Their last record was nominated too - for Best Comedy Album.

February 9, 2015 12:22 PM

It got lost in the Kanye vs. Beck hoopla, but metal fans are fuming that "joke band" Tenacious D took home last night's "best metal performance" Grammy for their cover of Dio's "The Last in Line." The comedy duo beat out such metal mainstays as Anthrax, Mastodon, Motorhead and Slipknot.
posted by Clustercuss (272 comments total)

Caring about the Grammys is maybe the least metal thing imaginable.
posted by saladin at 12:24 PM on February 9, 2015 [180 favorites]

What happened, Jethro Tull didn't release anything last year?
posted by box at 12:26 PM on February 9, 2015 [51 favorites]

Damn, I came to post something snarky BUT I SEE I AM TOO LATE.
posted by selfnoise at 12:26 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

If you're really Metal do you give a shit about the Grammys?
posted by billiebee at 12:26 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

DAMMIT
posted by billiebee at 12:27 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

Came looking for the obligatory Jethro Tull joke, was not disappointed.
posted by octothorpe at 12:29 PM on February 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Dio has rocked for a long, long time.
posted by dr_dank at 12:30 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

> Curiously dressed Atlanta prog metal band Mastodon, who many felt deserved to win the 2015 ‘Best Metal Performance’ Grammy.

That is not what I was expecting a metal band named Mastadon to look like.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:31 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

There is a distinct difference between "joke band" and "comedy band." Jack and Kyle love and respect metal, and while yes, the Grammy voters clearly voted for the one they'd heard of, it's not nearly the slap in the face that Jethro Fucking Tull was.
posted by Etrigan at 12:31 PM on February 9, 2015 [16 favorites]

I don't really care about metal, but let me storm the thread to take the mic and say the way Beck has handled the situation with Kanye West is impressive.
posted by aught at 12:32 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

If most metal was as good as Tenacious D, I might be a metal fan.
posted by Drinky Die at 12:34 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

I'm still bitter that Heavy Metal Mater was totally ignored in 2010.
posted by Kabanos at 12:34 PM on February 9, 2015

Lee Lee Lee Lee
Lee Lee Lee Lee Lee
Lee Lee Lee Lee
Tenacious Lee

(Also, Dio made a cameo in Pick of Destiny, so that seems to be one form of passing the baton, no?)
posted by a fiendish thingy at 12:35 PM on February 9, 2015

for whatever it's worth kanye has said that he meant to direct his ire at the grammys, not beck, in the "rant" everyone is salivating over this morning and says that he loves beck, but that it wasn't album of the year material. i honestly imagine we'll see them collaborating before the decade is out.
posted by nadawi at 12:36 PM on February 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

I mostly viscerally dislike Jack Black... but I didn't hate this.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 12:38 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

The Grammys make me feel young and I am almost 50.
posted by srboisvert at 12:38 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

The internet's attitude towards the Grammys is pretty much the same as my attitude towards girls in grade seven; I didn't care what they thought of me, but I desperately wanted them to like me.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:39 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

I'll pick Jack Black anyday over Kanye West. I'm waiting for the day West peters out and everyone doesn't have to be nice to him.
posted by smidgen at 12:40 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

Here's that champagne you ordered, Mr. Simpson.
posted by Drinky Die at 12:41 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

the real question that i still can't find the answer to is who is this unfortunate soul who got tangled up in the construction zones heading to the awards (also that article is a master class in shade)?
posted by nadawi at 12:41 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Also, Dio made a cameo in Pick of Destiny, so that seems to be one form of passing the baton, no?

The baton? No. He passed the torch.
posted by The Tensor at 12:41 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

Iron Maiden t-shirts everywhere are flying at half-mast today.

(Myself, I would've loved to have seen Soft Pink Truth's Why Do The Heathen Rage? take the ring.)
posted by octobersurprise at 12:42 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

I would really love a breakdown by genre and artist ethnicity of "artist of the year" winners - because it wouldn't surprise me at all if like the Oscars, the Grammys were whiter than chalk.

(IDGAF about the Grammys, but I'm pretty sure Kanye has a point here)

OTOH, I am all about Jack Black making metalheads angry because nothing fills me with more glee than angry pretentious metalheads.
posted by FritoKAL at 12:44 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

Beck should have given his award to Eddie Vedder.
posted by Flashman at 12:44 PM on February 9, 2015

Hadn't heard the track before this post. It's competent but nowhere near the original. I'm sure the Grammys are just like every other awards show: i.e. an industry circlejerk that deserves to be ignored by everyone else.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 12:46 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

That construction fence dress is amazing. Unconventional materials challenge ftw.
posted by Flashman at 12:47 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

I can't see Motörhead really minding all that much.
posted by Gelatin at 12:48 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Metal is funny. It's funny there's still a special category for a form of music that hasn't been pop music since 1991. Metalheads should be thanking the D for caring enough to riff on the tropes of Metal literally and figuratively, and for doing it so awesomely. In conclusion, Tenacious D.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 12:49 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

Pretty sure there is no artist of the year Grammy.
posted by aaronetc at 12:53 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I thought it was a stunt??? But real thing?
posted by boo_radley at 12:54 PM on February 9, 2015

I'm pretty sure the pretentious metalhead response is "Grammys? Those still exist? That's cute."
posted by Zalzidrax at 12:54 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

wonder if the grammys will just troll everyone next year and give the metal award to body count
posted by nadawi at 12:55 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

The baton? No. He passed the torch.

And his cape and scepter. \m/
posted by entropicamericana at 12:55 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

"How many great records has he put out in the last five years, right?”[Beck on Kanye]

Oh, snap. (Hi, I've been doing it for 20 years. Idiot.) Kanye West is an irate schmaltzy hack who's 15 minutes are officially up. Grotesque.
posted by sexyrobot at 1:00 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

I would laugh so hard, but, they beat Motörhead? They beat LEMMY?

YOU ARE DEAD TO ME, GRAMMIES. WELL, DEADER.
posted by eriko at 1:01 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

sexyrobot: “Oh, snap. (Hi, I've been doing it for 20 years. Idiot.) Kanye West is an irate schmaltzy hack who's 15 minutes are officially up. Grotesque.”

I love how people who know nothing about music keep assuming that Beck, who is not an idiot and knows what he's talking about, was being sarcastic. He clearly wasn't.
posted by koeselitz at 1:04 PM on February 9, 2015 [42 favorites]

Kanye West is an irate schmaltzy hack who's 15 minutes are officially up. Grotesque.

Hahaha. Haha. Ahaha. No.
posted by sallybrown at 1:07 PM on February 9, 2015 [26 favorites]

Even my grammy don't care about the grammys no more.
posted by lumpenprole at 1:08 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

"Who wouldn't be excited for a night long tribute to the Spotify playlist of a 12 year old girl?"
posted by gwint at 1:10 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

Just coming here to say I've never heard a Kanye West song in my life. So glad it's so easy to opt out of the monoculture these days.
posted by entropicamericana at 1:10 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

How can you even call it monoculture then?
posted by smackfu at 1:11 PM on February 9, 2015 [23 favorites]

Kanye is certainly talented but his inability to understand that musical tastes are subjective and his poor (nonexistent) impulse control is getting a little annoying.
posted by rocket88 at 1:11 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

Also, Beyoncé has 20 grammys to becks 5. Underappreciated she is not. Sorry, but not even the Beatles are entitled to the amount of hubris that man displays.
posted by sexyrobot at 1:12 PM on February 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

I'm pretty sure the pretentious metalhead response is "Grammys? Those still exist? That's cute."

"Cute" shouldn't be in the vocabulary of any metalhead, pretentious or not.
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 1:13 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

The Grammys were on last night?! Is that something I need a lack of Downton Abbey, Walking Dead and Better Call Saul to understand? !
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:15 PM on February 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

As it is, I view the Grammies with profound indifference seasoned with mild disgust, but my god I would totally watch it if there was a chance the camera would show a drunken Lemmy in a tux pitching a fit when the envelope is opened.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 1:15 PM on February 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

Also, Beyoncé has 20 grammys to becks 5.

Heck, she won three just last night, and Kanye is still complaining because she lost the big one.
posted by smackfu at 1:17 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

"Cute" shouldn't be in the vocabulary of any metalhead, pretentious or not.

Ok, then, "Kvte."
posted by octobersurprise at 1:18 PM on February 9, 2015 [18 favorites]

"Cute" shouldn't be in the vocabulary of any metalhead, pretentious or not.
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 1:13 PM on February 9 [+] [!]

Cüte!
posted by chavenet at 1:18 PM on February 9, 2015 [23 favorites]

You'd think someone had thrown a burrito in their faces, causing them to crash their bike and then dropkick a dog off a bridge.
posted by potsmokinghippieoverlord at 1:20 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Metafilter: Because Beyoncé Lost the Big One
posted by 4ster at 1:20 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Metalheads who are pissed about this are an insult to metal. Besides, Tenacious D are a lot of fun, and at least they're not Jethro Tull.

Kanye's great, but the awards-heckling schtick got real old real fast. It's predictably hacky in a way that he is typically not. It's also pretty insulting for him to suggest that Beyoncé would need this kind of "support".

But, you know, whatever, Grammies.

Also, neither Beck nor Beyoncé deserved that particular award this year. They have both done much better work in the past.
posted by Sticherbeast at 1:24 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Reminds me of when NIN won "best metal performance" for Wish around 92. The broken EP was metal as fuck but NIN fans didn't typically consider NIN to be metal (or industrial for certain values of fan). So you had NIN fans saying "I'll take the Grammy but it's Moar than metal man" and metal fans saying "even the NIN fans think someone else should've won."

But Wish was an epic life changing song with some groundbreaking subtle vulgarity for its time so it deserves some recognition even by squares who care about Grammy awards
posted by aydeejones at 1:25 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Ok, then, "Kvte."

needs an umlat or something
posted by entropicamericana at 1:25 PM on February 9, 2015

Honestly, it's a fantastic time to be into metal. Heavy music is pretty much off the cultural radar at this point, which means that it's back to being a DIY thing with a thousand subgenres to explore, technology in place to make it easy to produce and distribute, an extremely international scene. It's great.
posted by gwint at 1:26 PM on February 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

Metal isn't my thing. But it is the preferred music of a lot of my friends. And--none of the people I know really take it that seriously, so I'm kind of surprised by this. I have a hard time keeping track of the sub-genres but there seem to be common elements--everything goes over the top because why not. These friends are the reason that while I don't listen to metal recreationally, I can quote wide swaths of Metalocalypse while talking about grocery shopping. Dethklok has won an IMA for Best Metal/Hardcore Album, evidently. I think I'd kind of worry about anybody who got upset about the genre not being serious enough.

It's much like folk music, I think, in that getting too serious sucks all the life out of it. (Also, A Mighty Wind and This is Spinal Tap make a good pairing for movie night.)
posted by Sequence at 1:27 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Brandon Blatcher: “The Grammys were on last night?! Is that something I need a lack of Downton Abbey, Walking Dead and Better Call Saul to understand? !”

Ha – well, unfortunately there are those of us who don't have AMC and have to wait a day for that stuff to become available.

smackfu: “Heck, she won three just last night, and Kanye is still complaining because she lost the big one.”

Because it's the important one, and many of the others are sad jokes. (Like "Rap Album of the Year." Eminem? Yikes.)

And it's really insulting that Beck won – even Beck himself seems to have felt this; I like Morning Phase plenty, but even he has said in interviews that it's some minor stuff he's been working on that he released in the lead-up to his next album, which has been his major project over the past few years.

Why did Beck's album win? Because it was the only rock album nominated. And if only one rock album is nominated, then that album must win. It's basically a rule of the Grammys.

Morning Phase is a great little album. But Beyoncé was the best album nominated.
posted by koeselitz at 1:28 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

What I find annoying about the Kanye situation is that's another man speaking up "for" a woman who has her own agency, power, and right to complain or not complain about the fact that her music and status is constantly undervalued by an establishment full of old white man and a critic's press full of young and middle-aged white men because (at least in part) her music appeals to young women, including young women of color, teenage girls, women who aren't upper middle class, women who dress revealingly, women who are "trashy," women who love pop music, women who aren't generally "into music." As if members of the Beyhive can't have substantive and sophisticated reasons for loving Beyonce and her music.

I realize that is hugely overgeneralizing, but I feel it oozing out of the pores of every "into music" guy I've heard dismiss Beyonce and BEYONCE with an eye roll. All of whom love that Beck album. As do I - shockingly, even Beyonce fans contain multitudes.

And BEYONCE should have won.
posted by sallybrown at 1:29 PM on February 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

I love how people who know nothing about music...

