O v. G: fuck you, film kids

It's time for my comparison between this year's 47th Annual Grammy Awards and the 77th Annual Academy Awards.

Why oh why oh WHY must we, as an industry, always get upstaged with those camera-wielding buffoons? A bunch of neurotic, coke-snorting narcissists (I mean the film kids, not us) always get the lion's share of fucking everything in Hollywood. Why? Why?

I'll tell you. Because we, as an industry, have lost sight of what makes us great, what makes music art and not just commerce. Film lost sight of their art for a while (hello 1980s!) but they have recovered. They have recognized that not all pictures must be Sideways just as not all films must be White Chicks. There has to be a balance of art and profit, of star-driven money-makers and summer block busters with art house films funded by the Sundance Institute and FOX Searchlight.

Where is the artistry in 'American Idiot' or the all-Usher, all-the-time show? With all the majors coming off of or still on signing freezes, we're forced to put out the same shitty music over and over and over again and then blame declining profits on downloading. But this is a different rant, the long and short of which boils down to fuck you, major labels.

My original and intended rant, which I have strayed from, was a comparison between this years "please god, someone tell us we're finally hip" Oscars and the excruciatingly boring Grammy Awards. The Oscars went out of their way to revamp their image this year, with off-the-wall host Chris Rock and the multi-pronged attack format of presenting awards. But they still kept their integrity (such-as-it-is for a glorified fashion show) by nominating movies that lent the requisite mystique to the word 'Oscar.' All the movies may have been pictures that no straight black man would ever watch (Thanks Mister Rock!) but they were undeniably some of the most poignant, well-written, and flawlessly produced pieces of cinema made by the Americans this year. (And I do mean the Incredibles as part of that statement.) And if Johnny had to lose, at least he lost to the man who should have won for best actor instead of to the filmic eqivilant of Simple Plan.

In contrast, the Grammys once again let MTV dictate what 'good' music is supposed to be. When Usher ( I keep harping on him, sorry baby boo) is up for 3 out of 5 Grammys for R&B, there is a goddamn problem. Some of it is the shit we put out as an industry and some of it is NARAS. They have never understood what it is to be "an innovator in music." The Grammy in each category is supposed to go to the artist who expanded the bounds of said category. Once upon a time, only the most obscure acts who had no impact on the genre were rewarded. (Give the Beatles some more Grammys for fuck's sake! Led Zepplin! And never mind giving Jethro Tull the Heavy Metal Grammy above Metallica and giving Metallica the Grammy last year, you brainless twats!) Now the opposite holds true. If you’ve been at number one on TRL for more than five weeks, you're probably going to get nominated. If you have a reality tv show on a Viacom subsidary, you're probably going home with at least one golden champagne flute... sorry, gramaphone horn.

And the categories! Incubus should have won Best Rock... but Best Heavy Metal? Against Metallica, Motorhead, Slipknot, and Cradle of Filth? Who the fuck is doing the nominations? (Okay, I know who is but allow me to be rhetorical.) And U2? They are legends, they are amazing, Joshua Tree is a landmark record... but not How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. Dookie changed the face of American punk, not American Idiot.

And then there was the telecasts themselves. Neither was particularly outstanding but the Grammys were just horrendous. If I didn't want to see my friends who were there, I wouldn't have watched. Fuck, I chose to go to work over go to the actual event! You know when you're turning down the "hottest seat in town" that it's a boring ass spectacular spectacular. The multi-band opening was painful, the Kayne West number was so preachy I wanted to scream, and everything else blurs together like MTV Hits after a few hits of acid. The speeches were dull, the fashions were boring, and all of Queen Latifa's spunk must have been liposuctioned out of her.

At least Chris Rock made the Oscars somewhat interesting.

How do the rate with everyone else who isn't little ol' over-opinionated industry kid me? With 18.8 Million viewers (a 28 per cent drop from the 2004 Grammys and the lowest rated Grammy broadcast since 1995, the Grammys lack luster. But even the Oscar's fell below their 43.5 mil last year. But when will the Grammys reach the 41.5 million the Oscars got to this year?

All I ask, people, is that my industry just stop sucking for just a little while.

And with that, I am retiring to watch FUSE and bug the artists.