first music preview with out the obligatory “maybe this is the season when we actually get Chinese Democracy” on account that it came out last November to surprisingly little fanfare. At least we still have Detox to wait for. But here are the albums that you may expect to be released while you are waiting for the weather to turn warm, many of which will be reviewed on the 9th Green. You can pre-order the album through Amazon (where available) or download currently available music by clicking on the artist name. (Release dates subject to change)
You may also expect albums something new by Beastie Boys, Green Day, Eminem, Jay-Z, Gorillaz, Big Boi, and at least one of the three albums Prince promises in 2009 by Spring. If there is anything I left off, feel free to let me know in the comments.
There have been a couple of videos that have caught my eye lately so I though I’d give them some love since the death of Musical Television left a void for a forum on the art form so here they are courtesy of YouTube. I advise you to watch them before you read my reviews if you don’t want me to spoil things. If you are interested in buying the video through iTunes, click the title link (where available, if not the link goes to YouTube where you can watch the video in full screen). If you are interested in buying the song, look for a link in the analysis.
Christmas just doesn’t feel like Christmas until I have Bono tell me, “Well thank God tonight it’s them instead of you.” Much like Do They Know its Christmas, proceeds to this song goes to a good cause as it is part of the new (Red)Wire music service where you get exclusic music with the money going to buy medicine for people in need.
Remember the days when new music videos were such an event that Michael Jackson’s Black or White was simulcast on Fox, MTV, VH1, and BET? To put in perspective how far the music industry has fallen, the latest Bruce Springsteen video debuted this on Amazon.com. Oh, and if this is any indication, music is gonna suck under an Obama administration. Huckabee 2012!
It took me a while to figure out this wasn’t a long lost video from the nineties. EPMD featuring Teddy Riley with Max Headroom-quality graphics and references to Andre Rison and Jim Carey. Really if it weren’t for the E-Bama mention I probably would have continued to think that.
The Presidents of the United States of America is one of those bands you feel bad for because they should be remembered as a One Hit Wonders but actually scored a second hit and sadly VH1 doesn’t run Two Hit Wonders specials. But on the bright side one of those two hits was actually parodied by “Weird Al” Yankovic who coincidentally directed their latest video. Speaking of Al, he has finally discover he can release songs as singles on iTunes right after writing them instead of waiting to have enough to fill an album. So if you haven’t already checked out his version of T.I.’s Whatever You Like do so ASAP. Now if you excuss me, I am going to move to the country and eat me some peaches.
For any music fan, you know a title of the 1000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die is worth a look. For novice fans, the book makes good suggestions ranging every musical genre you can think off. For the music fanatic you can read it to pick it apart, because even with a thousand entries, certainly everyone can come up with a least of a hundred recordings that should have been included in the list and a few that you make you scratch your head at their inclusion.
From his picture on the back of the book, it should be noted that author Tom Moon is of the Baby Boomer generation so naturally there is an overabundance of music from the sixties while Bob Dylan and the Beatles are more than represented. Okay old people, we get it, you really loved the Beatles, but really eight albums featuring the band members? Dylan landed four while a few ranked twice. Keep in mind Bruce Springsteen (Born to Run) and Pink Floyd (Dark Side of the Moon) and U2 (The Joshua Tree) only made the list once. I would really like Moon to justify just how Usher’s Confessions, Britney Spears’ Toxic and No Doubt’s Rock Steady (which isn’t even the band’s best work) rank higher than Born in the USA, Wish You Were Here and Achtung Baby.
I also am not sure if I should complain about the exclusion of any Eric Clapton album (seriously, no Slowhand), he does show up with Derek and the Dominos, Cream, John Mayall’s Blues Breakers, The Yardbirds, and Blind Faith. Where the sixties is well populated, looking at this book it is as the nineties didn’t exist unless you were a grunge band or a dead rapper. That did lead to possibly the best write up in the book for Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chamber) where Moon bizarrely starts up the review quoting poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. But enough with the complaints of the selections because if I continued to nit-pick I would write a review that rivals the book’s 1007 pages.
116 of those pages are just indexes. But with indexes for Genre, Occasions (like Parties, Romance), Composers, and Performers. Although it would have been nice if they would have thrown in an extra five pages to list the recording chronologically. But each write up is well done even if Moon doesn’t seem to really understand any the music he included that release after 1980. Each recording also include Key Tracks, Catalog Choice, other works by the artist worth listening to, as well as Next Stop and After That, two recording that are related musically to selection worth checking out.
Easily the most interesting inclusion has to be The Grey Album by Danger Mouse considering that to listen to it you are technically breaking the law. For those unfamiliar, The Grey Album a mash up between The White Album by The Beatles (which of course is also listed) and The Black Album from Jay-Z (which is conspicuously missing from the list) that launched Danger Mouse into a succesful producer and one half of Gnarls Barkley.
But whatever type a music fan you are, there is plenty of gems to find in the book. And the short segment are perfect to have laying around when you only have short spurts of time to kill, as it is currently taking up space in my bathroom. Just keep in mind the 1007 page thick frame is a little cumbersome to hold at time, so the short spurts of reading is really ideal.
There have been a couple of videos that have caught my eye lately so I though I’d give them some love since the death of Musical Television left a void for a forum on the art form If you are interested in buying the video through iTunes, click the title link (where available, if not the link goes to YouTube where you can watch the video in full screen). If you are interested in buying the song, look for a link in the analysis.
Lucky Japanese, they go to a Coldplay concert and out comes Alicia Keys. Although all she does is play some piano, chords that I can play (no, seriously, I can), and it sounds like she played an octave too high. Great nonetheless.
It is really hard to complain about MTV and VH1 no longer showing videos anymore because who these days wants to wade through videos that they hand pick when you have almost every video ever made at your disposal whenever you want on sites like YouTube? And here are the best of the best of from the past twelve months. I have embedded the first couple videos, the rest you can click the link to follow to YouTube and if you are interested in buying the videos, click the iTunes links. Now I should mention some of these videos are not safe for work but really nothing on YouTube is all the safe for work because I’m sure you boss wouldn’t be thrilled even if your watching a video of a cat playing with a ball of yarn. But anyways:
1. Can't Tell Me Nothing - Kanye West
2. Trapped in the Closet Chapter 1-12 Recap - R. Kelly
- Even though they were not up for any award, U2 opens up the show. Hopefully Get on Your Boots isn’t a preview of what is to come on their new album as it is just a Vertigo retread. Then we get our first awkward moment of the night with Bono throwing to Whitney Houston.
- The biggest showdown in the night didn’t actually take place in any announced category, but between The Rock and Jay Mohr between for most uncomfortable dialogues.
- Was that Lita Ford playing guitar for Carrie Underwood?
- Do we really need a Blink-182 reunion? Certainly their sophomoric rock was fine when you’re twenty-three, but not when you are thirty-three.
- Holy Neil Diamond sighting. But how do not get an all-star chorus to sing a drunken backup like has happen in every bar for the past thirty years? That could have been the highlight of the show.
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. Oh, and if this is any indication, music is gonna suck under an Obama administration. Huckabee 2012!
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on my 