Hi, I've worked on productions, videos, costumes, sets, and what-not for such nobodies as Madonna, Cher, David Bowie, TV on the Radio, Missy Elliot, The Beastie Boys, etc etc.. you're a.. database programmer? I know these people. For Beyoncé to not win an industry award for an album she self-released, basically saying 'I don't need you people' is hardly surprising.
And, TBH, whenever a Kanye song comes on the radio my reaction is almost always "what is this horrible shit" and then the announcer says "Kanye" and I go "ah." Maybe his is a career made out of B-sides, but I honestly couldn't be compelled to find out. Not a fan. But, to each his own.
posted by sexyrobot at 1:33 PM on February 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Metal isn't my thing either, except for Jethro Tull.
posted by thelonius at 1:35 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Beyonce was robbed and Eminem shouldn't be winning anything these days but at least Iggy was blanked.

Hi, I've worked on productions, videos, costumes, sets, and what-not for such nobodies as Madonna, Cher, David Bowie, TV on the Radio, Missy Elliot, The Beastie Boys, etc etc

And yet you still completely misread Beck's comment.
posted by kmz at 1:36 PM on February 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

The injustice of the Tenacious D win is not because they aren't metal, but because the award was for a cover version.
posted by rhizome at 1:36 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Dethklok has won an IMA for Best Metal/Hardcore Album, evidently.

Dethklok is a lot like Tenacious D: the songs are full of jokes, but the quality of the music is not a joke. I listen to quite a bit of metal, and Brendon Small is legitimately one of my favorite musicians.
posted by IAmUnaware at 1:37 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

When Jethro Tull won in 1989 the category was Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance. The Grammys subsequently separated Hard Rock and Metal into two separate categories, then recombined them in 2012, then dropped "Hard Rock" altogether.

That doesn't mean Jethro Tull deserved the award. Crest of a Knave wasn't a great album and wasn't Hard Rock (although that's debatable if Coldplay are considered Rock)
posted by rocket88 at 1:37 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Metal is funny. It's funny there's still a special category for a form of music that hasn't been pop music since 1991. Metalheads should be thanking the D for caring enough to riff on the tropes of Metal literally and figuratively, and for doing it so awesomely. In conclusion, Tenacious D.

The genre is alive and well and virulently "anti-mainstream." The best stuff has largely come well after 1991.

"True Metal Heads" hate pretty much all popular post 90's metal and are not thankful for acts like Slipnot trying to represent the genre.

These are some of the best metal artist / album pairings from my life:

Carcass - Swansong, Heartwork

At the Gates - Slaughter of the Soul (seriously, best Gothenberg shit ever)

In Flames - Clayman, Colony, Whoracle -- the holy trinity of In Flames at their prime in my opinion

Dark Tranquillity - Haven, Damage Done -- amazing

Opeth - Morningrise (Black Rose Immortal is the best metal song in the history of all metal songs and yes it's 20 minutes long), My Arms your Hearse, Still Life, all Opeth albums

Therion - The Secret of the Runes all of their albums are great but this one is God Like and you have no soul if you don't absolutely love at least one of the tracks

Crematory, Children of Bodom, Katatonia, Dimmu Borgir, Old Man's Child -- a little less accessible maybe, but hey.

And say what you want about Cradle of Filfth, but if this song doesn't give you shivers in your spine, you haven't listened to it enough. Good shivers.
posted by aydeejones at 1:38 PM on February 9, 2015 [20 favorites]

Also, last time I checked, "The Album" was still alive and well in the world of Real Metal (TM)

I am getting to be an old though and haven't listened to any metal albums in a long time.

I forgot to mention Amorphis. Jesus these guys are gods. This shit makes me cry, yo
posted by aydeejones at 1:40 PM on February 9, 2015

Yes I am familiar with Metal. As you point out it is not pop music and therefore kinda odd that it gets its own Grammy. Like does Triphop get its own Grammy? How about Klezmer?

But also, all of those metal songs are mad silly.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 1:40 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I AM SRSLY MAD
posted by aydeejones at 1:42 PM on February 9, 2015

Prince's facial expressions during his presenting stole the entire show. He needs to attend all the award shows and stand in the background on stage and role his eyes.
posted by 80 Cats in a Dog Suit at 1:43 PM on February 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

It gets its own Grammy because it appeals to a large demographic of 11 year-old and up angry white dudes, I suspect
posted by aydeejones at 1:43 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

WE MUST BATTLE iiiiin HEELLLLLLLLLLLLL *a cathedral explodes*
posted by Potomac Avenue at 1:43 PM on February 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

sexyrobot: “Hi, I've worked on productions, videos, costumes, sets, and what-not for such nobodies as Madonna, Cher, David Bowie, TV on the Radio, Missy Elliot, The Beastie Boys, etc etc.. you're a.. database programmer?”

Oh lord, we're doing this. As tempting it is to point out that I'm a piano player – well, I guess I just did, so there it is – this stuff doesn't matter to me. I apologize for overgeneralizing.

“And, TBH, whenever a Kanye song comes on the radio my reaction is almost always ‘what is this horrible shit’ and then the announcer says ‘Kanye’ and I go ‘ah.’ Maybe his is a career made out of B-sides, but I honestly couldn't be compelled to find out. Not a fan. But, to each his own.”

They play Kanye on the radio? Seriously? Huh. I guess I didn't know people still listened to radio at all anyway.

But if your attitude now is "to each his own," that's fine. Just keep that in mind next time, and maybe don't declare openly that he's a "hack." It's pretty objectively clear that he's not. Regardless of your opinion of him, his lyrics and work have a remarkable depth and character. It's not always my type of music, but I respect it for what it is. So does Beck, apparently. And he's right – Kanye has produced a slew of great albums over the past five years. (He said "five years," by the way, because that's how long it's been since the infamous T-Swift incident which almost destroyed Kanye's career.)

Kanye West is a scapegoat. The sheer bile and unremitting hatred people display whenever his name is mentioned is stunning to me sometimes. It just goes to show that people need something to hate. And all because Kanye is a bit impolite. The winner of Rap Album of the Year is guilty of much worse, but nobody seems to care.
posted by koeselitz at 1:46 PM on February 9, 2015 [36 favorites]

Kanye Should Have Taken the Mic From Beck at the Grammys
posted by koeselitz at 1:46 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have "meh" feelings about most of Kanye's music, but that doesn't mean I don't think he's got something, even if just an obnoxious insistence on his own greatness (and any number of older folks at that ceremony last night have been accused of the same thing, starting with smirky orange-pants-suited Prince and matador-writhing-with-faceless-human-horned-creatures Madonna), that tons of people seem to gravitate toward. It also seems hard to escape that without his presence and his snarky tweaking last night, the ceremony would have been more dreadful and funereal than it already was -- a bigger room of needless pretend jewelry-rattling sad sacks the world has rarely seen, and the producers were probably ecstatic that he injected a little life into the goings-on. Even Eric Church, who's supposed to be the savior of country music (?), sang his "Give Me Back My Hometown" like a whiny dirge, or an outtake from One Foot in the Grave, complete with weird grainy footage of roiling European protesters from 1968 or something playing on a jumbo screen in the background. Bizarre.
posted by blucevalo at 1:48 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Rufus Reid won a Grammy. All is well.
posted by thelonius at 1:49 PM on February 9, 2015

Oh dear, did the wrong act win Best of Your Favourite Sub-Gen of Rock and Roll Grammy this year?

Get off my lawn.

Record of the Year
1964 Days of Wine and Roses (Henry Mancini)
1965 The Girl from Ipanema (João Gilberto & Stan Getz)
1966 A Taste of Honey (Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass)
1967 Strangers in the Night (Frank SInatra)
1968 Up, Up and Away (The 5th Dimension )
1969 Mrs. Robinson (Simon & Garr)
1970 Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In (The 5th Dimension)
1971 Bridge over Troubled Water (Simon & Garr)
1972 It's Too Late (Carole King)
1973 The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face (Roberta Flack)
1974 Killing Me Softly With His Song (Roberta Flack)
1975 I Honestly Love You (Olivia Newton-John)

Album of the Year
1964 Barbra Streisand (Barbra Streisand)
1965 Getz/Gilberto (João Gilberto & Stan Getz)
1966 September of My Years (Frank Sinatra)
1967 A Man and His Music (Frank Sinatra )
1968 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Beatles)
1969 By the Time I Get to Phoenix (Glen Campbell)
1970 Blood, Sweat & Tears (Blood, Sweat & Tears)
1971 Bridge over Troubled Water (Simon & Garr)
1972 Tapestry (Carole King)
1973 The Concert for Bangladesh (various)
1974 Innervisions (Stevie Wonder)
1975 Fulfillingness' First Finale (Stevie Wonder)

Song of the Year
1964 Days of Wine and Roses (Henry Mancini)
1965 Hello, Dolly! (Louis Armstrong)
1966 The Shadow of Your Smile (Tony Bennett)
1967 Michelle (The Beatles)
1968 Up, Up and Away (The 5th Dimension)
1969 Little Green Apples (Roger Miller)
1970 Games People Play (Joe South)
1971 Bridge over Troubled Water (Simon & Garr)
1972 You've Got a Friend (Carole King)
1973 The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face (Roberta Flack)
1974 Killing Me Softly With His Song (Roberta Flack)
1975 The Way We Were (Barbra Streisand)

Best New Artist
1964 The Swingle Singers
1965 The Beatles
1966 Tom Jones
1967 [none chosen]
1968 Bobbie Gentry
1969 José Feliciano
1970 Crosby, Stills & Nash
1971 The Carpenters
1972 Carly Simon
1973 America
1974 Bette Midler
1975 Marvin Hamlisch

Each year the American music industry embarrasses itself by nationally televising a 90-minute display of the irrelevant and the ridiculous – the Grammy awards.

It’s invariably a frustrating evening . . . although reasons why it’s so infuriating are obvious – the Grammys’ unconcealable anti-rock bias – even the most cynical would be shocked to learn that none of these artists (and many others) has ever won an award: The Rolling Stones, the Allman Brothers Band, Joan Baez, Rod Stewart, the Who, Eric Clapton, David Bowie, Chuck Berry, Jackson Browne, Bob Dylan, Yes, Leiber & Stoller, Marvin Gaye, Phil Spector, Van Morrison, Smokey Robinson, Elton John, Randy Newman, Richard Perry, the Beach Boys, Diana Ross, the Band, the Byrds, Led Zeppelin and Sam Cooke.

No matter what your musical affiliation, there’s something here to make you slap your forehead in dismay. Several in that list, including the Rolling Stones, have never even been nominated.

-- Dave Marsh, writing in March 1976

posted by Herodios at 1:50 PM on February 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Well, that's mostly 'cause Dave Marsh is a much bigger jerk than Kanye will ever be.
posted by koeselitz at 1:53 PM on February 9, 2015

eh, never mind - Reid was nominated for two, won none.
posted by thelonius at 1:53 PM on February 9, 2015

koeselitz: "Kanye Should Have Taken the Mic From Beck at the Grammys"

Look at that got dang picture. Beck is like

wait kanye

kanye please come back

please wait
posted by boo_radley at 1:54 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

If Deafheaven isn't winning every award for metal every year regardless if they have anything new out then the award means nothing.
posted by xmutex at 1:54 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Even Eric Church, who's supposed to be the savior of country music (?), sang his "Give Me Back My Hometown" like a whiny dirge, or an outtake from One Foot in the Grave, complete with weird grainy footage of roiling European protesters from 1968 or something playing on a jumbo screen in the background.

Lord was that awful. They couldn't have got Sturgill instead?
posted by sallybrown at 1:56 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Beck is like

But Beck always looks like that.

Well, that's mostly 'cause Dave Marsh is a much bigger jerk than Kanye will ever be.

What is?
 
posted by Herodios at 1:57 PM on February 9, 2015

Caring about the Grammys is maybe the least metal thing imaginable.

That may be true, but it's nice of the Grammys to show exactly why.

Fuck 'em.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 2:06 PM on February 9, 2015

rocket88: Kanye is certainly talented but his inability to understand that musical tastes are subjective and his poor (nonexistent) impulse control is getting a little annoying.

WINNA WINNA CHICKEN FUCKING DINNA!
posted by IAmBroom at 2:06 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

And all because Kanye is a bit impolite.

Eh, I think if you go out and say that your wife was robbed and obviously should have won, after already making a big spectacle about it before, you shouldn't be surprised if people aren't very impressed at your opinions.
posted by smackfu at 2:15 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

your wife

Errrrrrrr
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:18 PM on February 9, 2015 [29 favorites]

Eh, I think if you go out and say that your wife was robbed and obviously should have won...

