Grammys 2014: Who Will Win Best Song Written For Visual Media?

Mike Wood | January 24, 2014 5:34 am

This award has been around since 1988 (when it was called the Grammy Award for Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture Or Television) but its name has been changed more than a couple of times to keep up with technology and the changing times. And wouldn’t you know it? This year a song from a visual medium (other than TV or film) is finally nominated! OK, some might call streaming a show through Netflix television, but it is technically an Internet show since Netfilx isn’t a TV network…yet. That being said — and boring Grammy history lesson aside — the remaining five nominees in the category are from traditional motion pictures.

Now back to business: Are you ready for a room full of grandmas? Wait, that’s something else. This is the Grammys, a gathering of musical talents that stretches far beyond the tunes that are solely intended for the nanas and meemaws of the world. Movies, television—and all visual media—wouldn’t be complete without their music, so we’re looking at the songs written specifically for theses channels, and breaking them down to deduce which are the best of bunch.

Best Song Written For Visual Media Nominees:

“Atlas” from The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Written by Guy Berryman, Jonny Buckland, Will Champion & Chris Martin
Performed by Coldplay

“Silver Lining” from Silver Linings Playbook
Written by Diane Warren
Performed by Jessie J

“Skyfall” from Skyfall
Written by Adele Adkins & Paul Epworth
Performed by Adele

“We Both Know” from Save Haven
Written by Colbie Caillat & Gavin DeGraw, songwriters
Performed by Colbie Caillat Featuring Gavin DeGraw

“Young And Beautiful” from The Great Gatsby
Written by Lana Del Rey & Rick Nowels
Performed by Lana Del Rey

“You’ve Got Time” from Orange Is The New Black
Written & Performed by Regina Spektor

THOUGHTS ON THE NOMINEES: Five of the six nominees not only put pen to paper to write the music and the lyrics for their songs, but they also performed these songs, so not only are we impressed, we’re smitten—we love multi-hyphenate, singer-songwriter artists. That said, we’ve got a baker’s dozen of true contenders here. But when you consider that songs from motion pictures dominate in this category—and they always have, year after year—you realize that Regina Spektor should be honored, as they say, just to be nominated for “You’ve Got Time”. Despite her indie cred and increasing popularity (we do adore her), we’ll call Spektor out of the running. Silver Linings Playbook was one of the most talked about movies last year, but does anyone really remember the song “Silver Lining”? No offense, to the great Diane Warren, but we’re thinking not.

Grammy loves duets, and Colbie Caillat and Gavin DeGraw may just be a match made in soft-and-sunny pop musical heaven, but “We Both Know” is from a film (Safe Haven) few saw, and that’s its own kind of curse.

And, despite the massive appeal of all things Hunger Games, we think “Atlas” is a bit too melancholy for Grammy, even it it does capture the depravity and darkness of children murdering each other in the woods for the sake of sport. So that brings it down to a showdown between two great, grand belting divas: Lana Del Rey and Adele.

WHO SHOULD WIN: We’re seriously torn. A lesser talent than Lana Del Rey could have easily drowned beneath the big, bright, boisterous film that was The Great Gatsby. But the sultry songstress was not overshadowed by busyness and the Baz-Lurhmanness of it all because her sexiness and her soul burned through ever so bright with “Young And Beautiful.” But then there’s Adele to consider: Seductive and sexier than we’ve ever heard her, her big vocals and sweeping lyrical arcs served the Bond franchise its best anthem in years, giving Recording Academy voters exactly what they crave…and then some. Forced to call it, we think Del Rey should take the Grammy in this too-close-to-call category, but…

WHO WILL WIN …Adele’s stamp is already all over this one. “Skyfall” has the gravitas Grammy voters often look for and the esteem that comes with the ideal—Adele—package. Plus, she already nabbed the Oscar and the Golden Globe last year for this same song, so the Grammy voting block will all but certainly fall in line.

Who do you think will win?

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