The Grammy nominations were announced yesterday with the usual amount of manufactured drama and very little in the way of surprises. We have the usual players here, Dave Matthews Band, Beyonce, Black Eyed Peas, and the hits just keep on coming. In my opinion, this is the most embarrassing list of nominees we’ve ever seen. Should I be surprised? Of course not. This is an industry that is bound and determined to make “Irrelevent” it’s mantra. When Black Eyed Peas are nominated for Album Of The Year, there is zero hope for a music industry. How many more Madonna/Britney/Lady GaGa’s does a person need? Where is the innovation? What happened to rewarding artists for creating something special, instead of rewarding people for a persona or for a bunch of beats strung together? I really feel there’s a huge undercurrent in recent years for rewarding a persons sales, rather than for doing something truly interesting like say a Girl Talk, or an Animal Collective or Grizzly Bear. Hell, we don’t even see them in the alternative nominees. It brought me a bit of hope that Kings of Leon, MGMT and Silversun Pickups were nominated, but for every one of these we see the same old retreads, Hall and Oates? Clapton/Winwood? (I like Hall and Oates as much as the next guy, but come on). Phoenix was nominated in the alternative category, so at least they got that right. In the end, these nominees do seem to get worse every year. With all the categories they have, it seems to me they could do a lot more to promote innovative artists. Why is it such a surprise that people have turned to the internet to find their music? It’s the only place where music fans have found outlets that “get it”. For all the griping about the indie blog infliuence, I thank God for it. If not for that, where would we find anything interesting to listen to? We’re certain not to find it on the Grammy broadcast, that’s for sure.

Song of the Year:

• Poker Face, Lady Gaga
• Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It), Beyonce
• Use Somebody, Kings of Leon
• You Belong with Me, Taylor Swift
• Pretty Wings, Maxwell

Record of the Year:

• Halo, Beyonce
• I Gotta Feeling, Black Eyed Peas
• Use Somebody, Kings of Leon
• Poker Face, Lady Gaga
• You Belong With Me, Taylor Swift

Album of the Year:

• I Am … Sasha Fierce, Beyonce
• The E.N.D., Black Eyed Peas
• The Fame, Lady Gaga

Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King, Dave Matthews Band

• Fearless, Taylor Swift

more nominees under the cut…
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When I moved out to Los Angeles a little over a year ago, my major motivation was the access to a greater range of cinematic options than I was getting in the midwest. And that’s certainly held true. But what I didn’t expect to find (at least not to the degree I have) is such a vibrant, booming music scene. Consider this a love letter to LA and the fantastic music I’ve found here. It’s literally possible to go to a show nearly every day of the week and find bands I like, and pretty inexpensively, too. Even going much less often than that (three or four times a month), I’ve discovered many bands that keep me coming back for their shows, opening bands that I seek out everywhere they play, and seen what a great and supportive music culture exists here (if you look at the band line-ups below, you’ll find several people who are in multiple bands – nearly everyone is involved in more than one project, creating really interesting cross-pollination). I’ve arranged them roughly from lesser known to better known (sort of an opening band – second opening band – headliner sort of thing), but that’s not completely accurate. Just a general rule of thumb.

A mural in Silver Lake, the center of the LA music / arts culture

All songs in one zip: I Love LA Mix.

1. Hello from Reno – It Comes and Goes

2. The Sweet Hurt – Bright Ideas

3. The Belle Brigade – 4%

4. Angie Mattson – Leanne

5. Local Natives – Airplanes

6. Obi Best – Swedish Boy

7. The One AM Radio – Old Men

8. Army Navy – Dark As Days

9. Earlimart – Face Down in the Right Town

10. The Whispertown 2000 – Pushing Oars

11. Juliette Commagère – Overcome

12. Lavender Diamond – Open Your Heart

13. Great Northern – Fingers

14. The Airborne Toxic Event – Gasoline

15. Munchausen by Proxy – Uh-Huh

16. The Submarines – Xavia

17. The Bird and the Bee – Love Letter to Japan

18. Jenny Lewis – The Highs and Lows of Being Number One

19. Silversun Pickups – Panic Switch

20. Rilo Kiley – I Love LA

The tracks provided here are for sampling only. If you like the bands, please support them by buying their music and going to their shows. If you are or represent any of these bands and would like the .mp3s removed, please let me know. Full mix details are after the jump, with info and photos for every band. Most photos are not mine. Promo-type photos obviously aren’t. Crappy iPhone-looking concert photos probably are.

