The Grammys Afterparty

"I'd like to thank my record label for finding my target demographic and marketing to that demographic aggressively and tastelessly.  Without them, I could have never bought my second Aston Martin."

America loves awards.  Not just receiving awards, either; though it would be totally sweet for America to finally win the much-touted "World's Most Badass Nation with A Big Dick" award that we as a nation have had our collective eye on, we also like to give awards.  And I'm not just talking about Olympic medals or Nobel Peace prizes either; no, the awards that we like to give go to people who, though they are indisputably not the best in their fields, are definitely the most well-known and highly publicized (which in America is the same thing as being the best).  Last night, we all had to steel ourselves against the soft-news onslaught brought to us courtesy of the red carpet at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards, and it was a doozy, I'll tell you what.

Every year, with every snub from the Grammy Committee, I become more bitter and resentful of awards shows.  I mean, just because I spent most of 2010 not being in a band and not releasing any music doesn't mean that I shouldn't be nominated for an award.  I'm 26 years old, and I have more than three (!!!) guitars; I am therefore entitled to a little recognition in the form of a "prestigious" award statuette and an enormous cash prize.  It's bullshit.  I should have at least gotten a gift bag and a "Participant" ribbon.

I usually don't pay so much attention to what goes on at the Grammys, but since I'm getting older, all of my friends are getting older, which statistically means that we are becoming exponentially less interesting with each passing year.  Since I don't have any children yet, and since my brain is broken in such a way that it forces me to randomly generate strange things to say that some people find entertaining, my curve is much less steep.  However, all of my friends who have children over the age of 2 days old are slowly substituting reality television and pictures of babies for their personalities, which apparently cease to exist the first time you have to wipe shit off a tiny set of balls with a Wet-Nap (I'm only kidding; only the vast majority of breeders lose their personalities to the bottomless black hole that is their offspring, and that's only because they had amazingly little personality to begin with).  What I'm trying to say is that, through the magic of Facebook status updates and Yahoo's disinterest in presenting anything that is actually "news" in their News Feed, this year I am surprisingly in-the-loop Grammy-wise.

It sucks.

Since the Grammys came and went last night, I thought I would pretend like I remembered that this whole debacle was going on in the first place and throw out my picks for the hottest categories.  Before I get to the predictions, however, I would like to say that I visited the website for the Grammy Awards, and was astonished by some of the surprisingly specific and frivolous categories that exist.  "I know who won Best Album, dude; what I need to know is who won the Best Album Notes category?  Ohhh, I can't believe that one won; the album notes for the Roky Erickson album were so much better than that one.  FUCK THAT!  Who won the Best Spoken Word Album for Children category?"  And if you're wondering, yes, those are actual categories.  Now, to predict!

Best Album
My prediction: Cephalic Carnage, Misled by Certainty
Result: Arcade Fire won with their album The Suburbs.  Surprisingly, Cephalic Carnage wasn't even nominated, which actually makes perfect sense, now that I think about it.  I mean, they easily took the "Best Colorado Hydro-Grind Album Sang By A Dude With The First Name 'Lenzig'" category, but I guess their brutal masterpiece couldn't stand in the same arena as real artists like Eminem and Katy Perry.

Best Record
My prediction: I thought Best Album was the same as Best Record, so I'll say....uhhhh....Black Breath, Heavy Breathing. 
Result: Lady Antebellum won this category, begging the question: what's the difference between an album and a record?  I have always seen them used synonymously.  However, Black Breath were snubbed this year; it seems that D-boners may as well not exist outside of my life.  This leads me to imagine that everyone who isn't me must envy the dead.

 I'm starting to envy the dead after looking at this picture of some ridiculous pop diva before her first D.U.I. arrest.

Song of the Year
My prediction: Cut Your Teeth, "Drink Beers"
Result: Again, the people making these decisions must not enjoy love and brotherhood and happiness, because Cut Your Teeth were edged out by a wide margin by Lady Antebellum's song "Need You Now."  I looked up the lyrics to the Lady Antebellum song, and much to my chagrin, it wasn't about drinking anything at all!  It's some faggy love song for girls that doesn't condone imbibing alcoholic beverages in any way!


Best New Artist
My Prediction: Cloudkicker
Result: Esperanza Spalding.  Just who the fuck is that, and why is she trying to butt in on Ben Sharp's fancy award?  I assume that she is some kind of ugly tween pop star since I've never heard of her, but she isn't the best new artist unless she writes, records, and self-releases a Djent album all by herself.  Ben Sharp managed to not only do those things, but to create a Djent album that is listenable to the point of being "actually good," which is something the myriad other Djent bands have failed to do up to this point.


Those were the main predictions that I had concerning the Grammys.  Needless to say, I have no idea what the hell normal people listen to anymore.  One time, I took a friend of mine and his brother out to see their first concert in Austin.  They described their musical tastes as being into "Indie Rock and stuff, but pretty much everything."  The bands they described reminded me of my friend Jeff, who has similar musical tastes.  In choosing which band we would go see, I saw that a band that Jeff loves was in town, a little band called Lightning Bolt.  I thought to myself "Well sir, if Jeff loves them, so must Ben and his brother."  I enjoyed the show a great deal; Lightning Bolt were grinding the night away wearing technicolor microphone/ski masks.  Ben and his brother did not enjoy the show.  It was at this point that I realized that the only person that I can accurately pick a good concert for is myself, which is usually fine.

But it sucks for entertaining new friends.

I apologize to Ben and Joe.  Actually, no I don't.