Beyonce is not Kanye West's wife.
posted by sparklemotion at 2:19 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Beyonce legally married Watch the Throne in 2012 wake up sheeple
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:21 PM on February 9, 2015 [20 favorites]

The sheer bile and unremitting hatred people display whenever his name is mentioned is stunning to me sometimes. It just goes to show that people need something to hate.

Get it together, man. Some people in the thread don't like Kanye - it's not a big deal.
posted by crank at 2:25 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

*shrugs*

*wins Grammy*
posted by turbid dahlia at 2:25 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

beck scrapped an album after hearing yeezus and kanye put a beck reference on his first album. they seem to respect each others work in general.
posted by nadawi at 2:27 PM on February 9, 2015 [14 favorites]

If Kanye and Jay-Z got married then Beyonce could be his wife-in-law.
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 2:27 PM on February 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

if we're talking about watch the throne and beyonce's husband, can i just say that his verse on "that's my bitch" is one of the sweetest things around?
posted by nadawi at 2:29 PM on February 9, 2015

If anyone could become the matriarch of a polyandrous family of musical genius fabulousness...
posted by sallybrown at 2:29 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

did the wrong act win Best of Your Favourite Sub-Gen of Rock and Roll Grammy this year?

Damn right. Babymetal was fucking robbed.
posted by octobersurprise at 2:32 PM on February 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

THOSE "BABYS" IS ACTUALLY THE SECOND WTT RECORD PERSONIFIED WELCOME TO THE NEXT LEVEL OF "ILLUMINATION" I've said too much
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:32 PM on February 9, 2015

Damn right. Babymetal was fucking robbed.

The metal is still in danger.
posted by thefoxgod at 2:41 PM on February 9, 2015

Ashley Ford on twitter:

...Again. Critique Yeezy all day long. But watch your language. And think about why it's so satisfying for you to come for him particularly. Kanye is not more narcissist than Bono, Sean Penn, Leonardo DiCaprio, or another fifty famous white dudes. He's an unfamiliar narcissist. I'm not saying if you don't like Kanye then you don't have the ability to "get him". That's bullshit. Every artist ain't for everybody. BUT I think a lot of people don't like Kanye because he gave himself--a black man--permission to be a narcissist. Without your approval....Here's a list of words that are suspect when you're critiquing Kanye West: Idiot, Moron, Talentless, Ungrateful, Audacious, and Fraud. Those words indicate that you or "the right people" haven't given him permission to feel how he feels about himself & artists HE respects. If you've seen me tweet that it's okay for Kanye to undercut someone else's moment at an award ceremony, please send me that tweet. Otherwise, don't argue with me about things I haven't said. Cool? Cool.

Not a new sentiment, but this keeps coming up and she articulates my own frustrations well.
posted by naju at 2:42 PM on February 9, 2015 [33 favorites]

Bono, Penn, DiCaprio, and 50 other famous white dudes don't make a habit out of making awards show moments honoring others all about their own opinions by literally running up on the stage uninvited.

Kanye is an asshole who earns his criticism and he should never be given a seat anywhere near the stage again because he simply can't behave like an adult at these shows.

/likes his music.
posted by Drinky Die at 2:46 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Yeah, that's what pop music is for, behaving like an adult.
posted by Errant at 2:51 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Yes, they are all just like Kanye. And yet literally every other human being involved seems to have no impulse control problems with randomly running on the stage to whine about the awards.
posted by Drinky Die at 2:53 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Well, there was that time with Jarvis Cocker.
posted by Flashman at 2:56 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Here's a list of words that are suspect when you're critiquing Kanye West: Idiot, Moron, Talentless, Ungrateful, Audacious, and Fraud.

Pretty sure these words are regularly applied to Sean Penn, Bono, Sting, and their ilk...
posted by crank at 2:56 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Sorry to keep quoting twitter, but my follow-up reaction is to quote a friend: "People who don't realize Kanye is literally always fucking with everyone make my head hurt". It just feels hopelessly out of touch to not realize that this is all part of the fun... for everyone! It generates the water cooler talk, everyone involved was laughing, the press is dissecting the hell out of it, Kanye is getting his troll on like he has dozens of times before. What's the problem. An awards show isn't church, for gods sake.
posted by naju at 2:57 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

and he should never be given a seat anywhere near the stage again

it's almost as if the powers that be like to use him for the spectacle of it...before people realized they still weren't televising the rap awards people thought they assigned him that seat so he'd run up on iggy should she win.
posted by nadawi at 2:57 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

naju: "An awards show isn't church, for gods sake."

thanks for ruining the pasties show, jerk.

you know, the pastor of the year award show
posted by boo_radley at 2:58 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Bono, Penn, DiCaprio, and 50 other famous white dudes don't make a habit out of making awards show moments honoring others all about their own opinions by literally running up on the stage uninvited.

I'd rather someone who would run on stage at an awards show than someone who would tie their girlfriend to a chair and beat her bloody (not that you suggested otherwise, just...if there are levels of assholishness, poor manners is not the highest rung).

Speaking of, it was far more grotesque to see Eminem take home a prize and Chris Brown in the audience as the Grammys moralized about how no one should stand for sexual violence than it was to see Kanye's reprise.
posted by sallybrown at 2:59 PM on February 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

how do they not televise the rap award by the way haha man the grammys
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:59 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

oh and kanye was the most tweeted grammy related thing last night - the organizers should be sending him a fruit basket for giving us something other than the rihanna dress meme.
posted by nadawi at 3:00 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

If Deafheaven isn't winning every award for metal every year regardless if they have anything new out then the award means nothing.

Replace Deafheaven with Agalloch and I'd agree with you.

As for Kanye, who cares? This is the sort of thing which makes dry award shows at least slightly interesting and it boosts the visibility of whatever artist he interrupts.

I only hope he ups the ante the next time Beyonce doesn't win. Maybe pull a Charlie Rich and light something on fire.
posted by honestcoyote at 3:00 PM on February 9, 2015

Just coming here to say I've never heard a Kanye West song in my life.

So... you haven't seen any TV ads or movie trailers in the last 5 years?
posted by kmz at 3:01 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

What I find annoying about the Kanye situation is that's another man speaking up "for" a woman

Is that really what he did? He didn't just find a quick way to make the show and the talk and the noise more about him than the winners or the music or people who dressed funny?
posted by dilettante at 3:02 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

"People who don't realize Kanye is literally always fucking with everyone make my head hurt".

No, I mean people realize he is a troll. It's just that trolling isn't universally regarded as "fun." It didn't look to me like Taylor Swift was having fun back in the day when Kanye yanked the microphone out of her hand and ranted about how she shouldn't have won the award.

(And I care about that because I have empathy and I don't like seeing someone publicly humiliate another person at a moment that should be one of the best in their lives. But hey, a second of entertainment!)
posted by Drinky Die at 3:03 PM on February 9, 2015 [16 favorites]

i guess it could be a coincidence that the two times he did this on such a huge stage it was over beyonce but it seems at least at first blush that her being denied what he feels is owed to her is something that gets stuck in his craw. i sort of wonder if she's a replacement for the lost motherly energy in his life.
posted by nadawi at 3:05 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Drinky Die: “ It didn't look to me like Taylor Swift was having fun back in the day when Kanye yanked the microphone out of her hand and ranted about how she shouldn't have won the award.”

Yeah, and his career was almost destroyed by that moment – his new album scrapped, his tour cancelled.

So maybe – just maybe – he's been punished enough for that already.
posted by koeselitz at 3:05 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

And yet he pretty much just did it again so no?
posted by Drinky Die at 3:06 PM on February 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

t-swift is doing just fine - she managed to spin that to the max because people will always defend the pure sweet blonde girl against the angry drunk black man - plus they've made up over it many times, including last night.
posted by nadawi at 3:07 PM on February 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

I'm a huge fan of Tenacious D going back to the late 1990s when they were doing open mics at Largo and people traded bootlegs of their shows online, but I was still flabbergasted to hear they won a grammy in the main Metal category and not the comedy one. I like this cover and it's well done, but I don't think it's Grammy-winning-level.
posted by mathowie at 3:07 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I think it's pretty clear that neither Beck nor Taylor Swift care (anymore), why do so many people care on their behalf?
posted by girlmightlive at 3:08 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Drinky Die: “And yet he pretty much just did it again so no?”

Why does it annoy you so much? It clearly didn't annoy Beck – in fact, he seems to be mostly disappointed that Kanye turned around and didn't say anything. And I can totally appreciate where Beck's coming from on that.
posted by koeselitz at 3:09 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

I wish Kanye had interrupted Beck, but that's just because I fucking hate Beck.

Actually, I wish Kanye had interrupted Beck and Tenacious D. And then himself. And then they accidentally gave all of the awards to Rich Homie Quan, Rae Sremmurd and Dej Loaf, because they made the only new commercially available music I wanted to hear in 2014.
posted by still bill at 3:09 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Iron Maiden t-shirts everywhere are flying at half-mast today.

Unfortunately, many of them look like my dad, which means more than enough manboob and pot belly to go around.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 3:10 PM on February 9, 2015

Wake me up when Taylor Swift wins "best metal performance" because she's made of steel with a platinum layer to reduce the impact that all of this crap has on her.

\nTn/
posted by nfalkner at 3:11 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Okay guys you are right it is totally cool to interrupt and publicly humiliate people when they are being honored. I mean, Taylor Swift didn't set up a permanent lifelong vendetta or go broke so clearly anybody being critical of a man yanking a microphone out of her hand to insult her is just racist or something.

Jebus, this site sometimes.
posted by Drinky Die at 3:12 PM on February 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

Eh, I think if you go out and say that your wife was robbed and obviously should have won...

Beyonce is not Kanye West's wife.

Kanye West WISHES Beyonce was his wife, if his constant whinging on her behalf is anything to go on.
posted by bitter-girl.com at 3:14 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I didn't watch the Grammys but I had to google today to see what Gaga wore and I AM DISAPPOINT.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:18 PM on February 9, 2015

what do you guys think of odd future
posted by Awful Peice of Crap at 3:20 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I mean, it goes further than trolling - it's his art - arguably, the avant form that Kanye is working in is radical performance/assertion of black narcissism as a correction. That 99% of people don't remotely get his project, or that it even is conscious on any level, just shows how much he's tapped into something we desperately need.
posted by naju at 3:20 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

the way that people hold on to weird grudges from the vmas (an award show filled to the brim with people jumping on stage) from 6 years is pretty head shaking. also, kanye didn't actually do anything to beck - jump up, made a funny face that made everyone laugh and jumped down. really, if there is disrespect that happened it was during an after party interview with e!, which is obviously a bastion of respectability - an interview that he all but walked back a few hours later.
posted by nadawi at 3:20 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

feckless fecal fear mongering - she was there in a jazz/standards capacity last night, not as artpop gaga.
posted by nadawi at 3:20 PM on February 9, 2015

Tenacious D are like the most metal possible band made up of camp counselors. Which is great. But, y'know, Steel Panther had an album last year too.
posted by batfish at 3:23 PM on February 9, 2015

Yeah I know, nadawi, I was just hoping she'd show up in a dress made out of trumpets or something.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:23 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

during an after party interview with e!

Conducted by his sister-in-law, if I'm watching the video correctly.
posted by Clustercuss at 3:25 PM on February 9, 2015

The cover thing clearly doesn't matter. Aphex Twin won a Grammy for a cover of an Aphex Twin album.

Awards are marketing. Nothing else. They reflect the True Nature of whatever they're nominally nominating only as far as marketing ever does - only less so, because they're generally incoherent and you can't really tell what they're trying to sell this year. This has been true of any awards in any sector I've ever had any contact with, and like Tinkerbell, Satan and sport. if they don't directly affect your career once you stop caring about them they cease to matter.

Also, has Beck ever been sarcastic about anything? My Beck period, while intense, petered out quite suddenly (I think it was halfway through listening to Midnite Vultures for the first and penultimate time. You know that switch where suddenly you can't remember a single reason why you're doing something?), and apart from having him on my Scientology watch list I haven't really been paying attention. But I don't remember him having a bad word to say about anyone.
posted by Devonian at 3:28 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Seems like an appropriate thread to share one of my favorite songs.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 3:30 PM on February 9, 2015

to my knowledge i've never heard beck be sarcastic, no. he comes across as too smart for the crowd, but always very sincere if he's expressing an opinion.

also, i misspoke - kanye's interview was et, not e!
posted by nadawi at 3:32 PM on February 9, 2015

Remember when we were talking about metal?

