[h=1]Grammys 2012 – live coverage[/h] Live coverage of the 2012 Grammy awards as the death of Whitney Houston looms over the 54th ceremony in Los Angeles. Live blogging: Brian Braiker and Joshua Alston
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British singer Adele arrives at the 54th annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles, California. Photograph: Danny Moloshok/REUTERS
11.14pm: AWARD! Adele wins for record of the year for "Rolling in the Deep."
Brian – Adele just thanked "radio programmers" for playing her track. This is 2012, right?
Joshua – Hey, give her a break Brian, you start to run out of people to thank when you win every award ever.
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11.12pm: Performance: Nicky Minaj[/h]
Brian – Nicki flips Busta's classic Scenario verse and slips into I Feel Pretty and then tosses to a pre-filmed spoof on the Exorcist. And now here's Roman Holiday, a live setpiece for her new single. Look, she's fierce. She gets a lifetime pass for her verse on Kanye's Monster. This is a pop star I can get behind. (Lana del Rey should take notes on how to do artifice with conviction.) Here's what Minaj told
AOL's Boombox about the possibility of winning a Grammy:
At the end of the day, everyone wants to be recognized and everyone wants to at least feel like you recognize that this is hard work. People think that they can become an artist overnight. People think that a cute face or a nice car makes them a rapper. But a musician is so much more than that. But in terms of me and my career, the
Grammys is everything. It's the only thing to a music artist. It's what you live for. This is what you work for.
– Can I totally opt-out of the National Dialogue about the Nicki Minaj performance? I just want to opt-out of it. I'm not going near the watercooler all day tomorrow.
10.54pm: Brian – I think a performance featuring Chris Brown, the Foo Fighters, Deadmau5, Lil Wayne and David Guetta was slated to be a set piece in Dante's sequel to Inferno, which he died before finishing: Inferno 2, Electro Boogaloo.
Just checking: dubstep is what Mitt Romney was talking about when he said "the worst of what Europe has become" right?
Joshua – Um, yeah, I gotta say that was pretty terrible. And since when do people get second performances? Chris Brown and Foo Fighters both got two times at bat. What's Bruno Mars gotta do?
10.49pm:
[h=2]The Whitney Houston Tribute – Jennifer Hudson[/h]
Joshua – That was a really lovely tribute to Whitney by Jennifer Hudson, but I wish they had done a little something more. "I Will Always Love You" is a great song, and in many ways her signature song, and also a song that worked as a tribute. But I wish they had figured out a way to represent more of her career, perhaps in a medley of some kind. Obviously the producers didn't have a huge amount of time to put something together, but this was a little too quiet for me, a little too elegiac. I'd have liked something slightly more celebratory.
Janine – Beautiful. Something in my eye.
10.37pm: AWARD! The best new artist Grammy goes to Bon Iver.
Brian – Ahh, yes. Bon Iver. Best "new" artist. I remember when his breakthrough record came out … in 2008. "I am a little bit uncomfortable up here. But with that discomfort I have a sense of gratitude," he said, accepting his award. Let's compare that to what he said he would say in December if he
won the Grammy: "
Everyone should go home, this is ridiculous. You should not be doing this. We should not be gathering in a big room and looking at each other and pretending that this is important.' That's what I would say.
Joshua – Best new artist is invariably controversial. This time last year, Esperanza Spalding was upsetting a nation of hormonal tweens by besting Justin Bieber in the category. Nicki Minaj was the front runner based on stardom and name recognition, but the Bon Iver selection isn't terribly surprising. After a history of giving this award to one-hit wonder types, NARAS voters lean towards more serious musicians rather than pop stars.
Rebecca – My old math teacher Mr Cooper walks away with best new artist! I suppose, at an event which has featured Tony Bennett, Glen Campbell and Paul McCartney, winning a new artist gong for your massive second album is not so extraordinary. The humble speech is having quite a year.
10.31pm: Janine – For some viewers, the Grammys can be a gruelling marathon.
Seth Rogan has a suggestion.
10.30pm: Brian – And now the academy is taunting us with a list all the other Lifetime Achievement nominees that didn't get to perform tonight. Oh what I'd give to see the Allman Brothers, backed by the Memphis Horns and joined by Diana Ross singing Jobim.
10.23pm: Brian – I reckon that's the closest we're going to get to an Amy Winehouse tribute tonight. (Not to diminish her moment – Adele deserved it.) NOW BRING ME SOME GLEN CAMPBELL AND SOME BACON-INFUSED BOURBON. I cannot wait for this.
And the Rhinestone Cowboy looks great in his Nudie jacket and sounds good! This is a nice, touching moment. I wish there were about 80% fewer orchestras on stage with him.
Janine – Glenn Campbell is not lip synching. Macca is singing along in the audience. Love that.
