The 61st annual Grammy Awards were hosted by Alicia Keys at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California on Sunday, February 10.
The night came complete with many awards handed out, nine of which were televised, as well as 18 performances.
Many people on the nerdier side of music conversations (such as ourselves) generally have a distaste for the Grammys, feeling as though the academy picks based on popularity instead of the quality of an album. With those biases being established, we have give props to some categories that made phenomenal nominations.
Although the Grammys may not always award our favorite artists, one thing they often do right is giving props to some great, and oftentimes artsier musicians in the form of nominations.
Starting from the big winners and going down, we are very pleased at all the love given to Childish Gambino’s ‘This Is America,’ taking home the awards for Record of the Year, Song of the Year, Best Rap/Sung Performance, and Best Music Video.
For an organization that has been greatly criticized in the past for going with very safe (and very white) choices, it is quite impressive that four huge awards are being awarded to a song like ‘This is America’.
Another big winner of the night was Kacey Musgraves, who took home the awards for Best Country Song for ‘Space Cowboy’, Best Country Solo Performance for her song ‘Butterflies’ and -as predicted by WXAV’s own DJ Eddie X- the awards for Best Country Album and Album of the Year for her album ‘Golden Hour.’
For Best New Artist, Dua Lipa was called to the stage to be presented her award. Through tears of joy, she expressed how happy she was to see so many women were nominated for the award, mentioning how they must’ve really “stepped up” – a reference to some nasty statements made by president of the Grammys, Neil Portnow, earlier in the year.
Female artists continued to crush it in the pop field.
Lady Gaga took the award for Best Pop Solo Performance and Best Duo/Group Performance with Bradley Cooper.
Additionally, Ariana Grande’s “Sweetener’ took the Grammy for the Best Pop Vocal Album.
The rock performance field was pretty uncontroversial.
Chris Cornell posthumously won the Grammy for Best Rock Performance, while High On Fire snagged the trophy for Best Metal Performance.
A bit of disagreement among Grammy fans was sparked when St. Vincent’s “Masseduction” won the award for Best Rock Song, beating out songs with passionate fans, such as Ghost’s “Rats,” Twenty One Pilots’ “Jumpsuit,” and Bring Me the Horizon’s “Mantra.”
One category that was almost universally dreaded by fans was the Best Rock Album, which contained nominations for Fall Out Boy, Greta Van Fleet, Weezer, Alice In Chains, and Ghost.
In the end, Greta Van Fleet took the award, pleasing fans of their throwback sound but angering those who consider their sound a big rip-off.
The rap category also had an impressive list of nominees, but some decisions were still less than perfect. The Grammy for Best Rap Performance was a tie between ‘Bubblin’ by Anderson .Paak and ‘King’s Dead’ by Kendrick Lamar, Jay Rock, Future, and James Blake.
While ‘King’s Dead’ feels like the safe choice the Grammys would go for, it was fantastic to see them recognize Anderson .Paak, who was not the most well-known name out of all the nominees.
A category that may have flopped was Best Rap Song, where hot tracks Travis Scott’s ‘Sicko Mode’, the aforementioned King’s Dead, and more eventually lost to Drake’s ‘God’s Plan.’
The biggest award in rap went to Cardi B, who took a significant trophy home by winning Best Rap Album for ‘Invasion of Privacy.’
The significance of a woman winning that award in a genre that is still very male is not something to be neglected, but many hip hop heads felt that Mac Miller’s ‘Swimming’ or Pusha T’s ‘Daytona deserved the recognition.
Janelle Monae delivered one of the better performances of the night as she performed her song “Make Me Feel.” It was complete with her playing an electric guitar and dancing with a full group of tight back-up choreographers.
In addition, Monae’s singing and stage presence was pitch perfect so all the visual aid really pushed the performance an extra mile, making it one of the most memorable of the night.
Another highlight of the event was the St. Vincent and Dua Lipa performance. Both artists collaborated well and demonstrated their sexy, flirtatious chemistry in an unforgettable duet.
St. Vincent and her guitar started off the performance with her song “Masseduction,” only to later be joined by Dua Lipa.
As the two sang and moved in sync, they flawlessly transitioned into Lipa’s song “One Kiss.” This was a strong take away from the night. Amidst the great performances, there were a few that fell a little flat. I am, in fact, talking about one of the most anticipated performances of the night, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Post Malone.
Post has been known to play with established rock bands at awards shows in the past, like his performance with Aerosmith at the VMAs. He opened up by playing his song “Stay” with his acoustic guitar while sitting on a barstool.
This part of the performance was solid and adequately displayed Post’s singing abilities before transitioning to his hit “Rockstar.” He started in the middle of the song, which made for a bit of an awkward transition.
In addition, he didn’t pay any sort of homage to 21 Savage, who is featured in a verse on the song.
The rapper was recently arrested by ICE for being in the United States in an expired visa, which has been a controversial issue in the music world.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers then came out to play their song “Dark Necessities” with Post on guitar and backup vocals. The mix was a bit off with singer Anthony Kiedis’s vocals getting lost in the mix during the first verse and both Post’s vocals and guitar were unable to be heard.
The chemistry did not flow all that well and everyone just seemed a bit off, making it one of the weaker performances of the night.
Anthony Lopez & Luke Hodorek
Features Contributors