The Electric Six‘s “Jimmy Carter” is, as far as I’m concerned, the single best song ever written about the American presidency. (Well, the American presidency and boy bands.) But there are a lot of excellent runners-up!
As of right now, 20 of the 25 entries on Google’s Hot Trends list—which tracks the “fastest-rising search queries in the U.S.”—are about music. And all of them seem to be Grammy-related: “blink 182 back together,” “m.i.a. pregnant,” “static major,” “raising sand,” and so on. Look back at, say, Sept. 8, the day after the VMAs, and there are only four music-related search terms, surrounded by the usual mix of politics, sports, and TV stories. Does that mean, then, that the Grammys’ seemingly ridiculous strategy of only televising ten awards and filling the rest of the telecast’s three and a half hours with live music actually made people interested in music?
Welcome to Idolator’s liveblog of the 2009 Grammy Awards, a year in which there will be more spectacle and less award-doling than ever. Well, at least it seems that way: The 3 1/2-hour telecast will have no more than 10 brass gramophones handed out during its running time, presumably because the music industry decided that what it really needed to give it a shot in the arm was a slightly more pretentious version of the Video Music Awards. (And yes, that is Paul McCartney being That Guy—or rather, the Bret Michaels-pioneered variation on That Guy who wears a shirt advertising his own projects—above.) Full minute-by-minute coverage after the jump!
The nominations for Hollywood’s annual tribute to itself are in and, hmm… not my favorite batch of Best Picture nominees this year (I was profoundly disappointed by The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and David Fincher’s Zodiac was my favorite movie of last year!), but we’re not here to talk movies. We’re here to discuss the usual travesty that is the Academy’s music nominations. Here they are:
OK, so N.A.S.A. actually stands for North America/South America, and the project from Squeak E. Clean (Spike Jonze’s brother; you may also remember him as the guy who created the Karen O song for that Adidas ad) and DJ Zegon certainly has transcontinental goals. Its track listing reads like a lineup card for the Hype Machine Vs. Elbo.ws All-Star Internet Music Blog-Off (Tom Waits! The RZA! Lykke Li!), and the latest song to leak from the album, “Whachadoin,” is more proof of that, what with it featuring M.I.A. and Santogold and Spank Rock and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner. So you have a “banger” beat and M.I.A. shouting, and Spank Rock being filthy, and Santogold… in there somewhere. If anything, it brings to mind the Converse ad where Santogold, Julian Casablancas, and Pharrell do their own schtick without ever cohering. I guess the endless remix culture perpetuated by blogs (LIKE THIS ONE) had to come to a point where the songs were already pre-chewed-up-and-spit-out for people, right? Anyway, another track from the album—with David Byrne! and Chuck D! so eclectic!—is after the jump.
What were the 80 most important musical recordings, artists, trends, events, and performances of 2008? What were the eight things this year that broke our hearts—or, at least, our ears? We’re happy to announce 80 ’08 (and Heartbreak), Idolator’s year-end overview. The list is below the jump.
I left Slumdog Millionaire during the mansion scene—I couldn’t watch someone be that stupid anymore, sorry. Flimsy framing device, too. But even I had to admit that when “Paper Planes” came on it matched the images perfectly—even if I also think playing the entire song in the middle of the movie was, well, kind of unnecessary.