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So this is a half-assed review and recap of Lollapalooza 2009, but quite honestly this festival is so big with so much to do and see yet there is still so much I missed, words just aren’t really adequate. I will say this for starters, Sunday was the most fun I’ve ever had at any concert. Ever. Not necessarily the “best” show or even legendary show I’ve seen; it was 150% pure joy and adrenaline. I’ve never experienced anything quite like how happy Jane’s Addiction made me.

Other highlights: sitting next to Tom Gray from Gomez at Breakfast. Seeing Kings of Leon at the Pub Friday night. A fat guy passed out but still managing to roll in the mud and his own vomit. White Lies. No Security. Good friends. Old friends. New friends. Cheap food. Free Water. Friendly people. Yeah Yeah Yeahs playing just a brief bit of “What ya Want” by The Beastie Boys. Museum of Contemporary Art. New Belt Buckle (pictured below). Striking a good deal with the art dealer. Trees.

So here’s a recap of my personal weekend mostly told through images and photos that I managed to shoot while partying my ass off…

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As hard as it will be, I’ll be missing out on seeing Band of Horses (possibly my favorite band overall of the last two years) in at Lolla this year in favor of seeing a band I’ve not yet seen: Silversun Pickups. One of the first recommendations in the Lolla handbook is to definitely skip out on bands you’ve already seen (even if you really really like them) in lieu of trying something new or something you might not be able to ever see again. Since I’ve seen BoH twice, I’m going to be checking out this slightly more bubble-gum version of Smashing Pumpkins (circa 1999).

Last night Silversun Pickups played a private short set at PC Richard and Son Theater in the Tribeca neighborhood of NYC after their performance at All Points West Fesitval. Looking at the set list, it appears they sort of went back and forth from playing tunes from the new album, “Swoon” and from the previous record, “Carnavas.” Perfect. They ended the show with their most popular song to date, “Lazy Eye”, which you can hear below along with the full set list from last night’s show.

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SETLIST:
Growing Old is Getting Old
Well Thought Out Twinkles
Substitution
Panic Switch
Creation Lake (cover)
Lazy Eye

Me too. That’s why I had a ball for the last many minutes checking out their live performance over at Spinner studios. I’ve included one below, but you can check out four or five more over HERE.

I‘ve never made it to a music festival before (largely because I didn’t really get into festival-type music until a few years ago), but when this year’s Coachella featured several of my favorite bands I decided to spring for it, since it’s the biggest festival close enough for me to drive to rather than fly. And even though everything’s overpriced, it’s hotter than Hades, and I ended up only seeing full sets from seven bands rather then the eleven or twelve I wanted to see, it was worth it. The downside is I think I’ve caught the festival bug – I’m drooling over the Lollapalooza lineup Andrew posted the other day.

Anyway, here’s a recap of my subset of Coachella, which woefully underrepresents the available audio overload. Especially since I skipped Sunday altogether – fewer bands I wanted to see meant I didn’t care to spend the money for the extra day and night.

Details of bands after the jump.

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I have to confess that the first time I saw the Silversun Pickups, I was heartily unenthused. They opened for Snow Patrol on a tour in early 2007, and I don’t know what it was, but I just didn’t like them at all. Then last year I started hearing some snippets from their 2006 album Carnavas, and getting more and more into it every time until I finally got the whole album. And now, well, let’s just say Silversun Pickups are one of two or three bands I’m most looking forward to at Coachella next week.

Their new album Swoon drops next Tuesday (April 14th), and I’m liking “Panic Switch,” the first single off it. Here’s the video for it – warning, it may cause seizures. The Metric video I posted a couple of weeks ago was one shot. I roughly estimate that this one cuts somewhere around every five frames on average.

Hat tip: The Scenestar