Grammy Thoughts

I agree with Bono that tonight's Grammys were possibly the best ever. Great performances, pretty decent distribution of awards, and lots and lots of U2 (see a trend here?)

The Best:
- Very glad that Loretta Lynn won, and what Jack White had to say about her lack of country airplay was pretty funny (and dead-on.) If Tim McGraw had won, I would've puked. And Loretta was wearing the best dress of the night, period. And I'm not just saying that because I'm country and I love purple.
- Melissa Etheridge now beats Sinead O'Connor for best bald head ever. She also had one of the best performances of the night, competing with...
- U2, who played what's become one of my all-time favs of theirs. Maybe it's not as memorable as "Vertigo" or the stadium-killer of "City of Blinding Lights", but "Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own" just has unbelievable emotional resonance. Just in case I haven't said it in the last few days, I have to see this tour. I'm just reminding myself of this so the ticket price will go down easier when the time comes.
- Very nice Ray Charles tributes. And the tsunami relief ensemble was just cool enough to justify an iTunes buy at some point.
- Kanye West showed a ton of class in his acceptance and in how gracefully he lost to Maroon 5. And somewhere a PR flack got her wings.

The Worst:
- Okay, a disclaimer here - I'm not a big fan of Lynard Skynard. Sue me. I come from a part of Tennessee where you don't play "Sweet Home Alabama" unless you're wearing a Roll Tide shirt and/or you don't value your life much. And I'm sick to death of "Freebird". I think if they were going to do a "tribute to Southern Rock", they needed to include more legends. And with the exception of Gretchen Wilson (who had a cool tribute T for Merle Kilgore, by the way) the selection of "new artists" to sing with them sucked. Tim McGraw does not rock. And not only does Keith Urban not rock, but he's not even Southern (okay, you can now label me jingoistic, but it makes a difference.) And where the hell was the live performance by Big & Rich that CBS promoed? I understand that they were showcasing the nominees, but this wasn't a great way, IMHO.
- Something's weird in the universe when the lead singer for Green Day is wearing more eye makeup than Britney Spears did in her latest video. But I've always kinda thought that the only men who could really pull that look off are David Bowie and the Cure.
- Is it just me, or aren't Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony starting to look more and more like the modern version of Taylor and Burton?
- Did the makers of "Sahara" buy slots for their cast to present awards? That just seemed strange.
- And what was that crap at the beginning with all of the "Record of the Year" nominees singing their songs all at once? I thought that the point of good radio was to try to prevent trainwrecks.