Good times.
posted by gwint at 3:32 PM on February 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

Kanye sayeth: "Beck needs to respect artistry, and he should have given his award to Beyoncé..."

Hahahaha. It's not like I'ma #1 Beck fan, but in no universe is Beyonce more of an "artist" than Beck. Literally raised by artists.

Beck is also--literally!--a chinless milquetoast, for beckoning on Kanye's jackassery (credit: Obama). He probably would've relinquished the award if Kanye would've pressured him on stage. And If he really thought she deserved it more, like he says, then it would be easy to give her the award.
posted by dgaicun at 3:34 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Beck is probably one of the more chill artists in the crowd last night. He seems likeable. He genuinely seemed confused when he won. I think he was as surprised as anyone else. He probably did think Beyonce deserved it much more than he did.
posted by naju at 3:34 PM on February 9, 2015

Haters gonna hate, shake it off!
posted by Pendragon at 3:35 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

wait! ugh. so many after party interviews. it was e! not et! and yes, one of the people conducting the after show is a kardashian.
posted by nadawi at 3:35 PM on February 9, 2015

thread needs more of this
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:36 PM on February 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Aaaand the award for the most ironic prescience in an FPP goes to Clustercuss for the very first eight words in this very thread - "It got lost in the Kanye vs. Beck hoopla...."
posted by Devonian at 3:38 PM on February 9, 2015 [18 favorites]

As far as genres go, I think both (non-pop) rap and (non-pop) metal will be happy to stay away from the Grammys limelight. They're both better off in a dialogue with listeners who understand the form and intent. Not in a dialogue with the PR machine.
posted by naju at 3:38 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

He probably would've relinquished the award if Kanye would've pressured him on stage. And If he really thought she deserved it more, like he says, then it would be easy to give her the award.

Play this out in your head: Kanye pressured Beck on stage to hand over the award. Beck caves.

What the hell is Beyonce supposed to do with that? Accept it? Does anyone think she'd come out looking better for that? Does Kanye honestly think that?

And no, I don't think Kanye's all an act. I think he sincerely believes that he's doing the right thing when he pulls this shit. And it is shit.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 3:46 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

More 2014 metal:

Baby Metal

The Dagger

Satan's Satyrs

Scott Walker and Sun O)))
posted by batfish at 4:00 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I highly recommend Pallbearer's Foundations of Burden. "The Ghost I Used to Be"
posted by naju at 4:14 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Oh wow, it made a lot more sense when I thought they were married! My bad.
posted by smackfu at 4:30 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

If you think there's one kind of metal, I invite you to explore http://mapofmetal.com/
posted by asfuller at 4:42 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Beck's Popularity on Spotify Is Up 524% After Grammy Win and Kanye Kerfuffle

posted by zutalors! at 4:43 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Awards are marketing

Although, if you look at Grammy winners down through the ages, they're pretty conspicuously not the biggest selling artists of the moment (fairly often they're given to people who were popular a generation ago). There'd be a lot less griping about the awards if they were pure marketing; nobody gives a hoot about the People's Choice Award because it's obvious that the winner is just the one with the most committed fans.

The problem with awards like The Grammys is that they actually do kinda take themselves seriously about picking "the best." It's just that--shockingly--sometimes not everyone agrees what music is better than other music.
posted by yoink at 4:45 PM on February 9, 2015

Awards are marketing

if Kanye isn't objecting to you winning a Grammy, you're the product.
posted by mullacc at 4:58 PM on February 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Kanye sayeth: "Beck needs to respect artistry, and he should have given his award to Beyoncé..."

At ... the Grammies. Artistry. Respect. ... Hrm.

It has to be performance art, and if it's not, it's rather depressing.

I do relish the stage-rush, and in the age of post-9/11-endless-war-on-terrorism, entertainment celebrities are about the only people in the world who can do it.

Then to consider that in 45 years we've gone from Miss World protest to Kanye bumrushing the MTV Grammies, well that's fairly depressing too, I guess, even if it is rather incomprehensible performance art and/or protest at the unequal treatment that black performers receive.

industry circlejerk that deserves to be ignored by everyone else

I'm with you. The notion of "artistry" and "award" seem rather incompatible to me, but we are clearly in the minority. What makes me laugh are the people who say that the Grammies are stupid, but then watch the Oscars. Both are probably decided by rich, white, men, no? And they are good at deciding .. what now?

And if that was Kanye's point, he'd be better off saying that outright.

I believe that Oscar voters are 77 percent male and 94 percent white. Blacks are 2 percent. Latinos are 2 percent.

What are the racial/sex demographics for Grammy voters? Why doesn't anyone ask?
posted by mrgrimm at 5:26 PM on February 9, 2015

if you look at Grammy winners down through the ages, they're pretty conspicuously not the biggest selling artists of the moment (fairly often they're given to people who were popular a generation ago).

Exactly. The winners are older and whiter.
posted by mrgrimm at 5:27 PM on February 9, 2015

More the Grannies, amirite?

(yeah, time for bed, Devonian)
posted by Devonian at 6:01 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Herodios, I sincerely hope you were not dissing The Swingle Singers there.
posted by queensissy at 6:05 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Scott Walker and Sun O)))

...would have been a great record without Scott Walker's painful histrionic warbling. He's like the Leonard Cohen of people who shout into buckets.
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:08 PM on February 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Best metal album of 2014 was Heathen by Thou k thnx bye
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:10 PM on February 9, 2015

I already wrote about some of this a couple weeks ago in a different thread.

I do NOT get how or why giving a shit about the grammys became a thing in hip-hop (or really anywhere else). Even some early Odd Future/Tyler stuff he talks about wanting one while at the same time lambasting middle aged rappers for being materialistic and out of touch. Like, I really don't get it. It makes a sound in my head like a broken fax machine when I try to think about it.

Hip hop threads on metafilter are not always great,
and the great gulf between the "No thanks, I like *real* music/Look at these white people doing an acoustic cover of some old dre and snoop song/Kitty Pryde is the best rapper ever" and the Cult of Kanye gets really divisive.

Look, Kanye has a lot of talent. He's got a good voice (for rapping, he can't sing, or at least not to his standards which is why he uses autotune -- there might be some additional explanations but thats the big one). He's a decent beatmaker, but not wholly original. He's a good producer in the sense that he knows how to put albums together and what goes where and how.
Also, he can be funny, he's more clever than the haters give him credit for, ("African-American express card" was pretty funny), the same way that his wife is smarter than the haters give her credit for.
I think his lyrics are atrociously bad, the only thing that I've ever agreed with The Needle Drop on is that Kanye songs are really only interesting if you find Kanye interesting. Because that is what they are all about.
I don't have that kind of investment in him, but I certainly understand why people like the guy.

But,
His music to me is like nails on a fucking blackboard. I can't actually explain what the quality of it that does that, but I couldn't even make it through the college dropout when it was new, and thats never improved (the only other band that has had such an immediate reaction for me was the first time I heard/saw "Creep" by Radiohead, and I just went "i will hate everything this band ever does forever and ever").

Tastes change, and I like hip-hop an awful lot, so I do go back and check stuff out that I've passed on before, kinda same reaction each time.
His lyrics and delivery just sound wishy-washy and corny and simplistic and shallow and self-centered the way that a baby is self-centered. Like, for all his artsyness and desire to have a message or make a statement, I don't think we'll ever see anything like "The Equinox" come out of him, because I don't think he is capable of it.

And all of that is fine.
He's not for me, but he obviously is massively popular.

However, the guy is a raging asshole in public. Yeah, some of that is the media, some of that is his persona (all rappers have personas).
So here is the question: if its all an act, and he acts like an asshole, and people don't like him, but ITS ALL AN ACT, does it matter? Was it cool when Joaquin Phoenix faked a mental illness as a publicity stunt? I don't think so. In fact, I think it makes him a huge asshole. But he's still a capable actor, and that doesn't make his movies bad (though I've got some opinions on that too...). It just makes him a dick. And calling Kanye a dick for acting like a dick is not racist (ignorant, thug, talentless, etc most def has an undertone -- I get that), just like saying Phoenix is a dick is not racist. Its being called on behavior that would make people think he's a dick.

So this is the crux, this is what I do not understand about Kanye fans:
Why is it so hard to accept that you can love someones artistic and creative output, but also not like the way they act?
Why is it so hard to reconcile that someone who is good at expressing his angst and complicated internal drama in such a resounding way might actually be lacking in some other graces?
Why is it not possible for someone to be a responsible and loving and expressive person personally and a raging fucking jackass in public.
Why does he have to be all things to all people?

Bukowski, Axl Rose, Polanski, Ted Fucking Nugent, Michael Jackson, and whoever you're thinking of right now, have all said and done reprehensible fucking things. You can ignore their persona, you can dislike it, or think that its all just GREAT AND YOU HAVE NO OBLIGATION TO TIE THAT TO THEIR CREATIVE OUTPUT. Its not 100%, its not all great or terrible.

If I suddenly get "cat scratch fever" stuck in my head, it doesn't mean I'm suddenly some crossbow-hunting neanderthal arch-conservative fuckwit.

And if I don't like Kanyes music or his actions does not mean that I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about.
I think Power is a great beat.
I'd rather gouge my own eyes out than listen to all of MBDTF.
YMMV.
posted by lkc at 6:24 PM on February 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Kanye West had the greatest troll moment of the whole George W. Bush administration. No end of props for that moment alone.

Metal artists should just refuse Grammy awards until the Grammys stop pretending that they have any standing to judge the best metal album of any given year.
posted by graymouser at 6:32 PM on February 9, 2015

"Hi, I've worked on productions, videos, costumes, sets, and what-not for such nobodies as Madonna, Cher, David Bowie, TV on the Radio, Missy Elliot, The Beastie Boys, etc etc.. you're a.. database programmer?"

This comment should have been deleted, but since it wasn't I'll respond. It's nice that you've let us all know that you're a somebody, good for you, but I've seen spent a little time on MeFi Music and have heard koeselitz playing piano and guess what--he's a fine musician. So I think his opinion on music means something. You don't just magically gain knowledge of music through osmosis, even if the musicians you hang around with are very big names.
posted by MattMangels at 6:52 PM on February 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

the people who say that the Grammies are stupid, but then watch the Oscars

Really, both are entirely inadequate judges of their mediums and both are more or less entertaining (YMMV) televised spectacles. It's clothes, people, and skits. Expect anything more from either and disappointment looms.
posted by octobersurprise at 6:58 PM on February 9, 2015

Bukowski, Axl Rose, Polanski, Ted Fucking Nugent, Michael Jackson

The greatest band ever? Bukowski could focus mainly on writing, Polanski on organizing shows -- between the two of them during concerts rough percussion would be a reasonable goal -- with Rose and Jackson on vocals while Nugent shreds.
posted by mr. digits at 7:18 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

the real question that i still can't find the answer to is who is this unfortunate soul who got tangled up in the construction zones heading to the awards

That would be Joy Villa. I appeared in one of her music videos as the Mystery Man. I disappear!
posted by Jawn at 7:25 PM on February 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

The greatest band ever? Bukowski could focus mainly on writing, Polanski on organizing shows -- between the two of them during concerts rough percussion would be a reasonable goal -- with Rose and Jackson on vocals while Nugent shreds.

And just think of the tour stories! ...wait
posted by naju at 7:26 PM on February 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

The symphony I sing with won a Grammy! (Best contemporary classical performance, Beyond Ocean, John Luther Adams. well technically Adams won it but they commissioned it and recorded it so there.) An album I sang on was even nominated for one*, for Best Producer, but it didn't win.

Apparently the classical Grammies are handed out in a closet at 10:30 in the morning on the day of, and everyone gets a Molson Ice and a tin of anchovies, and then they all stand outside the REAL Grammies and watch them on TV. I exaggerate but not by much.

*which totally makes me a Grammy-nominated singer amirite
posted by KathrynT at 11:51 PM on February 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

Ok so I totally bought the Scott Walker / Sun O))) album because I love Sun O))) and...uhh...I really want to like it. The lyrics are very interesting, I think? And the credits list a "bullwhip technician". That's gotta count for something, right?

They should have supergrouped and gotten Wino to do the vocals for Walker's avant-darke songs
posted by Doleful Creature at 12:15 AM on February 10, 2015

Here's the thing about the Taylor Swift incident. Ms. Swift was accepting the Grammy for Female Video of the year. That was the year of Beyonce's Single Ladies video. I'm pretty sure that the majority of you can reach back in your memories and pull up some images from the Single Ladies video. I don't think very many of you could do the same for the You Belong With Me video. It's possible that Taylor Swift's video was actually better or more popular or whatever weird metric the Grammies use to decide who wins but I doubt it. Kanye should not have gone on stage and interrupted Taylor Swift but part of his trolling routine seems to be to tell the inconvenient truth.
posted by rdr at 5:11 AM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

I came in here to watch white people get mad at kanye west.

