With platinum albums an endangered species and the practice of selling music looking more and more outdated, you’ve got to wonder how much the recording industry will have to celebrate at the 54th Grammy Awards in February. That is, if you forget momentarily how much the recording industry loves blowing its own horn.
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But the Grammys are also under increasing pressure to appeal to consumers acclimated to the rapid churn of Internet-enabled entertainment—people for whom the awards’ period of eligibility, which runs from the beginning of last September through the end of this September, means that pretty much anything that might win is already ancient history. The academy wants to appear at least conscious of what these kids are listening to, and it’s surely just as eager to avoid gaffes like the notorious 1988 decision to award Jethro Tull, not Metallica, the prize for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance. So the smart gambler will put money on indie-rock phenom Bon Iver, aka Justin Vernon, to take home at least one of the four awards for which he’s nominated: Record of the Year, Song of the Year (both for “Holocene“), Best Alternative Music Album (for Bon Iver), and Best New Artist. (To get some idea of the Grammys’ level of self-regard, consider that you can now qualify as a “new” artist even if you’ve been nominated for a Grammy before—the only requirement is that you release a recording that first establishes your “public identity” during the eligibility period. And guess who’s defining the “public”?)
Vernon may actually have an edge on the Arcade Fire, because people who haven’t even heard of Pitchfork might know who he is—or at least recognize his name—thanks to his work on Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. He’s prominently featured on several songs, including the standout single “Monster.”
Fri 12/9, 7:30 PM, UIC Pavilion, $40.
