Tuesday, January 28, 2014

The 56th Grammy Awards

As usual, Rants is a couple of days behind with things, but last night for the first time, I watched the Grammys on 4Music. I was going to try and watch it, like a normal person, but within thirty seconds I was reaching for my note pad and I didn't stop for two hours.

If you didn't manage to see it, then try and see if it's on catch up and I'm sure you'll understand each and every comment made. This is going to be a bit like my Eurovision run down; what happened in the order it happened and nothing but the truth from Rants. Enjoy!

Beyonce and Jay-Z
So it started with a music performance, and me having no bearing on current music, had no idea who it was. I guessed Rhianna, Slut (AKA Miley) and then woe betide, it was Beyonce straddling the chair. It wasn't so bad when she was on the chair but once she got up, you could see right where those knickers went. Ewww. Anyhoo, the song was crap, the words were nothing short of bizarre and there was absolutely no melody but of course that doesn't matter when Beyonce's gyrating against her husband.

Oh well, the crowd loved it.

LL Cool J
The presenter for the night. It's the usual crap nonsense that feels really forced and just read off the auto cue. It's so awkward and unnatural. Can't they ad lib? Most of them are actors/singers/performers. I'm sure they could find something hilarious to say that actually sounded genuine.

Daft Punk
I realised the daft punk guys are like The Stig from Top Gear. They never take them damn helmets off.

Cue another shitty in between segment. It's all so uncomfortable.

Lorde
Well, this was the first time I'd heard this song and seen the woman herself. Sorry, I mean girl. She's 16! What the feckles? I would have said at least 26 and believe me, it's not a compliment. I thought one of the lyrics was: 'You can call me creepy.' In which my response was: 'Good, you are.' But then I later realised she said, 'You can call me Queen bee.' I guess that made more sense with the song title: Royals. Ah well, could work either way.

Pharrell's Hat seems to need special mention. It did tend to distract away from other things.

Steve Coogan
Wow. I though Steve Coogan was presenting a Grammy but turns out he was introducing an act. Still it was nice to see a Brit up there, there weren't many over the course of the night. He was being beautifully British, though I'm not sure he used quite the right words to describe Katie Perry.

Katie Perry
Started off a bit Kate Bush - Never Forever, but didn't last long. The usual over the top theatrics you'd expect from Perry but very pitchy. It must be really hard to be her backing vocalist. Try and harmonise with that. There was a bit of pole dancing during the rap interlude in which one of the horrific lyrics was: 'She can be my sleeping beauty. I'll put her in a coma.' Lovely!
It just feels as though they create as many distractions and over stimulate - fire, props, screens, pole dancing, rap, dragons - so you don't notice just how bad the song and vocals actually are.

Pink
Now, if you didn't get to see the Grammy's, this is the performance you have to see! It must be on YouTube somewhere. Pink is suspended over the crowd doing all sorts of acrobatics, whilst singing in key. It's fuckin' mind blowing. She's upside down. She's spinning. She's hanging. She's fuckin' strong as Ken and it's completely jaw dropping. Her performance shits all over anything else that night.

She then joined the guy from Fun for a duet which was a shame because the guy in the suit was just screeching and sounded terrible. Whereas Pink who'd just been suspended from the ceiling, comes back on in a lovely long skirt and massive heels and sings her ass off.

Lorde won an award and she's actually a little terrifying.

Chicago and Robin Thicke
It sounds sleazy. You are sleazy. So don't try and do something cute in a tux. You will never be forgiven for Blurred Lines. You don't fool us. But I felt sorry for the lovely old men that you dragged into it. He sang a medley of songs, finishing with Blurred Lines, of course. And I'd just like to say, it doesn't matter if you stick some fuckin' brass in it, it's fuckin' hideous!

Taylor Swift
Hooray, another clothed woman. Actually she had quite a nice dress and she looked very pretty. She played the piano and sang, albeit a little pitchy here and there - which I was quite shocked at - but we also had some very exuberant head movements. It was a very committed performance, if a tad boring. But half way through 6 guitarists appeared, all playing the same thing and 6 backing vocalists.