Yeah, word.

Hip hop threads on metafilter are not always great,

Hip-hop threads on Metafilter are usually pretty good, much better than they used to be. Kanye threads, on the other hand, are often shitty.

One possible interpretation: while people who are proud to know nothing about hip-hop mostly stay away from hip-hop threads, this is not the case with Yeezy ones.
posted by box at 5:12 AM on February 10, 2015 [6 favorites]

Also:

in no universe is Beyonce more of an "artist" than Beck.

This seems overstated. Consider, for example, the nine muses of classical mythology:

Calliope (epic poetry) - Neither one of them is really a concept-album type. Let's call this a draw.

Clio (history) - Again, probably a wash.

Euterpe (flutes and lyric poetry) - Beck's not a bad lyricist, but Beyonce's a more lyrical one.

Thalia (comedy and pastoral poetry) - Beyonce's not that funny, and she's not particularly into nature. This one goes to Beck.

Melpomene (tragedy) - Just so nobody will accuse me of stacking the deck, let's give this one to Beck.

Terpsichore (dance) - Come on. Beyonce.

Erato (love poetry) - Beyonce? Beyonce.

Polyhymnia (sacred poetry) - Beck's a Scientologist. Beyonce Beyonce Beyonce!

Urania (astronomy) - Astronomy? How'd that get in here? Uh, Beck, I guess?

So, Beck gets Thalia, Melpomene and Urania, and Beyonce gets Euterpe, Terpsichore, Erato and Polyrhymnia. Four to three, Beyonce.
posted by box at 5:23 AM on February 10, 2015 [8 favorites]

Beck and Beyoncé just seem so apples and oranges to me. They've never really inhabited the same cultural space. At least Taylor Swift and Beyoncé were both on Top 40 at around the same time, but even then...

All the fulmination over the Grammies just seems so silly. By way of comparison, it's common knowledge that many of the greatest filmmakers never won a proper Oscar, or that they only get consolation Oscars for later, less worthy work. Hitchcock's legacy as a filmmaker towers over the fact that he never won a real Oscar. Nobody's blood pressure rises over what awards he did or didn't win. Nobody thinks he's that powerless.
posted by Sticherbeast at 5:37 AM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

I came in here to watch white people get mad at kanye west.
posted by hal_c_on at 3:54 AM on February 10 [+] [!]


I can oblige you. Guy's a dick.
posted by Trochanter at 6:15 AM on February 10, 2015 [6 favorites]

So within days of Bob Mould tearing down the Letterman studio, the Grammys are on TV and pretending to talk about metal? The only metal on that broadcast was the gold leaf on the award. Boom! Bless their hearts.
posted by wenestvedt at 6:23 AM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

i watched some of the non-televised awards, which were pretty interesting actually - so much shade thrown at the mainstream music industry and the award ceremony across the street. also my favorite part (besides the eye rolls at the big stars who couldn't even send an underling to accept the award, and john waters presenting) was when the winner of jazz ensemble started his speech by thanking chick corea for not releasing an ensemble record (as he had won for improvised and instrumental moments earlier).

also, here are instances where kanye felt someone else deserved his award.
posted by nadawi at 6:50 AM on February 10, 2015 [7 favorites]

Here is what Kanye West's mother, Donda West, wrote about her son's award ceremony behavior before she passed away, from an earlier comment here:

"It's been said that Kanye is a creative genius. With that, I agree. It's evidenced in his music, designing, and directing. Of course, the world knows him best thus far for his music. But he pours his heart into everything he does. And with that passion I spoke of, he expresses himself in multiple ways. The same passion he has when he creates his music or draws a picture is the passion he has when he makes such statements as "George Bush doesn't care about black people" or "I should have won that award." It's passion. And I would never stymie that.

". . . . So when he went up on that stage and said what he said, I understood. That was not my proudest moment -- not by far. But I understood.

"Why sit there, smile, and applaud when you really feel like you were robbed. I hate false humility. I don't go for it. There's a lot to be said for being a gracious loser, but my philosophy has always been "Show me a good loser and I'll show you a loser." While it's prudent and appropriate to be silent sometimes -- some things are indeed better left unsaid -- being honest and open about how you feel is not all bad. I didn't like Kanye making the comments he did, I didn't applaud it, I didn't find it amusing. But I understood.

. . . .

"I suppose if Kanye won and someone came up onstage and went off, I would have a problem with it. But if they really felt they were better than Kanye, I would honor their feelings. We're dealing with human emotions. Real, raw, honest human emotions."

Note that West's mom wrote this in 2007, so the current Grammy kerfluffle and West's 2009 interruption of Taylor Swift's MTV acceptance had yet to occur.

The whole quote is good to read -- she talks about how West developed a sense of self at an early age, identity, her high expectations for him as a child, his desire to succeed, etc. She sounds pretty wonderful.

I do think West is really funny and that this was a really funny moment in the broadcast. And I think Beck's reaction could not have been more perfect, both during and afterwards.

FWIW, Morning Phase has sold 300,000 copies so far, and Beyonce is reported at over 5 million. It's just weird, and only explained by the splitting of the vote and the proliferation of old white male dudes as the voters. It's weird to have such a prestigious award be so out of touch with real people. West isn't wrong about that.
posted by onlyconnect at 8:01 AM on February 10, 2015 [8 favorites]

thank you for posting that donda west quote! i've been looking for it all morning!
posted by nadawi at 8:18 AM on February 10, 2015

I came in here to watch white people get mad at kanye west.

I came for the casual accusations of racism.
posted by seymourScagnetti at 8:55 AM on February 10, 2015 [12 favorites]

What on earth has Kanye done that even compares to Polanski or "Ted Fucking Nugent"? Seriously? That's where the claims of hyperbolic hate come from.
posted by zutalors! at 9:00 AM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

FWIW, Morning Phase has sold 300,000 copies so far, and Beyonce is reported at over 5 million. It's just weird

Wait...are we supposed to be mad that the Grammys do or don't just go to whoever's moving the most units?
posted by yoink at 9:06 AM on February 10, 2015 [4 favorites]

zutalors!: What on earth has Kanye done that even compares to Polanski or "Ted Fucking Nugent"? Seriously? That's where the claims of hyperbolic hate come from.

Pretty sure being unliked by many is pretty comparable.

If you want a more meaningful comparison, clarify your question.
posted by IAmBroom at 9:12 AM on February 10, 2015

part of the issue is that when people pull to find other celebrities to compare kanye to they always seem to end up grabbing at rapists and women beaters, which i would think would show how out of bounds the hate is for what he's done, but i guess not everyone sees it that way.
posted by nadawi at 9:25 AM on February 10, 2015 [8 favorites]

I'm responding to the comparison made above that compared Kanye to a child rapist and a disgusting racist who has encouraged violence against the President.

Also who says Kanye is "unliked by many"? He's pretty popular. In general, I'm responding to the comment that said people can like Kanye's music but not like his behavior (which is true). But we can also like his music and like his behavior and that doesn't make us Kanye sheep or something, and it's a much less complicated position than Polanski.

Interrupting at awards shows is like...really not a big deal, man. And for all the people saying he should be banned from awards shows forever - clearly that's not going to happen, the buzz he creates is huge. People say "Imma let you finish" these days without even recognizing the context/origin for that comment.
posted by zutalors! at 9:26 AM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

On a side note, I haven't seen any reaction shots of TSwift when the Beck thing happened - how could there not have been cameras on her?
posted by zutalors! at 9:38 AM on February 10, 2015

I'm responding to the comparison made above that compared Kanye to a child rapist and a disgusting racist who has encouraged violence against the President.

FWIW, nobody actually "compared" Kanye to Nugent or Polanski in the sense of "suggested what he did was as bad as that." Rather, the person who (rather late in this thread) brought up Polanski, Nugent, Bukowski et al. was using them as extreme cases to make the point that we can still admire the art even if we dislike the artist. In other words, they were saying that thinking Kanye is a bit of a jackass at times is not the same thing as denying his musical sophistication and significance.
posted by yoink at 9:38 AM on February 10, 2015

It was pretty much "here are some other people who are also publicly assholes or reprehensible" and mentioned those people (Polanski, Nugent etc). It's not just an extreme comparison it's a pretty wildly off base one.

Like nadawi said, similar to my comment:

part of the issue is that when people pull to find other celebrities to compare kanye to they always seem to end up grabbing at rapists and women beaters, which i would think would show how out of bounds the hate is for what he's done, but i guess not everyone sees it that way.
posted by zutalors! at 9:43 AM on February 10, 2015

It was pretty much "here are some other people who are also publicly assholes or reprehensible" and mentioned those people (Polanski, Nugent etc).

You do realize the comment is right there, still perfectly accessible in the thread, right?

It's a long comment about our ability to differentiate between disliking the artist and liking the art. It nowhere says or implies that Kanye is morally equivalent to Polanski or Nugent (or that Nugent is the equivalent of Bukowski or Polanski or Michael Jackson or whomever). Indeed it tosses in "or whoever you're thinking about right now"; it's pretty clear that the point is a general one about the ability to distinguish between "admirable artist" and "unlikeable person" and not an attempt to claim that Kanye is a rapist or a gun nut.

I can understand that it's convenient to misread it as saying that because it gives you a nice straw man with which to paint people who disagree with you (I do like the way this late-breaking comment is now being held up as what everyone in this thread who disapproves of Kanye has been saying all along too), but I think it would be more honest to just accept that pretty much nobody is saying KANYE IS WORSE THAN HITLER. Some people think he's a bit of a loudmouth jackass, and some don't.
posted by yoink at 10:19 AM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

It's not a straw man, it's my good faith reading, other people seem to be reading in the same context, and it's not even an attack on that comment, but a general comment on how when talking about Kanye's behavior people reach for the worst of celebrity behavior, actual criminal behavior. I'm not the only person who mader that point. And yes I read the comment again. Also I never said everyone in this thread was saying all along, my comments are here to read, too.
posted by zutalors! at 10:24 AM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Can we compare Kanye to Bono in terms of self-absorbed wankery then?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:30 AM on February 10, 2015

Surely if you want to reach for an "abrasive jackass" comparison for Kanye, you'd go to someone like Liam Gallagher or Russell Brand, not Ted Nugent or Roman Polanski.
posted by KathrynT at 10:31 AM on February 10, 2015 [4 favorites]

a general comment on how when talking about Kanye's behavior people reach for the worst of celebrity behavior, actual criminal behavior

Which literally no one in this thread has done. I just CTRL-F'd my way through the whole thread searching on "Kanye." There is not a single comment in this thread saying that Kanye's behavior makes him similar to some putative "actual criminal" or suggesting that his behavior amounts to "criminal" behavior. There are criticisms of his music and suggestions that he behaves like a jerk at times. That's it.

The comment that mentions Polanski et. al offers this actual opinion of Kanye: that he is a "raging asshole" and is "acting like a dick." That is pretty clearly not a suggestion that he's engaging in "criminal" behavior.
posted by yoink at 10:34 AM on February 10, 2015

It nowhere says or implies that Kanye is morally equivalent to Polanski or Nugent (or that Nugent is the equivalent of Bukowski or Polanski or Michael Jackson or whomever).

Then why go to those examples?
posted by kmz at 10:34 AM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Surely if you want to reach for an "abrasive jackass" comparison for Kanye, you'd go to someone like Liam Gallagher or Russell Brand, not Ted Nugent or Roman Polanski.

Indeed you would. If you read the comment, it's clear that when lkc refers to Polanski, Bukowski, Nugent and Michael Jackson they are not trying to find good analogues for Kanye's behavior (the claim isn't "Kanye is morally equivalent to....") they are trying to find extreme limit cases to demonstrate the point that we can separate the moral status of the artist from our opinion of the art even in cases where the artist is much more morally objectionable than Kanye.
posted by yoink at 10:37 AM on February 10, 2015

yoink, you're the only one using the phrase "morally equivalent" yet you keep quoting it like someone said it. That comment is representative of a general trend, on this here page and also elsewhere, of comparing Kanye's behavior to that of criminals.

