I'll definitely put a second vote into Billie Eilish. I agree. This is one of her best songs. I am not a big avid Billie Eilish fan, but I feel like the control and the emotion of what was I made for is going to be perfect in this setting, in this showcase and just show off her artistry in a new way. Other than Billie, I'm really excited to see Burna Boy take this stage. He's a one-time Grammy winner in the Global Omen category back in 2021, but this is the first time he's nominated alongside a lot of his other African artists. And with the new category of African performance, making it debut this year, I'm pretty sure he's going to bring out a lot of his OG's, a lot of new artists, and maybe even club some hip-hop artists that he did on his last album. Travis Scott is also a listed performer this year, and they have music together, so you never know what can happen.

One thing that I think that's interesting, you mentioned Burna Boy and Travis Scott, both of those artists are very, very gifted at collaboration. And one of the best things about Grammy performances through the years, they've often tried to take disparate performing artists and have them perform together and see what happens. And sometimes you get a massive train wreck, and sometimes you get something that's way better than it has any right to be, and has a way of tearing down barriers between genres. And so I'm really hoping to get some weird bonkers collaborations this

year. So you're thinking maybe like, Luke comes with Duolipa, they'll maybe be

sure. Sure, sure. Would watch. I really want

to see two great tastes that taste great together. I really want to see the country crooner who's dressed head to toe from a Bass Pro shop with our girl, Dua, who is one of the most fashionable

women in pop. Do you guys remember when they had Kendrick Lamar perform with Imagine

Dragons? Imagine Dragons, yeah. Oh no. That was a heater. That was amazing. It

was actually weirdly great. Part of it is I think Kendrick Lamar is kind of a rising tide that lifts all boats, but it really gave me a fresh perspective on like, wait, this Imagine Dragons is involved in something that is really intriguing to me. Even if I'm not necessarily putting on their records, that was a great performance. My

favorite weirdo performance of all time at the Grammys was Blue Man Group, Moby, and Jill Scott. That was like that dessert you order at a restaurant, and you know, because the chef was really ambitious, and you're like, I got to try this, and then you're like, I had a bite, but you know what? I'm full.

It's like that Simpsons joke where Homer pulls out the can and says, nuts and gum

together at last.

Exactly. Other performers that we're going to see are Olivia Rodrigo. She's always great on a stage. She's a child of television. I'm sure she'll do something amazing. And Billy Joel, apparently performing his first new song in decades. So that'll be interesting. And then you two beaming in from the sphere. I don't know. I'm a little, I mean, you two, those are my guys. Okay. I've been a YouTube fan since I was a little lapsed Catholic, trying to figure out how to relate to my faith as I explored rock and roll. But I don't know if we're going to have the impact from the sphere on our televisions or our computer screens. What do you think?

Yeah, I think it's hard to tell. I mean, the sphere is nothing if not an incredible visual, how they're going to be able to kind of contain it on a TV screen will be interesting to see. I will echo. I can't remember which of our colleagues said this on Slack when we were kind of discussing the ceremony. Somebody asked, is YouTube imprisoned in the sphere? Can

they leave? Very very imprisoned or have they got some equity stake in it because they've been selling every suit that opened? Okay, maybe

this is a bit of maybe I've watched too many horror movies, but I actually think perhaps YouTube somehow we're done away with and they've now been regenerated by the sphere. They actually are only of the

sphere. They can't tell where the sphere ends

and they begin. Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. Somebody

on Twitter said they were hoping for a Joni version of a case of you with SZA and Lana Del Rey just putting

that out there.

Manifesting? I think that would be cool. I'm sorry, whoever it was who said that. That's a great idea. I wish I could credit you. But this isn't just, you know, cavalcade of stars or modern day Ed Sullivan. This is an award ceremony. And I think we should talk about the actual categories. Who's nominated? Let's start with record of the year.

