Tuesday, February 07, 2006
STOP: GRAMMY TIME
It's everybody's favorite time of the year again. The time when you try to remember what differentiates Record of the Year from Song of the Year, the time when you stock up on No-Doz to help prepare for the hour long performance by an elderly singer, the time when you marvel at U2 for being nominated 748 years in a row for the same album. That's right: Grammy Time!
The Grammys are the red-headed stepchild of awards shows. In a world where Oscar is King, SAG is highbrow, and the Golden Globes come with booze, the Grammys just can't compare. Any award show that contains vast amounts of Fergie and Usher and doesn't even have the common decency to give people in the audience a flask of liquor and/or a barf bag is just not right.
That said, I am intrigued in spite of myself--well, I say that as though I have standards of any kind and did not stay up too late last night watching General Hospital and The Young and the Restless--by the race for Record of the Year, which features the Gorillaz, a rapper with a Jesus complex, a woman who thinks she's Hello Kitty, a drag queen and a band that made whining cool again. Fun! Let's look a bit deeper, shall we?
[Aside: a commercial for the Grammys just proclaimed that Kanye West and Jamie Foxx performing together is a "once in a lifetime" event. The hell? Do they not remember "Slow Jamz"? If I have to remember it, they should too!]
There are times that I don't believe Mariah Carey is for real, just because it worries me that someone who believes so strongly in unicorns and glittery rainbows is allowed to roam free, since she could harm herself and others. But there she is, with the mental capability of a twelve year old who plays MASH in order to find out who she will marry, who decorates her locker with pictures of Hello Kitty and Strawberry Shortcake and who dots her i's with hearts. She is completely and utterly detached from reality, in a way that I both disdain and envy. From frolicking in the water (I know the word frolic is used quite often, but there is no word to describe it except for maybe prance) to having someone hold her drink for her, Mariah aka Mimi aka Princess Sparkle McBonBon Flutterton is operating in a world of her own.
Which would be fine if she didn't keep making new music in my world. In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that Daydream was the first CD I owned and that many hours were spent singing along to "Open Arms" and "Forever" into a brush in front of a mirror. I'm not proud. Old School Mariah (identified by her singular wind machine and multiple layers of clothing) was cool. When I turned 15ish, I grew out of my Mariah Carey phase, as I had finally grown older than her (and, fine, it coincided with when she started dating Derek Jeter and the snide comments she made about him being dim only exacerbated my animosity).
Then she went all spazzy and carried around nineteen wind machines and wore an entire horse farm on her head and Glitter and now she's back with the biggest album of her career and she's all legitimate and shit, and I'm sorry, but what she does on this album is not singing and also, why is it called The Emancipation of Mimi, because I was under the impression that Mimi Caterpillar had already been emancipated via metamorphosis in the Butterfly album, but I digress. Anyhoo, "We Belong Together" is notable only for the video starring Wentworth Miller. The vocals are sort of whispery and willowy and the lyrics, well...
When you left/I lost a part of me/It's still so hard to believe/Come back baby please, 'cause/We belong together/Who else am I gonna lean on/When times get rough/Who's gonna talk to me on the phone/Till the sun comes up/Who's gonna take your place/There ain't nobody better/Oh baby, baby, We belong together
I swear, that is cribbed directly from a sixth grade girl's note to her boyfriend (does it count as being a boyfriend if all you do is walk to the bus together?)
Verdict: No
FIRST OF ALL, I don't understand why the Grammys have a billion loopholes in their rule book. I don't get why this is allowed to be nominated this year when American Idiot was nominated for awards last year.
SECOND OF ALL, I don't understand why this song is so popular among the living. People looking to slit their wrists, sure. But really--the droning. What is with the whining? Just because Janice on Friends got some laughs because of her whine doesn't mean that entire songs need to be whined and droned and ohmigod.
I walk a lonely road/The only one that I have ever known/Don't know where it goes/But it's home to me and I walk alone
Yeah, alone except for every person who shops at Hot Topic and buys into this bullshit. This song is just way too emo for my liking. Emo and needy and no, I don't feel bad for you, Billie Joe Armstrong, because there's probably a reason people shun you.
VERDICT: No
I like Gwen Stefani. I think she is cute, and I love that she is willing to take risks with fashion and cosmetic choices and that she's okay with looking like a fool. The video for "Cool" is unspeakably pretty. Sure, she is as needy as Green Day and she has a Mimiesque third grade thing going on with Love Angel Music Baby (did she just pick girly words out of a sparkly hat?), and her fetishization of Japanese culture is so not cute, but I have to stay on Team Stefani (Please shoot me the next time I say Team _______) because:
But Hollaback Girl? Seriously? No. I have not met one person who is willing to go on the record stating that they enjoy this song, and I know some maladjusted freaks. I mean, it is the type of song that you are morbidly fascinated with, but to nominate it for an award is just...
I heard that you were talking shit/And you didn't think that I would hear it/People hear you talking like that, getting everybody fired up/So I'm ready to attack, gonna lead the pack/Gonna get a touchdown, gonna take you out/That's right, put your pom-poms downs, getting everybody fired up
There is something wrong with her.
And this is saying nothing of the bizarre "B-A-N-A-N-A-S" part of the song. The first time I heard it, I thought I had stumbled upon Sesame Street or The Big Comfy Couch. I feared for the world when I learned it was a for real song.
VERDICT: No. A million times, no
We've all heard it. We've all imitated Kanye's strange dance moves. We've all screamed out "WE WANT PRENUP" in a crowded public place. The song is catchy as hell. And you all know that I love Kanye, Jesus imitating and Cosby sweaters notwithstanding. But there are two things extremely wrong with this song and, as such, I don't feel right giving it an official endorsement
My best friend say she use to fuck wit Usher/I dont care what none of y'all say I still love her
WHAT
THE
FUCK
?!??!
Nobody deserves Usher's sloppy seconds. Nobody. Not a chipmunk cheeked, sweater vest wearing egomaniac. Not Joel Stein. Not the creepy man who works at the deli next to my job. NOBODY.
If I may be so bold as to suggest legislation that needs to be brought to the Senate immediately, I think that Usher needs to be quarantined. Sent to an island somewhere with nobody to keep him company except for Jermaine Dupri and Dominic Monaghan. The internet should have all pictures of him erased. I don't know why he looks like that. It is scary enough to have to look at somebody with a tiny head, or with a penis shaped nose, but when you combine the two and then add in skeeze? No words.
On Seinfeld when Jerry found out his girlfriend was dating Newman, he was understandably freaked out. That is a normal reaction. But for Kanye to brazenly claim that he still loves this girl after hearing that she...knew...Usher? No. That is just the wrongest thing ever.
Did he just need someone whose name rhymes with "Busta" and "her"? I mean, it's hard, for sure, since the only name I can come up with "Burr" as in Aaron and you know, if we're being honest, I'd rather that than Usher.
VERDICT: USHER?!
That leaves us with Gorillaz and "Feel Good Inc." by default, but which is a deserving song in its own right, so yay.
And while I know that the Grammys mean nothing, I do hope Kanye wins big and if John Legend doesn't win at least Best New Artist, I am going to need to lay low at one of your houses after the mass murder I will surely commit. Fair warning!
Mallory at 2/07/2006 09:24:00 PM