Have to say I absolutely love this series. It’s entertaining and fun, but in the weirdest way, wildly ambitious. An album a day (assuming not just in the background) is quite the undertaking. As for Billy Joel vs. Supertramp, well there’s no modern equivalent to that face off for pure song power. I’d have to go with Supertramp though. BIA and Crime of the Century are both in my all time top 20. Across both those records the band was up there with The Beatles, Zeppelin, anybody…but strangely underrated.
I apologize if you've covered this before, but have you ever actually cared about the Grammys? I've aged out about caring about awards at all, but I admit to being a bit obsessed with the Oscars when I was in high school and made it a point to watch nominated films from the past and present. And though I don't care about them anymore, the nominees are a respectable list. But even with an equivalent interest in popular music, I always saw the Grammys as a bit of a joke, a glorified popularity contest, no better than the VMAs in terms of actual prestige, and useful only for some fun performances.
Maybe they are better when you get more granular? Maybe they do indeed nominate an exceptional list of Bluegrass and Americana albums? They do nominate and award great albums here and there, but I was always struck by how objectively mediocre a lot of the albums were. "Album from a popular artist with 2-3 great songs and a bunch of filler" is usually enough to warrant an album of the year nominee, if not a win, and it always felt very arbitrary to me.
I think that the Grammys' general category awards are a very poor guide for the best or most interesting music of the year, but the genre-specific nominees are slightly better. I do wonder if one of the reasons the Grammys suck compared to the Oscars is that not only are there far more noteworthy albums released in a year than noteworthy films, but there's far more variety in the musical landscape than in the cinematic landscape, making it impossible for Grammy voters to rally around a consensus pick. But as weak as I think their selections are, I still enjoy the Grammys every year because I think they're good discussion fodder. Who would I nominate? Who would I vote for among the actual nominees? Who are other people rooting for? How did THAT artist manage to get nominated in this category? Which is what this post does.
Do I care about the Grammys? No. But do they matter? Yes. Artists can pretty much always count on a boom in sales and popularity after winning or being nominated. It's marketing, really.
Fair point! It's just interesting because I've hardly ever heard anyone even mention that something won or was nominated for a Grammy, which is quite different from the Oscars, which, at least at one time, were a pop culture talking point.
The only time I remember the awards part of the Grammy awards (as opposed to the show) coming up in a conversation was when Norah Jones won nearly 25 years ago.
It'd be interesting to compare sales/streaming bumps from the Grammys to, say, being featured on the NYT best of the year list, as well as genre specific lists/awards.
So many interesting match-ups here. The hardest would have to be "52nd Street" vs. "Breakfast in America" vs. "Bad Girls." They're all great but I think I'd still give the edge to Billy Joel. The others have a lot of great individual songs on them but "52nd Street" may be the best from start to finish.
My God, Celine Dion beating Beck's Odelay is a deeply disturbing new fact I wish I didn't know! Great post though, thank you. I've a lot of listening to do.
Oh it's OK, it's 3.17pm here in England, I'm going to have put one of the albums from your post on (not sure which yet) and have a beer to wash away the bitterness of Celine's win. Might take more than one, but we'll see.
I was in college in 1980 so I was involuntarily exposed to a lot of the Billy Joel and Supertramp albums. I preferred Billy Joel. Supertramp’s hooks got on my nerves which proves that they were brilliant. I thought of my self as a cool kid who listened to Elvis C. , The Clash, Talking Heads, etc…
To be fair, the award show and the view toward certain changed radically through the 60s. Sgt Pepper won. But early in the decade its lot of classical, show tunes, etc
I love when Beck was still weird and anti-. MTV Makes Me Wanna Smoke Crack, paired with his comatose appearances on said network, and his skewed lyrics about folk singers' paychecks and hanging oneself with a guitar string and running down the street dodging chicken fat just make me laugh, at myself and the era and all of it.