For the purposes of journalism, I will now read the nominations with as little emotional affect as possible. So as not to betray any subliminal bias. Record of the year. Worship by John Batiste. Not strong enough by boy genius. Flowers by Miley Cyrus. What was I made for by Billy Eilish. On my mama by Victoria Monet. Vampire by Olivia Rodrigo. Antihero

by Taylor Swift. Kill

Bill by SZA. I actually don't think

there's really like a leading candidate in that category unless it is the human embodiment of the 1% in popular music, which is Taylor Swift. So less percent Taylor doesn't exist as hard as

that is. And who do you

want to win? Like who of that list would you like to see take on the gramophone? How about you, Steven?

Very often when I'm predicting the Grammys, one, I'm usually wrong, but two, I often go into predicting, trying to think like what would be the most embarrassing possible outcome for the Grammys? And I will assume that they do that. Sort of like the year in the 80s when the album nominees were like purple rain and born in the USA and she's so unusual and private dancer and then they gave her album of the year to Lionel Richie's Can't Slow Down. Like look for the thing that the Grammys are going to pick where the most people are going to go, that's what they'll probably end up doing. But I don't think this is a terribly embarrassing field. I think these are pretty, these are strong songs. You can make a case for a lot of these ending up winning. If you kind of go down through the list, you know, John Batiste is certainly a big, big Grammys favorite. You can make a case that he might win. Boy Genius obviously had a really big year. People love them. Miley Cyrus, that flower song was huge. We've already talked about Billie Eilish. She has always engendered a lot of awards support. I suspect she is likely to win her second Oscar next month for this very song. Victoria Monet is clearly the type of artist that the Grammys are trying to embrace as an avatar for themselves. She's got seven nominations. The Grammys clearly love her. That song is fantastic. Olivia Rodrigo has clearly entered the A list. Taylor Swift is Taylor Swift. I think one of the main things that could potentially hold her back is that that record came out so long ago. But you can certainly make a case that Taylor Swift just continues to steamroll all of our lives. And she ends up taking big prizes. And SZA had as big a year as anybody in 2023. And you can absolutely make a case for her as well. It's a very, very strong field and a very hard field to predict.

Stephen, your airy edition is beautiful, but it's also an avoidant strategy. So is my

indecision. Your indecision is impeccable.

Come on, who do you want to win in that game? Who do I want to win?

I mean, looking at this list of songs, I mean, I really, really love that boy genius record, and I really love that song that maybe that may be my personal favorite song, but I kind of want SZA to

win. Yeah, yeah, I hear you. What about you, said, what do you want to win?

This is incredibly tough because yeah, I agree with Stephen. There's no front runner in this list of records that I'm seeing. A lot of these songs are very strong contenders. You know, as I was saying before, the control and the vulnerability of what was I made for by Billie Eilish is a new level for her, like, a new stepping stone.

All my mama

was absolutely confident. It was the record from me all year. I know it was a form of catharsis for Victoria making it after she had her first child, and she was like deep in the throat of postpartum. Kill Bill, which SZA has said previously, that was one of her lower effort tracks on SOS, but it's still, like I said, it was Poppy. It was such an eyeball.

This opens up that question that I asked at the beginning of the podcast, like who are the Grammys for? I feel like these are the top stars of our time, and they do kind of fit together, but also they represent such a vast field and they're all at the top of the field, right? They're not leaning any one way, genre-wise, or status-wise, or veterans versus newcomers, you know, it's very, very representative. On that note, I'm going to vote for Miley, and here's why. She doesn't have a Grammy. She has been on a fascinating redemption arc for such a long time, at least since that performance on the MTV Music Video was a notorious twerking performance with Robin Thi. Yeah, it's funny,

it's teeny, and just a lot of it I think that was over 10 years ago.

I know, and I think Miley, well, I've always rooted for Miley, and always thought that, you know, she was underestimated by the karate or whatever, you know, and this song is, you know, it's kind of her story, right? I think she'd be a wonderful winner in this category. Yeah.

Well, I think you hit on something that's worth mentioning here, which is this category is Record of the Year. It's very much about these three minutes, it's these four minutes, like, you're kind of supposed to look at these as very discreet pieces of art and judging them accordingly, but it's very hard to divorce them from their larger stories. And like that Miley Cyrus song that you mentioned, it's hard not to hear that song kind of in conversation with used to be young, the song that she put out afterward, that is very much a part of that same, I guess you call it a redemption arc, that she's been going through it. You can say the same thing about John Batiste, you can say the same thing about, you know, Victoria Monet, as Sidney mentioned. There are larger stories here that are worth telling. You

know, John Batiste is a great example. Those who didn't know his really moving story of, you know, his family, his wife, has struggled with cancer, do know it now because there was a documentary

that was really popular this year. It's called American Symphony and is nominated for an Oscar. Yeah, so, so,

we're feeling these people, not just the songs. But let's talk about another category. Album of the Year, can we have the announcement, please?

