The News From Grammytown
- Yesterday was Grammy day, and after much bureaucratic shuffling, the attendees were Adam, Kaveh, Angela, and Shane. It was a full day commitment involving suits and parking passes and stashed-away granola bars. The event bore some resemblance to other large conventions (although it is decidedly better-dressed than the National Baseball Card Convention). One thing going for me is that I love convention centers. I found one large area that was totally empty and had weird 80’s graphics on the carpeting and that made me very happy.
- But more along the lines of things that other human beings would find interesting, there were definitely lots of celebrities there, both in the Uninteresting Super Famous Person category as well as the Interesting Moderately Famous Person category. Highlights for me celebrity-wise were brief moments I shared with Queen Latifah (waiting in line eating pretzels together), George Clinton (I helped him deflect an overzealous fan), and sitting behind Neil Young.
- The telecast itself was, as you know if you saw even a brief moment, a spectacle on a grand scale. The general storyline seemed to be Sexy Chick Battle in which Lady Gaga played the annoying artsy girl that one roots against, Taylor Swift played the sweet naive country girl that one roots for, and Beyonce keeps it from seeming too white. My favorite thing was seeing Stephen Colbert in person, and P!nk becoming a human Spr!nkler was pretty cool.
- More interesting was the pre-telecast in which more, uh, well-rounded music people were featured. There’s a whole range of hard-working musicians who are working in fields visible or obscure that are there to receive accolades from their colleagues and that is nice to see. Chick Corea wore a really weird shirt.
- In total, although from my personal perspective the usual caveats apply about awards shows and other overly tangible signs of success in the arts, it was a real honor to be included in such a thing, and really nice to get an approving nod from the nominating and voting committees. The band works very hard and I am really happy to see the other guys have a reason to celebrate. It’s also been nice to hear that fans and friends have felt inspired that our quite personal and entirely uncompromising music would be honored by such a mainstream organization. It reinforces my long-held belief that the strongest statement is the most strongly believed statement, and that little good is done in the arts by trying to appeal to others, even toward that very goal.
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