What the fuck was Beyonce's dress about? It looked like she was holding the bottom of it, but it also wasn't attached to the rest of it. Weird!

Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr
Ringo was having a lovely time on the drums.
The lyrics to this song were preposterous but hilarious: Queenio, Queenio, who's got the ball. I don't know, it's not in my pocket. Ha ha. Peter Kay sketch comes flooding back.
The song was pretty shite actually and just sounded exactly like Shine by Take That. I wonder if he's been conspiring with Mr Barlow and Mr Owen? All I can think is: Morrison's advert.
I can't help but wonder what we'll do when there aren't any Beatles left?????????

Stevie Wonder, Pharrell, Nile Rodgers, Daft Punk
Pharrell's hat - a different one this time - was actually taking over the stage. He looked like he was either going, or he'd already been, fishing. It was like Huckleberry Finn with a cowboy hat. Quite cute.
I actually felt quite sorry for Stevie Wonder who still has a remarkable voice, because Pharrell really didn't tonight and there was some pretty freaky attempts at harmony.

What the hell was Bruno Mars wearing? Another wannabe cowboy?
Oh and Beyonce can't clap. You could see her just pressing her hands together. Make some noise, bitch!

Imagine Dragons
Wow, this was amazing. I'd never heard them before but the guy at the beginning had an incredible voice and then the rappy guy was fantastic and there were huge drums everywhere and so much atmosphere. It was a little bit rock, a little bit rap, there was so much energy and passion. This was an insane performance and again, one you need to check it out on YouTube if you haven't seen it yet. The final build up to the outro was amazing!

Queen Latifah came out to announce the next act, looking hot!

Macklemore and Ryan Lewis
Weirdly I knew who they are, due to my partner taking me to a gig as part of his work, last year. The song was fairly good, though as usual it was the melodic hook, not sung by the rapper guy that was the main thrust of the song. But 33 couples actually got married during the song from all races, cultures and sexualities. Which would have been nice until Madonna came on looking about 90 and barely able to wobble on without her trusty stick. Talk about doddery. She was a mess and still can't sing for shit.
When she sang along with the lady in the red dress at the end, it was almost like a singing lesson. It goes like this, listen and repeat. No Madonna, listen, it goes like this. Oh for fucks sake Madonna. Listen will you.
She ain't listening. Must have turned her hearing aids off.
What a slap in the face having a doddery old woman who can't sing, attempting to do so at your wedding. But then, you did choose to get married at the Grammys, so really you're just asking for trouble.

All the categories for awards, all have the same five artists in them. It's really annoying. Pharrell keeps winning in his random hat and Daft Punk keep winning in helmets.

Jesus is here (AKA Jared Leto) to announce Metallica and Lang Lang taking to the stage. Now this should have been amazing. Notice the should. The piano intro was great, though you knew it was nothing but a warm up for him. And he was surrounded by fire, very cool.
Then when Metallica kicked in there was some really dodgy timing going on and then AHHHHHHHHH! Mr Hetfield, what the hell have you done to yourself, your hair and your voice. You used to be so sexy. Oh my word. He looked like an older DiNozzo from NCIS.
I'm not exactly sure how this combination of greatness didn't work, but it really didn't. Until the outro, which was immense.

Alicia Keys came on to announce an award, looking a little mannish. Sorry but it had to be said. And guess what? Fuckin' Pharrell and the robot won again. Boring!

The final performance, again on paper should have been mega, but it turned out just a tad messy!
Queens of the Stone Age, Nine Inch Nails, Dave Grohl, Lindsey Buckingham (Fleetwood Mac)
Very messy first song, though Mr Grohl is a frickin' beast! But the second song was much better.
It did offend me slightly that they showed the stupid Grammy Sponsors over the top of the second rock performance of the night, but then who doesn't need to see a picture of a Delta plane.

Well, I hope you enjoyed reliving it through my eyes and seriously if you haven't watched any of it, you have to at least watch Pink, Madonna and Imagine Dragons. It will probably be on 4music catchup on 4od and I'm sure most of the performances are also on YouTube or something similar.

Well, I suppose I should stop having fun and go and do some real work.

Rants


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