Also, i get the point about "separate the artist from their actions" but I think that comment condescended to Kanye fans that we must have some sort of blind spot to clearly reprehensible behavior because they like his music. But people can like the music and also not be all that bothered by his rushing the stage. I just don't think that's as much of an issue as liking Polanski and liking his child rape. In that case it's much more complex, which is why it's not a good comparison.
posted by zutalors! at 10:47 AM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

I also don't know why you're insisting people aren't reading the comment. We're getting a different reading than you. It's not even your comment.
posted by zutalors! at 10:48 AM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

blucevalo: without his presence and his snarky tweaking last night, the ceremony would have been more dreadful and funereal than it already was -- a bigger room of needless pretend jewelry-rattling sad sacks the world has rarely seen, and the producers were probably ecstatic that he injected a little life into the goings-on.

OK, time for my boilerplate comment about popular entertainment awards shows. They're really just another industry award ceremonies, not inherently different from the HVAC Systems Marketers Association award dinner, save for (probably) having a better goodies bag. They are treated as somehow being inherently different (and vastly better) because the expectation of the public is that they have to be better, because how could they not be, with all those talented people there? Plus, there's the possibility of your favorite artist or work being further honored, if not vindicated if it hasn't been commercially successful. And then you get to it and it's just a lot of rich, overdressed people being sincere and occasionally clever in their acceptance speeches. They have entertainers that aren't up for an award themselves as hosts, and they can try to make the proceedings more bearable; sometimes, they even succeed. But mostly, even those attempts fail to liven up the rest of the night.

So, you hope that someone fucks up big time; you hope for someone like Seth McFarlane to low-ball it, or for Rob Lowe to do an inappropriate routine with Snow White, or for some awardee who didn't expect to get it to have a meltdown, or for Mr. Yeezus to inform us once again that, in his not-so-humble opinion, Mrs. Carter is insufficiently appreciated by the recording music industry or its satellites. It's a routine that's starting to get tired, and I think that even he knows it, and that he didn't grab the mic because of that, but he still had to shoot off his mouth backstage. And you got at least a little bit of the show that you wanted.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:52 AM on February 10, 2015

Just keep that in mind next time, and maybe don't declare openly that [Kanye's] a "hack." It's pretty objectively clear that he's not. Regardless of your opinion of him, his lyrics and work have a remarkable depth and character.

I tried listening to a recent piece of his. I got to "I want to fuck you on the sink/and then bring you something to drink" and shut it down. People whose opinions I respect seem to think there's something about Kanye that's worthwhile but I haven't heard it yet.

This is the single most get off my lawn comment I have ever made here, I think.
posted by jokeefe at 12:16 PM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

As a feminist I have to agree that I have a bunch of problems with the misogyny in his music, jokeefe, and yet I have grown into a defender. I guess I'm giving it a temporary pass because it's rap and that seems to be the current standard. I hear how dumb that sounds as I write it.

I'm grateful he had a daughter because I sort of think that's his best chance of figuring out the dumb myths he's perpetuating that are going to hurt her. He's maybe starting down that road with Only One.

My favorite West song is Runaway, where he (I think) acknowledges and mocks his own past douchebag behavior. The end, auto tuned until his voice sounds more like a guitar than a voice, is, to me, utterly gorgeous.
posted by onlyconnect at 12:34 PM on February 10, 2015

What happened, Jethro Tull didn't release anything last year?
posted by box at 3:26 PM on February 9 [52 favorites +] [!]

Jethro Tull as an entity does not exist anymore since Martin Barre has been indifferent about touring with Tull for the past few years. However over the past two years Ian Anderson has released Thick as a Brick II and Homo Eraticus. Neither would be Hard Rock, but since there is no category for Flute Rock...
posted by Gungho at 12:40 PM on February 10, 2015

i don't think bound 2 is evidence of misogyny - it's a song about fucking, yes, but those don't have to be the same thing. if you're looking for more of a political song and less of a fucking song off of yeezus, you'd probably want to look at new slaves (although i know a lot of [generally white] feminists have a problem with a couple of the lines).

fact of the matter is nearly every genre is misogynistic - i mean, just look at the other genre this thread is about, and everyone one of us excuses misogyny in art we like.
posted by nadawi at 12:44 PM on February 10, 2015 [4 favorites]

Oh no, Kanye sung about doing it! Outside the bedroom!

What a hack.
posted by rhizome at 12:57 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Eh, I see the misogyny in Bound 2. "One good girl is worth a thousand bitches." And "have you ever asked your bitch for other bitches?" I wouldn't want to marry him. I don't especially like what he has to say about women, but I think he has important things to say about other things that I appreciate, so I'm giving him a pass for now.
posted by onlyconnect at 1:10 PM on February 10, 2015

I mean, if a boyfriend wrote that song about me (ha ha ha ha!), I'd be all "oh you really shouldn't have." Now at least Kim has "Only One" to talk about when people ask her what her favorite Kanye song is.
posted by onlyconnect at 1:24 PM on February 10, 2015

i don't find just the appearance of the word bitch to be defacto misogynistic here - and i don't think it's misogynistic to discuss the fantasy of threesomes. the part about one good girl is worth a thousand bitches could be stretched that far, but i think in context of his music he's really saying he found his partner and to him that's better than all the woman who might try to jockey for his attention (this might also allude to the fact that they side pieced for each other for years and years, finally figuring out that all the other people weren't worth it and that they should be together).

or to put it another way, we can turn to (translated) antoine de saint-exupéry:

The little prince went off to look at the roses again.

'You are nothing like my rose,' he told them. 'As yet you are nothing at all. Nobody has tamed you, and you have tamed nobody. You are as my fox used to be. he was just a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I made him my friend and now he is unique in the world.' And the roses felt very unconfortable. 'You are beautiful, but you are empty,' he went on. 'One could not die for you. Of course, an ordinary passer-by would think my rose looked just like you. But in herself she matters more than all of you together, since it is she that I watered; since it is she that I placed under the glass dome; since it is she that I sheltered with the screen; since it is she whose caterpillars I killed (except the two or three we saved up to become butterflies). Since it is she that I linstened to, when she complained, or boasted, or when she was simply being silent. Since it is she who is my rose.'
[...]
'Now here is my secret, very simply: you can only see things clearly with your heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.'

posted by nadawi at 1:33 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

yep. exactly. it's especially funny to me when fans of punk or indie rock whine about misogynistic lyrics in rap - they need to attend to the beam in their own eye first.
posted by nadawi at 2:58 PM on February 10, 2015 [4 favorites]

I came in here to watch white people get mad at kanye west.
posted by hal_c_on at 3:54 AM on February 10 [+] [!]


I can oblige you. Guy's a dick.
posted by Trochanter at 1:15 on February 11 [5 favorites +] [!]

"I'd rather be a dick than a swallower."
-Kanye West

Wow. No way a dick would say that. I like how he worked a cock sucking reference in there at the end.
posted by Trochanter at 3:11 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

"Let's have a toast for the douchebags - Let's have a toast for the assholes - Let's have a toast for the scumbags" - kanye
posted by nadawi at 3:13 PM on February 10, 2015

yep. exactly. it's especially funny to me when fans of punk or indie rock whine about misogynistic lyrics in rap - they need to attend to the beam in their own eye first.

I know, that sonic youth song about fucking hos and bitches was just beyond the pale and don't get me started on elliott smith
posted by entropicamericana at 3:22 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

What, and then I'm like The Dwarves or GG Allin or whoever, and then, what, somebody brings out TheeSatisfaction or Brother Ali or somegoddamnbody?

I don't know if this cherry-picking-examples game is going to be real productive.
posted by box at 3:33 PM on February 10, 2015

deathcab for cutie - "You reject my advances and desperate pleas / I won’t let you, let me down so easily, so easily"

misfits - “Inside your feeble brain there’s probably a whore / If you don’t shut your mouth you’re gonna feel the floor”

weezer (we could do a whole page here, but we'll settle for just one) I want a girl who will laugh for no one else - When I’m away she puts her makeup on the shelf - When I’m away she never leaves the house - I want a girl who laughs for no one else

black flag - I don’t care - gonna fuck you anyways - don’t care - your boyfriends here anyways - don’t care - is that a tampon on anyways - don’t care - well your gross anyways

bright eyes Yeah, you were just some song I wrote - A poem on a page- A sculpture I made - Out of clay
Desire was the flame - But now you’re more of a basketball - Boys just pass you around - They bounce you hard on the ground - And dribble -Then we all get high fives - And you think I’m an asshole now - Well, you’re probably right

good charlotte - She’ll get what she wants if she’s willing to please . - This type of girl always comes with a fee, - Hey now, there’s nothing for free

and i'm bored now. i could go on and on.
posted by nadawi at 3:42 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

I know, that sonic youth song about fucking hos and bitches was just beyond the pale and don't get me started on elliott smith

Thurston Moore just left his wife of 30 years for a younger woman so he's not a great counter-example here.

The Father John Misty record released today has plenty of misogyny. The lyrics are couched in irony, but so are Kanye West's (irony is so much more easier to spot when it's from a white guy!) Dude's singing about how his wife "gets down more often than a blowup doll" but no one's calling him out.
posted by naju at 3:44 PM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Seems to me that awards shows, under all the garbage, are about the moments of happiness of the people who are being recognized. It's a special moment for them.

And it takes a special kind of dick to shit all over that moment.

I'm indifferent to Kanye's music. I'm indifferent to Beck's music. I'm indifferent to Taylor Swift's music. We don't know what will last and what will be detritus.

But I know what a boor is.

As far as the lyric to New Slaves: Tough to know what's anger and what's posing. I thought I could tell with NWA.
posted by Trochanter at 4:04 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

naju: Where is the misogyny in that?
posted by rhizome at 4:04 PM on February 10, 2015

Thurston Moore just left his wife of 30 years for a younger woman so he's not a great counter-example here.

That's not a default example of misogyny unless you happen to know the precise details of both relationships which I'm guessing you don't.
posted by billiebee at 4:04 PM on February 10, 2015

If you're not into my examples then go to nadawi's. I have no interest in derailing this convo.

The way we talk about pop culture (the stuff we love, the stuff we despise) is interesting - it's considered "safe" to discuss but often provides accidental insight into how we think about class, race, and everything else. When you hold up indie rock as misogyny-free while hip-hop is a sewer, you're speaking volumes without realizing it.
posted by naju at 4:07 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

well, kim gordon did make pretty specific charges about him not being feminist minded when it came time to raise a family - i trust her description of it, honestly.
posted by nadawi at 4:15 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

When you hold up indie rock as misogyny-free

Who did that?
posted by billiebee at 4:36 PM on February 10, 2015

I have no interest in derailing this convo.

Also this convo - about Tenacious D winning the metal Grammy - was derailed long ago. But for the record I'm a big fan of Kanye and also indie music and also some metal and punk. Find me the person who claims any of it is misogyny free. Few aspects of popular culture are misogyny free. But we should call it out when we see it and not make excuses based on whether we like the artist or not, and that goes for all genres.
posted by billiebee at 4:43 PM on February 10, 2015

I think Bob Dylan is a good counterpoint for Kanye in terms of someone whose sincerely-meant actions can come off as boorish and someone whose less than feminist attitude is apparent from his lyrics.
posted by sallybrown at 4:52 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Who did that?

Well, this was the comment that made me see red: I know, that sonic youth song about fucking hos and bitches was just beyond the pale and don't get me started on elliott smith. It might've been a harmless joke, maybe I misread, but I saw it as a hand grenade representing a ton of foul ideas around indie rock vs. hip-hop that play into class and race.
posted by naju at 6:08 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Hey I am a Kanye West supporter. I have defended him in other threads, and I have interpreted his words and actions as truth telling to power or a guy speaking out sincerely against racism and otherism. I started this AskMe about him to learn more. I've read the biography his mom wrote about him! So c'mon, I'm not trying to take him down because he's black. I like his music and I'm on his side.

But in general when a guy calls all women, including his girlfriend, bitches and hoes and talks about degrading his girlfriend with sexual acts where he gets spunk all over them (and New Slaves isn't helpful to that point either), I think it's hateful to women. Bitch and ho are hateful, to me, anyway. Why isn't it okay for that to be a problem for me? That's not even necessarily the worst of it in his music, really. Golddigger (okay, there's the redeeming verse at the end, but still.)? Heartless? He is constantly writing about women as if they exist only to give him head or take his money. "The best living or dead hands down, huh / Less talk, more head right now, huh / .... / Think you motherfuckers really really need to cool out / Cause you'll never get on top of this / So mommy, best advice is just to get on top of this / Have you ever had sex with a pharaoh? / Put the pussy in a sarcophagus / Now she claiming that I bruised her esophagus / Head of the class and she just won a swallowship." Come. On. I don't think he sees the women in many his songs as equals, just vessels for fucking, clothes, and money exchange, and that's pretty gross.