Album of the Year, World Music Radio by John Batiste,

The Record

by Boy Genius, Endless Summer Vacation by Miley Cyrus. Did you know that there is a tunnel under Ocean Boulevard by Lana Del Rey, The Age of Pleasure by Janelle Monet, Guts by Olivia Rodrigo, Midnight's by Taylor Swift, S-O-S by SZA. For billing,

press three. So, I

sense a little repetition between these top categories. It's, you know, I don't know, I'm not a Grammy historian, nor do I play one on this podcast. But, you know, maybe Stephen, you know, is it pretty usual for songs to be nominated from albums that are also nominated in this top category?

I mean, it happens quite a lot. You know, there are certainly years, if you remember the year when Billie Eilish swept all the major categories. There certainly are examples where an artist just has clearly very, very widespread support in the general categories. And often, the Grammys will, will, I'll watch the Grammy nominations roll in and I'll be like, oh, these are pretty good. I'm pretty happy with how this is going. And then they get to the general categories and everything goes completely haywire. And I think that's, that feels like less the case this year. Again, like I'm looking over this list and I'm not seeing anything where I would be like, well, that album is

terrible. Right. Right. No, absolutely. It's a beyond solid group. And I don't know if it, I was, I was about to say it, it represents a kind of a generational fruition. Gosh, that's a terrible phrase. But what I'm saying is like, you know, it's like a young Titans category, or maybe it's a year of young Titans. But some of these Titans are really young. And we haven't talked about Olivia Rodrigo at all, yet. And her album got certainly a favorite among many people I know. And it really is an album album, you know, and she makes great singles. But that is a, a pop artist who told a whole story as we're talking about on this record of coming into her own, responding to the struggles of young romance, but also of like, just like needing to earn respect as a young woman. So I think that's a great nomination. Olivia Scott. I don't want to discount

the storytellers

that are in these

categories, because I think all of these albums are filled with beautiful cathartics stories put to insane melody. But I also think it is a very political move to have these main categories dominated by mainly women and women of cross generations, considering all of the backlash that the Grammys has been going through these last couple of years. The former president of the recruiting academy, Neil Portnau, he was actually just accused and had a civil case filed against him, alleging he sexually assaulted and raped a woman years ago. And this is the same person who a few years ago, when he was beefing with Ariana Grande performing Happy Wars. And then there were not many women in the field of the major categories. He said, Oh, well, you know, women, women in music need to step up like they need to do a bit better. And now I think with the sea change in leadership, also in the voting pool, we're seeing a lot more women who have been stepping up, have been telling stories pushed to the forefront. And no, it's not just our darlings like Taylor Swift.

I would reinforce what you're saying, Sid, by noting the omission in this category, which would be kind of like the rock album by a veteran or young veteran act that always ends up in album of the year. For example, last year, that would have been Coldplay's music of the Spears was nominated. We don't have a record like that. Unless, unless Lana's record is that record.

In past years, there usually would be a place in this list for something like the Foo Fighters. But here we are. You would have maybe a place on this list for a major country star like Morgan Wallen, who had a massive, massive, massive commercial year. And the fact that that that's eight artists and seven of them are women is a major sea change, absolutely.

Yeah, but it's also maybe, you know, mentioning the country thing makes me think it is a major sea change. But in another way, it is the status quo. And that the country artists who might have been nominated in this category is Zach Bryan. And Zach Bryan had a huge record this past year. He is a total leader in the country space also in the rock space and the American space, you know, kind of a genre-defying artist. And he was overlooked. I think that's partly because he's so vociferously independent. And you know, he's, you know, he kind of refuses to play the game, even though that is a version of playing the game, it must be noted, be in the Rebel.