Death by Committee

Over the years, the notorious secret committees that held controversial sway over GRAMMY AWARD nominations both giveth and taketh away. The complete snub of the WEEKND this year was widely seen as a case of the latter. But, as CHRIS WILLMAN points out in Variety, the same committees presumably were also responsible, for example, for the out-of-the-blue—and well-deserved—Album of the Year nomination for BRANDI CARLILE's BY THE WAY, I FORGIVE YOU at the 2019 Grammys, and quite possibly for the recognition of HAIM's WOMEN IN MUSIC PT. III this year. The committees made a lot of WTF choices, Willman writes, but among them were "a lot of *good* WTF choices."

After years of complaints, including from its own CEO less than two years ago—the RECORDING ACADEMY, at the time, kept the committees and got rid of the CEO—the Academy suddenly and decisively voted the committees, or at least most of them, out of existence on Friday. By and large they probably won't be missed. Superstar and big-event and widely acclaimed albums and singles by future TAYLOR SWIFTs and LIZZOs and KENDRICK LAMARs no doubt will continue to get recognized, and if WTFs like JACOB COLLIER's and COLDPLAY's most recent albums, both of which got 2021 nods, get passed over, it's hard to believe anyone will notice.

But was Friday's vote, which included a number of other tweaks to the nominating process, an overcorrection? When they were created in 1989—the year of JETHRO TULL's infamous hard rock/metal Grammy—the committees' purpose was to add a layer of vetting to the Grammy nominations, which are initially chosen by the Academy's entire voting membership, to make sure they didn't make the Academy look silly or out-of-touch. The Academy will continue to use them going forward in specialty categories including production, album packaging and historical recordings, while eliminating them for genre nominations (pop, R&B, rap, Latin, etc.) and the general categories like Album of the Year and Record of the Year. Might it have made sense to keep the committees, or some version of them, while working harder to root out the conflicts of interest and corruption that ex-CEO DEBORAH DUGAN and others complained about? Could they have been retained in a less active, more advisory, role? Or was it an easier, better choice to simply eliminate them and any stink associated with them, and to let the popular vote be the popular vote, no questions asked?

One oddity that always struck me in stories about how the committees worked was the image of committee members sitting in a room listening to all the albums put forward by the general membership and then winnowing the list of nominees down. Here's the Academy's current interim CEO, HARVEY MASON JR., explaining last November: "We listen to all the music—even an album, you’re listening to almost the whole album, it takes I don’t know how many hours. It’s a long, arduous process and people take pride in it." That's not how normal people listen to music. Movies and books are generally designed to be understood in a single viewing or reading. Records, on the other hand, are meant to be absorbed over time. Music fans listen to singles and albums dozens of times over weeks, months and years, in headphones, in cars, at clubs, alone, with friends, etc. You can't listen to the Weeknd's AFTER HOURS once, in a conference room, or at home, or in a car on the way to the conference room, and know if it's Grammy-worthy or not. That's not how recorded music works. Recorded music is, almost by definition, an art of repetition.

Which is to say, maybe it wasn't a problem of conflicts or corruption or unnecessary meddling. Maybe they were just doing it wrong.

Word Up

Did little-known Petaluma, Calif., metal band DIG THE GRAVE get members of LAMB OF GOD, MASTODON, TRIVIUM, ANTHRAX and several other bands to be in its video—to, in fact, be the video—by buying their time on CAMEO? That appears to be the conclusion of the metal community, which gives the band's "ISO" video two well-deserved devil's horns. You are—admit it—mad at yourself for not thinking of this first.

Etc Etc Etc

LAURA SNAPES' profile of BILLIE EILISH for British Vogue serves as one more piece of confirmation, in case anyone needed it, that Eilish is as strong, insightful and self-aware a teenage pop star as we've seen in a long time. A fantastic read, covering some difficult territory... New buyer in town: TEMPO MUSIC INVESTMENTS, which is partnered with WARNER MUSIC and reportedly has $1 billion to play with, has bought catalog rights (paywall) from the JONAS BROTHERS, FLORIDA GEORGIA LINE, WIZ KHALIFA, JEFF BHASKER, SHANE MCANALLY and others... Nine-year-old DJ MICHELLE, from the United Arab Emirates, will be the youngest artist ever to compete at the DMC WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS.

Rest in Peace

Bassist and songwriter TONY MARKELLIS, a longtime PHISH and TREY ANASTASIO collaborator... Original JUDAS PRIEST drummer JOHN HINCH, who left the band after its debut album, ROCKA ROLLA, to become an artist manager... WILL MECUM, lead guitarist for West Virginia stoner rock band KARMA TO BURN... MALCOLM CAMPBELL, a publishing executive for Spin, the Fader and Blender...DUSTIN BOYER, owner of Indianapolis honky-tonk DUKE'S INDY.