Hey, I have a problem with the way other artists write about women, too. I still like West's music, and I'd appreciate a more nuanced view of my position than, basically, she must be a white person out to make a black man stop making music any way she can. I hope he keeps making music for a long time, and I hope Nori makes him write about women in a way I can get behind.

nadawi I usually agree with a LOT of what you say, especially about West, but I think likening West's attitude toward Kim Kardashian in Bound 2 to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's description of the little prince's rose is way off. We made it to Thanksgiving, maybe we'll make it til Christmas, if you really want to know what I want as a present, how about a threesome? -- that's not really much of a "you're the one rose for me" statement. jmo.
posted by onlyconnect at 7:08 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

i'm a queer woman who has participated in group sex in loving relationships, so - yeah, i don't think threesomes are some how anti-romantic by default. and - to be clear i was comparing the line about good girl and a thousand bitches to what the little prince had to say about roses and foxes. i get that we're disagreeing here and i don't think you're wrong or bad for that - i hope you feel the same about me.
posted by nadawi at 7:32 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

I foresee a future where all the fates align, a conjunction that will precede the subgenius apocalypse:

* Best Metal: a tribute to Killroy was Here
* Best Jazz: Lady Gaga and Madonna crooning each other's greatest hits
* Best Country: Jack Black and Jack White doing Tom Waits
* Best Classical: arrangements of John Carpenter compositions for orchestra
* Album of the Year: a Britney Spears comeback album

In that year when five Grammy mediocrities align, a great silence will be heard around the world, and it will last for 30 milliseconds. And nobody will notice.

Except for Leonardo DiCaprio, who will finally win his Oscar, for playing himself not winning the Oscar.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 8:05 PM on February 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Oh I see what you mean about the rose, nadawi. I'm glad we can agree to disagree about this thing, and I didn't mean to disrespect you in my disagreement.
posted by onlyconnect at 8:13 PM on February 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

As a feminist I have to agree that I have a bunch of problems with the misogyny in his music, jokeefe, and yet I have grown into a defender. I guess I'm giving it a temporary pass because it's rap and that seems to be the current standard. I hear how dumb that sounds as I write it.

Erm, I might be late returning to this, but my complaint about the "sink/drink" lyrics is not that I think they're misogynist but that I think they're eye-rollingly awful as writing.

So is your problem with this that he's being very graphic, or do you feel this is some sort of horrible thing that he's doing to another human being?

See above.
posted by jokeefe at 11:19 PM on February 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wow, this thread blew up today.

C'mon!
I made a direct comparison to the "its just his persona" with Joaquin Phoenix,
I explicitly said the guy was really fucking talented.
I completely said that people calling him a "hack" or "untalented" had a definite racist undertone.
Seriously, he's better at everything he does professionally than most anyone in this thread.
Especially that "hi, i'm special" person earlier.

And I am concerned that his fanbase will justify and excuse every stupid fucking thing that he says and does just because they like his music.
And ignore actual problems because its like "lol! I trolled you racists!"
And the examples I gave are absolutely American culture going "YEAH, BUT THE ART IS GREAT"
And even if the art is ted stupid nougat..

OK?

Here's a guy who interrupted the grammys the same way in 1998.
Here is his cousin speaking at his funeral a few years later.


---

Here is the end of my last comment with the two controversial lines removed:

"So this is the crux, this is what I do not understand about Kanye fans:
Why is it so hard to accept that you can love someones artistic and creative output, but also not like the way they act?
Why is it so hard to reconcile that someone who is good at expressing his angst and complicated internal drama in such a resounding way might actually be lacking in some other graces?
Why is it not possible for someone to be a responsible and loving and expressive person personally and a raging fucking jackass in public.
Why does he have to be all things to all people?

And if I don't like Kanyes music or his actions does not mean that I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about.
I think Power is a great beat.
I'd rather gouge my own eyes out than listen to all of MBDTF.
YMMV."

----
posted by lkc at 3:46 AM on February 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

I just want to know why ripping off decade+ old NIN and Marilyn Manson riffs is so amaaaaazing that everyone thinks Kanye is a VISIONARY blah blah whatever. My husband played his last album for me, and it was all I could do to stop laughing and calling out the song titles being ripped off. I seriously don't get it.

And I'd say the same thing about any other band that did something similar, so his assholishness is just an anti-bonus. (Hello the Killers, the 1980s section of my iPod called, and it would like its music back. And its epaulets).
posted by bitter-girl.com at 7:28 AM on February 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

white artists have been ripping off black artists for a minute and it seems fair for black artists to get some their own back. hip hop is also a sample heavy medium and so i guess you can say they from the beginning "rip off" the old soul records, but that seems to be missing the point of what they're dong...

people think kanye is visionary because the beats and productions he uses on his albums are always about 6 months ahead of the mainstream. he's either very good at realizing what trends are about to pop or he creates those trends. it's not that it's never before heard of stuff - often you can find what he does in the underground or other genres at other times - but it's how he puts those things together and then how his peers react with their own work.
posted by nadawi at 7:40 AM on February 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

I just want to know why ripping off decade+ old NIN and Marilyn Manson riffs is so amaaaaazing that everyone thinks Kanye is a VISIONARY blah blah whatever

If folk historicism in music bothers you this much, you are going to have a bad time.

Protip: when you start saying things like, "they're just ripping off Beefheart," you'll finally know you hate music completely.
posted by rhizome at 8:10 AM on February 11, 2015 [5 favorites]

kanye discusses the grammys, beck, perceptions of himself, and some other stuff
posted by nadawi at 8:48 AM on February 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

bitter-girl.com: “I just want to know why ripping off decade+ old NIN and Marilyn Manson riffs is so amaaaaazing that everyone thinks Kanye is a VISIONARY blah blah whatever. I seriously don't get it.”

Yeah, I agree. It's like nobody was listening when NIN and Marilyn Manson were telling us about the experience of being a black man in America back in the 1990s. Kanye isn't doing anything new.

Look, this conversation is going to a stupid place. This is how it always goes: somebody says 'well, relatively speaking, Kanye isn't any worse than a laundry list of other musicians' - and then the response is 'yes he is,' and then we're arguing about whether Kanye West is terrible – when the conversation should be about hatreds endemic to music.

And, yeah – this is offensively obtuse:

entropicamericana: “I know, that sonic youth song about fucking hos and bitches was just beyond the pale and don't get me started on elliott smith”

Do you even listen to the things Kim Gordon has to say about the music establishment and its treatment of women? She's not exactly standing around and congratulating indie rock for always and everywhere being wonderfully equitable. And if you have doubts about the weird and uncomfortable places that punk and post punk often come from, read this piece by Lester Bangs. Or think about the painfully ugly attitudes toward women that emo took over the decade of its ascendance. Or the examples that nadawi and naju give.

This self-congratulatory attitude that we don't have the problems that those gross rappers have is only privileged posturing.

I like Kanye West. I agree that he's problematic. I don't like ironized sexism. I don't like that he clothes his messages in some difficult things. But I see that he's saying something, and it's an interesting thing.

We are not neophytes in liking problematic things. We do this all the time. We say "Bob Dylan sometimes goes off the rails, but he has some core messages that are really worth digging for." We object to this or that aspect of something while affirming that it's okay for us to value the non-problematic parts of it. So when we're willing to go through this process for some things, but not for others – when we consistently exclude particular artists and genres from our willingness to accept complicated art – that's systematic racism.

It's okay to hate Kanye West for his sexism. I don't listen to him every day myself, mostly for that reason. It's even okay to hate Kanye West for being impolite at awards ceremonies, as petty as that seems to me. But if we're going to do that, we have be consistent and accept that these faults are all over our culture and need to be confronted. We can't be selective.

And we can't sneer that our cultural heroes, our Sonic Youth and Elliot Smith, are totally immune to these problems as we see them.
posted by koeselitz at 8:49 AM on February 11, 2015 [9 favorites]

It's amazing to me that you could take some posts from this thread, change the name of the person being discussed, and slide them into the recent thread on Serena Williams without disrupting the flow of the conversation. And vice versa.

In addition to the scorn heaped upon Mr. West, I've seen this issue further uglified by something going around my Facebook feed: the image macro purporting to explain that Beck deserved the award because he is a true artist, while Beyonce may as well be an animatronic puppet since she didn't really contribute anything to her own songs -- if you can even call them songs considering how "simple" they are.

No one in my FB feed who has weighed in on the issue has taken the gracious and more charitable path of pointing out that Beyonce and Beck are both talented, hard-working artists.

Instead, Beyonce, once again, has her body of work dismissed as "not really" (not really feminist, not really art, not really singing, not really her own work, etc), and it's framed as a zero sum game, where somehow pulling Beck up requires pushing Beyonce down.

Ugh and double ugh.
posted by lord_wolf at 9:35 AM on February 11, 2015 [6 favorites]

kanye discusses the grammys, beck, perceptions of himself, and some other stuff
posted by nadawi An hour ago

I'm glad you posted this, because it does clear up a lot of issues. A big part of the problem I had with Kanye's post-Grammy comments was that they *were* disrespectful to Beck and his artistry. He flat out said Beck isn't a "real artist" like Beyonce. That's really not cool. I'm glad to see he backtracked on that a bit.

Music is a big tent, and it's impossible for the Grammys to give any album recognition as the overall "best" without pissing off fans of not just every other nominee but every other Genre of popular music.
Do the Grammys have a problem with under-appreciating black artists? Absolutely. Especially in the Album category. But that category has always been a bit of a mess. It seems to be where they reward past greatness by choosing a not-so-great current album. That's why Bob Dylan won for Time Out of Mind over Raiohead's OK Computer. That's why Steely Dan won for arguably their weakest release Two Against Nature. Ditto for Herbie Hancock's and Ray Charles' recent wins, neither of which was their best work.
Maybe when Beyonce releases a mediocre album when she's in her sixties she'll get Album of the Year.
posted by rocket88 at 10:53 AM on February 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

you are confusing the model in the video with his wife.

Out of all the stuff in that comment of mine, that part addressed to nadawi is what you choose to respond to? Dude! How about the part where I ask you not to label me a white person trying to take down a black man any way I can?

1. black man supports black woman.
2. white audience do not support black man supporting black woman.

Not from me, no. I thought his getting on stage was fine and provided comic relief. I thought his comments afterwards about Beck and Beyonce were fine, too.

I don't know if you are talking about me or other people in this thread, but you don't seem to be hearing the people who say that they appreciate his artistry and don't mind (or maybe even appreciate) his tendency to speak up about things, but have this whole other issue with the way he talks about women in his music. The latter concern, to me, doesn't delegitimize what he's saying or make him less of an artist.

jokeefe, I wish I hadn't misinterpreted your statement in the first place, and this whole sexism issue wouldn't have even come up. Ugh!
posted by onlyconnect at 12:06 PM on February 11, 2015

Well, it would have likely come up anyway, because Kanye.

The sink/drink thing is just... well, here are the correct lyrics, courtesy of hal_c_on:

I wanna fuck you hard on the sink
After that, give you somethin' to drink.

Getting fucked hard on the sink sounds uncomfortable to impossible. How? Is she sitting on the edge? Is he? Do they just have a really huge sink like a bathtub and he means IN the sink? Sounds like little to no fun. And then after he's written this line, he wants to rhyme it. I imagine him tapping a pen against his lips, running through the alphabet. Bring a a-ink? A bink? A crink? Wait, drink! There we go. Triumph!

So when I hear about Kanye's depth and great writing and so on, I wonder where I can find these scraps of poetry. I'm willing to believe that I'm not looking hard enough.
posted by jokeefe at 4:56 PM on February 11, 2015

Those lines are just setup for a Martin reference, silly enough to redeem everything IMO.
posted by naju at 5:12 PM on February 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

So when I hear about Kanye's depth and great writing and so on, I wonder where I can find these scraps of poetry.

And those hacks the Beatles rhymed "I wanna hold your hand" with itself. Three times.
posted by Etrigan at 5:30 PM on February 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

well - i mean, that line goes on to, not only be a martin reference, but also about him getting head, it's the beginning of a play on words - it's also a pretty normal sex act and doesn't require imagined giant tub sinks.

i could list every turn of phrase, every verse or hook that i thought showed how thoughtful, vulnerable, understanding, he can be (and how he dabbles in intersectional feminism at times) - but i just don't think you're approaching it in good faith. not everyone has to like kanye - but saying he's just ripping off nin and making simple rhymes is immediately obviously untrue to anyone who actually cares to take a minute to educate themselves.
posted by nadawi at 5:56 PM on February 11, 2015 [5 favorites]

Getting fucked hard on the sink sounds uncomfortable to impossible. How? Is she sitting on the edge? Is he? Do they just have a really huge sink like a bathtub and he means IN the sink? Sounds like little to no fun.