Have to say I absolutely love this series. It’s entertaining and fun, but in the weirdest way, wildly ambitious. An album a day (assuming not just in the background) is quite the undertaking. As for Billy Joel vs. Supertramp, well there’s no modern equivalent to that face off for pure song power. I’d have to go with Supertramp though. BIA and Crime of the Century are both in my all time top 20. Across both those records the band was up there with The Beatles, Zeppelin, anybody…but strangely underrated.
Glad this excites the album guru
Really enjoying this entire series!
I apologize if you've covered this before, but have you ever actually cared about the Grammys? I've aged out about caring about awards at all, but I admit to being a bit obsessed with the Oscars when I was in high school and made it a point to watch nominated films from the past and present. And though I don't care about them anymore, the nominees are a respectable list. But even with an equivalent interest in popular music, I always saw the Grammys as a bit of a joke, a glorified popularity contest, no better than the VMAs in terms of actual prestige, and useful only for some fun performances.
Maybe they are better when you get more granular? Maybe they do indeed nominate an exceptional list of Bluegrass and Americana albums? They do nominate and award great albums here and there, but I was always struck by how objectively mediocre a lot of the albums were. "Album from a popular artist with 2-3 great songs and a bunch of filler" is usually enough to warrant an album of the year nominee, if not a win, and it always felt very arbitrary to me.
I think that the Grammys' general category awards are a very poor guide for the best or most interesting music of the year, but the genre-specific nominees are slightly better. I do wonder if one of the reasons the Grammys suck compared to the Oscars is that not only are there far more noteworthy albums released in a year than noteworthy films, but there's far more variety in the musical landscape than in the cinematic landscape, making it impossible for Grammy voters to rally around a consensus pick. But as weak as I think their selections are, I still enjoy the Grammys every year because I think they're good discussion fodder. Who would I nominate? Who would I vote for among the actual nominees? Who are other people rooting for? How did THAT artist manage to get nominated in this category? Which is what this post does.
Do I care about the Grammys? No. But do they matter? Yes. Artists can pretty much always count on a boom in sales and popularity after winning or being nominated. It's marketing, really.
Fair point! It's just interesting because I've hardly ever heard anyone even mention that something won or was nominated for a Grammy, which is quite different from the Oscars, which, at least at one time, were a pop culture talking point.
The only time I remember the awards part of the Grammy awards (as opposed to the show) coming up in a conversation was when Norah Jones won nearly 25 years ago.
It'd be interesting to compare sales/streaming bumps from the Grammys to, say, being featured on the NYT best of the year list, as well as genre specific lists/awards.
So many interesting match-ups here. The hardest would have to be "52nd Street" vs. "Breakfast in America" vs. "Bad Girls." They're all great but I think I'd still give the edge to Billy Joel. The others have a lot of great individual songs on them but "52nd Street" may be the best from start to finish.
2014 and 1980 were def the hardest
My God, Celine Dion beating Beck's Odelay is a deeply disturbing new fact I wish I didn't know! Great post though, thank you. I've a lot of listening to do.
Sorry to disturb so early in the day
Oh it's OK, it's 3.17pm here in England, I'm going to have put one of the albums from your post on (not sure which yet) and have a beer to wash away the bitterness of Celine's win. Might take more than one, but we'll see.
I was in college in 1980 so I was involuntarily exposed to a lot of the Billy Joel and Supertramp albums. I preferred Billy Joel. Supertramp’s hooks got on my nerves which proves that they were brilliant. I thought of my self as a cool kid who listened to Elvis C. , The Clash, Talking Heads, etc…
Does the Grammy organization have something personal against the Beatles?! Wild.
To be fair, the award show and the view toward certain changed radically through the 60s. Sgt Pepper won. But early in the decade its lot of classical, show tunes, etc
I love when Beck was still weird and anti-. MTV Makes Me Wanna Smoke Crack, paired with his comatose appearances on said network, and his skewed lyrics about folk singers' paychecks and hanging oneself with a guitar string and running down the street dodging chicken fat just make me laugh, at myself and the era and all of it.
Listening to U2 twice in a week felt criminal