Thoughts on Beck Winning a Grammy For Album of the Year

So here’s my take on the whole Beck/Kanye grammy thing.  I think out of those nominees the self titled Beyonce record is the best album on there - but Beck deserves the Grammy.  

So first I’d like to say - the Grammys are fucked.  You can look at all the albums that were awarded that no one gives a shit about 5 years later, but what’s even crazier is thinking about all the pop artists who never got a grammy - to name a few: Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, The Who, Queen, Nas, Tupac, Curtis Mayfield, Sly & the Family Stone, Bjork, Chuck Berry, The Grateful Dead, Buddy Holly, Notorious B.I.G., Eric B & Rakim, Talking Heads, Patti Smith, Parliament & Funkadelic, The Stooges…For some of these artists - they were pushing too many musical boundaries in pop music and were too dangerous for the Grammy’s to really want to market them - for example, I totally understand why The Stooges or The Doors never won anything.  But then thinking about that Bob Marley never won a grammy is a mind fuck.  A couple of years ago they did a whole big tribute to him where all these artists played Bob Marley’s songs and such - but out of the 12 albums Marley put out I don’t think even one of them was even nominated for anything.  

And that’s just looking at pop music.  Other genres are even more fucked.  For example - Miles Davis never was awarded anything from the Grammy’s until they gave him the lifetime achievement award in 1990…what about his 48 studio albums he put out before that?   But then they give Winton Marsalis best jazz album of the year for three years in a row - which is maybe even a greater feat of ignorance and stupidity.  

The grammy’s are generally at least 20 or so years behind and often attempt to make up for it by rewarding artists for their previous successes for their mediocre to decent current albums if that album has a broad appeal to help it move more units.  To quote my friend Peter Gilli: "It's the industry's way of rewarding the artists that bring in the most money and getting them more publicity so they can make more…It only represents the artists that the major labels already chose and financed for national publicity. Plus the big awards (like album of the year) appear to be weighted in favor of what has the "broadest appeal", which to the RIAA appears to be some vague conception of white people”.  

If you look at a list of albums that won album of the year at the Grammys - a good amount of them are artists that past their peak about 30 years before that award.  Look at Herbie Hancock for example - the man was consistently putting out great records from 1962 until 1977, and didn’t win a Grammy until 1984 (for jazz album of the year…which I’m pretty sure they don’t even put on TV?) and then won album of the year in 2008 with a record that is solid - but doesn’t compare to classics he put out decades before that.  But again - out of all his records it’s probably one that has the broadest appeal to white people (as it’s all Joni Mitchell covers).  He’s a critically acclaimed artist who made an album that is extremely accessible that had the potential to get more units of it moved by bringing into the spotlight and awarding it the approval stamp of a golden gramophone. 

So back to Beck - the man has shaped the face of pop music today.  In 1994 he put out his major label debut, “Mellow Gold”, which I consider his most forward thinking and greatest album, and this collage of neo-psychedlia, anti-folk, and hip-hop helped define 90s alternative music.  But despite having the album sell over a million copies in the US, it’s hard to imagine the Grammies recognizing this record because of the lo-fi production and extremely anti-corporate lyrics such as, "Give the finger to the rock 'n' roll singer as he's dancing upon your paycheck.  The sales climb high through the garbage-pail sky, like a giant dildo crushing the sun”.  

And he went on to make many more brilliant albums such as “Odelay", "Midnight Vultures” (my personal favorite of his), and “Mutations” without ever really repeating himself.  And then in 2002 came out with an album called “Sea Change” that traded the surrealist/absurdist lyrics for a more straightforward sincere and emotional approach.  It’s a gloomy folk record and one of the most heartbreaking albums I’ve ever heard and definitely one of the greatest in Beck’s catalogue.  

After that he put out a few albums that were a return to his earlier style with a more electronic edge and a meeting point of both his straightforward and absurdist lyrical styles  - and those were alright, but he started to become more ambitious again in 2008.  He founded the Record Club where he put together groups of musicians to cover classic albums in their entirety (the highlight of this for me is when he covered Yanni’s “Live at the Acropolis” with Tortoise and Thurston Moore).  He then curated a a compilation of remixes of Phillip Glass pieces, for which he composed a 20 minute piece “NYC – 73-38”, which is not as much of a remix as it is a collage inspired by Glass’s music and life during this time period and is among Beck’s best work.  In 2012 he released a book of sheet music for other artists to cover, called “Song Reader” - allowing the songs to take a life of their own, which was a project that was really forward thinking and interesting in theory, but the product of it never really did anything for me.  Then the following year he released a video of a reimagining of David Bowie’s “Sound and Vision” with over 160 musicians that he conducts using sound painting and such and it’s just incredibly awesome.  

His album that he won the grammy for album of the year this year, “Morning Phase” is just a more bland and melodramatic version of “Sea Change”.  There’s some touches of 60’s psychedelia, some elements of interesting production and tasteful orchestration, and it does a great job of creating an atmosphere - but when it comes down to it it’s just a halfway decent sequel.  

There’s over 50 albums that I think were better records that came out last year, none of which were Grammy nominees.  BUT - out of those nominees for the Grammy's album of the year Beyonce’s record is the greatest…and I actually put it in my top 20 for 2013 (since even though it was a nominee in 2015 the record actually came out 2 years ago).  The thing is - Beyonce doesn’t need a grammy, she’s pushing selling enough albums as it is where it really do anything for her.   I mean - she is Beyonce after all.

Kanye said in an interview about the whole Beck/Beyonce thing, "when you keep on diminishing art and not respecting the craft and smacking people in their face after they deliver monumental feats of music, you're disrespectful to inspiration....Then they [the show's producers] do this whole promotional event, they'll run the music over somebody's speech, the artist, because they want commercial advertising. Like, no, we not playing with them no more".  I have to say I respect what Kanye is trying to fight for...but the thing is I'm not sure it's a fight worth fighting.  The Grammy's have been disrespecting art and smacking people in the face for over 50 years...I highly doubt they're going to stop now.  The Grammy album of the year is more or less just a huge add for a record that they want to sell more of - and Beck’s new album fits the role of that album that has a great appeal to the most white people from an artist who has gained tons of critical and fan acclaim.  The Grammys reminding people of his music, they can push more of his records - which is a great thing, since Beck is an amazing artist who I’m sure will accomplish many more great things - and even if “Morning Phase” isn’t one of them, if it helps him make in making more great art and raises awareness of some of other great things he has done - then I am in favor and I look forward to where his path leads next.