Oh god, you really are hung up on him talking about doing it outside the bedroom.
posted by rhizome at 7:58 PM on February 11, 2015

Come on.
posted by jokeefe at 11:57 PM on February 11, 2015

Yeah sex on the sink is pretty straightforward, I wouldn't even consider it outside the "vanilla" realm really - she sits on the sink, and as long as he's the right height it's completely non awkward.

People who are better at recall/research in the Kanye oeuvre can probably pick out better phrases than I can but to me it's the way all the lines come together (as mentioned above from the Martin references) but that's true for a LOT of musicians, especially rappers who are really into the wordplay.
posted by zutalors! at 7:36 AM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Fact: Kanye West's abilities to write lyrics has little-to-nothing to do with whether or not what he did was appropriate, forgivable, or a useful starting point for a discussion of race acceptance in the music industry and the US in general.

Every comment about his lyrics and talent is a derail, IMO. "Martin Luther King isn't a very good preacher - just listen to this quote from one of his homilies on John 2:16! BO-RING!"
posted by IAmBroom at 7:49 AM on February 12, 2015

Agree his music has nothing to do with his rudeness at the awards show.


As to the sink thing, he bent her over the sink. And the drink is the money shot. Wake up sheeple.
posted by Trochanter at 8:06 AM on February 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

the "hack" "talentless idiots" comments come up pretty quickly in Kanye threads and it's not like people aren't going to respond to that, whether or not it has to do with whatever he does in awards shows.
posted by zutalors! at 8:09 AM on February 12, 2015

(Browner is a defensive back for NE Patriots. Smart cookie.)

Brandon Browner @bbrowner27 · Feb 10
KANYE WEST is a sucka! Everybody don't listen to Beyoncé. Second time he tried to steal somebody shine. First time it was a 15 yr old girl


Brandon BrownerVerified account ‏@bbrowner27
Kanye try and play that I'm weird because of my genius. Non of the greats pull that stupid ish. Meaning Marley, Mike Jack, Tupac, Jayz etc
posted by Trochanter at 8:24 AM on February 12, 2015

the "talentless idiots" comments come up pretty quickly in Kanye threads and it's not like people aren't going to respond to that, whether or not it has to do with whatever he does in awards shows.

Perhaps his defenders could help keep the discussion focussed by not rising to this bait every time.

Every comment about his lyrics and talent is a derail, IMO.

Every comment about Kanye in this thread is a derail.
 
posted by Herodios at 8:30 AM on February 12, 2015

Every comment about Kanye in this thread is a derail.

Not really. He was mentioned by name in the FPP, and even though the post was primarily about the Tenacious D win, this is pretty much the "Let's talk about the Grammys" thread.
posted by rocket88 at 9:13 AM on February 12, 2015 [5 favorites]

the "talentless idiots" comments come up pretty quickly in Kanye threads and it's not like people aren't going to respond to that, whether or not it has to do with whatever he does in awards shows.

Perhaps his defenders could help keep the discussion focussed by not rising to this bait every time.

I usually find the responses from the hardcore/more invested Kanye fans pretty interesting.
posted by zutalors! at 9:14 AM on February 12, 2015

I've seen this issue further uglified by something going around my Facebook feed: the image macro purporting to explain that Beck deserved the award because he is a true artist, while Beyonce may as well be an animatronic puppet since she didn't really contribute anything to her own songs -- if you can even call them songs considering how "simple" they are.

That really did enrage me. Think the same people felt that way last year when Daft Punk won? Fat fucking chance. Think those people actually listened to Beyonce's album? Again, fat fucking chance.

I listened to and liked both Morning Phase and Beyonce upwards of 10 times this year. In my mind the choice wasn't close, and it wasn't Beck. I know which one of those albums I'll still be listening to occasionally a decade from now, and it's not Beck's either.

It's subjective, I get that. But the people who frame it as "real artist" vs. "fake artist" really handily expose their own biases.
posted by sallybrown at 9:30 AM on February 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

(Browner is a defensive back for NE Patriots. Smart cookie.)

I know it's gonna sound a little like Tu Quoque, but this is the same Browner who, with Bountygate still a relatively recent thing, made public comments advising his Patriots teammates to intentionally injure a couple of his former Seahawks teammates. None of the greats pulled that kind of stupid ish. Lambert, Taylor, Lott, Hayes, Greene etc.

You'd figure that as someone else prone to making unforced errors in public, he'd be a little more empathetic with Mr. West. (Also, Taylor Swift was, I believe, 19 at the time of the Grammy incident.)

I'm quite fascinated by the fact that Swift and Beck have both forgiven Kanye West and moved on but so many people refuse to let it go.

This is why some of us feel the reaction is far out of proportion to the deed and its consequences. Most of us are *not* saying West is a perfect little angel of goodness. Yes, it's a total jackass move to rush the stage like that. But...it's a silly awards show. There's no need to tattoo "Poor Impulse Control" on his forehead and banish him from the burbclaves. Put it this way: why did Rep. Joe Wilson ("You Lie!") fall upward after his utterly horrible and historical breach of propriety and conduct while Kanye is forever dissed and dismissed?

The continued and severe opprobrium strikes me as a very strong supporting piece of evidence for the theory that black people pay a higher price for transgressions -- both social and legal -- than people of other backgrounds.
posted by lord_wolf at 9:46 AM on February 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Especially considering both Taylor and Beck pretty clearly financially benefited from Kanye's actions.
posted by sallybrown at 9:49 AM on February 12, 2015

I know it's gonna sound a little like Tu Quoque, but this is the same Browner who, with Bountygate still a relatively recent thing, made public comments advising his Patriots teammates to intentionally injure a couple of his former Seahawks teammates. None of the greats pulled that kind of stupid ish. Lambert, Taylor, Lott, Hayes, Greene etc.

Chuck that mud.
posted by Trochanter at 10:15 AM on February 12, 2015

aydeejones, I respect that you feel strongly about the music you like. However, a point about "true metalheads" – in the nineties, your list would have been a classic poser list. In Flames, especially, was considered by death metal fans to be pop music. Dimmu Borgir was derided as dumbed down black metal (except for Stormblast). Swansong (parts of which I liked) was widely considered a sad last desperate attempt by Carcass (once the cutting edge goregrind band) to be more popular. Cradle of Filth was (correctly) pointed and laughed at.

Metal righteousness is a dangerous thing to wield.
posted by ignignokt at 10:15 AM on February 12, 2015

The first thing I thought of with the metal Grammy was the VMA incident in the 80s where Motley Crue rushed the stage and punched one of the guys from Guns N Roses when they won the metal award. Honestly any self-respecting comedy act in that position should have planned to have Lemmy come up and take a swing at him at least. Or maybe I'm too old and no one would get it. But it would still be awesome.

The Kanye thing

When I first read about it I assumed he got up on stage and went into another tirade and I'm like "holy shit dude WTF". I read a bunch of comments suggesting it was another Taylor Swift moment. Then I watched the clip. That's not what happened at all. He was actually just being self-deprecating, just briefly went on stage and turned around, and it was pretty funny IMO. Then later someone asked him for his opinion and he gave it. There's....there's nothing wrong with that.
posted by Hoopo at 11:12 AM on February 12, 2015 [5 favorites]

The continued and severe opprobrium strikes me as a very strong supporting piece of evidence for the theory that black people pay a higher price for transgressions -- both social and legal -- than people of other backgrounds.

I call bull. No way Bono gets a pass if he pulled that stuff. I submit it would be worse.

Legal stuff is a whole 'nuther issue. Giving a rich man a pass because of how poor people are treated is not going to wash.
posted by Trochanter at 12:54 PM on February 12, 2015

What the fuck is "that stuff"?
posted by koeselitz at 1:01 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Crashing the stage and interrupting the acceptance speech of a fellow musician. Or were you kidding? Apologies if you were making a joke.
posted by Trochanter at 1:06 PM on February 12, 2015

Which Kanye did once five years ago. What exactly did he do this time to earn your ire?
posted by koeselitz at 1:15 PM on February 12, 2015

Crashed the stage and interrupted the acceptance speech of a fellow musician.
posted by Trochanter at 1:17 PM on February 12, 2015

He didn't get on the stage at all. And he didn't interrupt any acceptance speech. Have you actually watched the video?
posted by koeselitz at 1:18 PM on February 12, 2015

#authentic #real
posted by naju at 1:32 PM on February 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

He didn't get on the stage at all. And he didn't interrupt any acceptance speech. Have you actually watched the video?

Honestly. If you blinked you would have thought what Kanye did was off-camera entirely. You see his head for a split second, when he's turning around to go sit back in his seat, to smiles and laughter. It was a joke and it was funny.
posted by Hoopo at 1:52 PM on February 12, 2015

– I mean: sorry if that seemed confrontational, Trochanter, but this is really a classic example of a situation that's been blown completely out of proportion by bad reporting. For instance, the headline on the story linked in the post is "Kanye West storms Grammy stage, says Beck shouldn't have won." This makes it sound like he stomped on stage, grabbed the microphone, and delivered a diatribe about who he thinks should have won.

In reality, he made a minor and unobtrusive joke making fun of himself by walking toward the stage and getting most of the way up the stairs before turning around and walking back. Everybody laughed, and although Beck wildly gestured that he should come up on stage, he demurred and returned to his seat, and everything went on. He said later that he did this specifically because he respects Beck as a musician and didn't think it was his right to ruin the moment.

nadawi posted this link to a radio interview with Kanye the next day up above, and I want to point it up again because it's really great. Anyone who thinks Kanye is a belligerent ass ought to listen to it – it's enlightening. He really speaks like a kind, loving guy who wanted to respect everybody there and be decent. He talks about his joking comments after about wanting Beyonce to win as a natural part of sporting awards shows – "somebody's gotta be there to say Marshawn Lynch should've got the ball" – and says clearly that he respects Beck and thinks of him as a very good musician. There's not any anger there at all.
posted by koeselitz at 1:57 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

It's subjective, I get that. But the people who frame it as "real artist" vs. "fake artist" really handily expose their own biases.

It was Kanye who framed it that way.
But I agree about the stupid Facebook graphic going around.
posted by rocket88 at 3:03 PM on February 12, 2015

walking toward the stage and getting most of the way up the stairs before turning around and walking back.

Stage crashed.

Beck wildly gestured that he should come up on stage

Acceptance speech interrupted. Ask me again about the video I didn't see.

As to the later radio interview, I recall West kissing ass up and down the block after the last episode, too.

And I guess I have to point out again that I know nothing about any of these people's music. I totally take a back seat to y'all on that.

As to the meme picture: Protip, voice is an instrument.
posted by Trochanter at 3:07 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

You're just standing up for the regal and staid ceremony? Downton Grammys?

What manners this, how do you say, "rapster," has. Horrors!
posted by rhizome at 5:21 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

that meme with different participants has been going around for a while - kanye didn't prompt it - and it's always seemingly used to pit hip hop against white dudes.
posted by nadawi at 5:28 PM on February 12, 2015

You're just standing up for the regal and staid ceremony? Downton Grammys?

Well, again. It's just like, this is a pretty big moment in a person's life. It's about consideration for a peer. And yeah, manners, politeness between people, that stuff.

As far as the ceremony: imagine a different type of personality accepting their award, and there's a shouting match, or a shoving match. Is that your type of awards show?
posted by Trochanter at 5:51 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Trochanter: “Acceptance speech interrupted. Ask me again about the video I didn't see.”

You're suggesting that Beck was giving an acceptance speech with his arms around Prince?
posted by koeselitz at 6:17 PM on February 12, 2015

Is that your type of awards show?

Hey, don't let me stop your campaign to bring gravitas and decorum back to the Grammys, I'm just chuckling at the sight of people who would probably otherwise be deriding the whole spectacle as a lot of corporate rubbish arguing over who or who didn't speak out of turn.
posted by octobersurprise at 6:19 PM on February 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Well, again. It's just like, this is a pretty big moment in a person's life. It's about consideration for a peer. And yeah, manners, politeness between people, that stuff.

Beck was trying to get him to come back up. Also like a kazillion more people know who Beck is now.
posted by zutalors! at 6:28 PM on February 12, 2015

I liked the hymn Beyoncé did. Something for the black kids that were killed this year.
posted by Trochanter at 6:32 PM on February 12, 2015

Wow, Jack Black sure sang the shit out of that Dio cover.
posted by and for no one at 8:12 PM on February 12, 2015 [3 favorites]