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10.11pm: Performance: Adele[/h]
Adele accepts her award for best pop solo performace at the Grammys. Photograph: Mario Anzuoni/Reuters
Janine – Gwyneth Paltrow takes time out from her 43rd cleanse of the year to introduce Adele. Simply standing on the stage in front of her band, she demonstrates that her voice is back with a powerful rendition of Rolling in the Deep.
Brian – I hope Adele's surgeon gets a Grammy.
Janine – Here's Adele's doctor on
how he saved her voice.
Joshua – This was a colossal moment for her. She looked fantastic, and while she wobbled a little in the beginning, she sounded really strong. The crowd flipped out. It was practically a coronation.
10.00pm: AWARD! Lady Antebellum picks up the Grammy for Best Country Album for "Own the Night."
Rebecca –
Lady Antebellum make me feel more English than I've ever felt in my life. Is it stadium-country? Garth Brooks-style? Do they wear headsets under their cowboy hats? I like Taylor Swift, but she's probably got enough awards for one night. Although if Taylor Swift had done a Kanye on Lady Antebellum I would have liked her even more.
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9.59pm: Performance: Katy Perry[/h]
Singer Katy Perry performs at the Staples Center during the 54th Grammy Awards in Los Angeles. Photograph: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images
Brian: Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj need to team up and star as anime super heroines in the Speed Racer sequel. They'd be great Miyazaki characters.
Joshua: Katy Perry's new Part of Me has officially replaced Kelly Clarkson's Since You Been Gone as the Official pop-rock breakup kiss-off song. That performance was brilliant, both as awards-show pyrotechnics and narrative pop stardom.
Brian – Relevant: Stand-up comic and Twitter god Rob Delaney
analyzes the lyrics to Katy Perry's TGIF for Vice.
I heard your song "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)" recently and I felt compelled to write you and share my analysis. Lyrically, it's basically just an attempt to piece together a crazy night of drinking on the morning after. But let's take a closer look!
9.55pm: AWARD! Adele and her co-writer Paul Epworth win the Grammy for song of the year for "Rolling in the Deep."
Joshua – This is shaping up to be a huge night for Adele. If she gets the post-Grammy sales bump that artists typically do, "21" is going to rack up even more sales. The comparisons to Carole King's "Tapestry" are starting to sound more and more apt.
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9.53pm: Performance: Taylor Swift[/h]
Taylor Swift and Neil Patrick Harris arrive at the Grammys. Photograph: Chris Pizzello/AP
Brian – Taylor Swift strumms her banjo, which looks like it weighs about as much as her, as if it was a guitar. Dressed like a Dust Bowl era Steinbeck character, winking like a Teen Vogue cover girl. Someone needs to give that girl a whiskey and a clawhammer lesson. Song title: Mean. Is she singing to Kanye?
Joshua – This Taylor Swift performance is really bizarre. You nailed it Brian. I can't help but think of A Mighty Wind. I'm still trying to spot Jane Lynch and Parker Posey.
9.39pm: AWARD! The Grammy for best R&B album goes to Chris Brown for F.A.M.E.
Rebecca – Oh good. Here's Chris Brown, walking away with best R&B album. Perhaps he'll get another standing ovation. I like to think that the first one was less for his performance, more for the fact that he managed not to hit a woman on his way here this evening.
Joshua–Tonight does seem, perhaps, the beginning of a "redemption of Chris Brown" narrative. NARAS voters have apparently gotten past the domestic abuse incident, even if a lot of people will never forgive him. His brief speech was pretty shrewd.
9.38pm: Brian –
Stevie Wonder is a national treasure. "I just want to say to Whitney up in heaven. We all love you Whitney Houston." And then he plays the melody from Love Me Do on harmonica to introduce Paul McCartney. There is nobody cooler on earth than Steveland Hardaway Judkins. Who else on earth could successfully rock a braided mullet with male pattern baldness? And who else on earth could introduce Sir Paul? Macca looking dapper in the tux he wore to his Bar Mitzvah. And is that Joe Walsh on guitar, sporting a distinctive GE Smith vibe. I guess Funk 49 royalties only get you so far.
9.36pm: Rebecca – Where are all the actual awards at these Grammy "Awards", you may be wondering? Most of them were doled out this afternoon at a pre-ceremony ceremony, to little-known underdogs like Foo Fighters, Adele, Kanye West and Taylor Swift. Less likely victors were bro-step's leading light Skrillex, who picked up three for his trademark wub-wub noise assault, and classy country-folk duo Civil Wars, who walked away with two. There were roughly 2893 other winners, though none of these categories explain why Mary Mary were being interviewed on the red carpet, sandwiched in between Cut Copy and Ministry.
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9.34pm: Performance – Foster the People and The Beach Boys[/h]
The Beach Boys perform with Foster the People at the Grammys. Photograph: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images
Brian: I lost internet connection for a bit there. I suspect TimeWarner Cable was too outraged by the Foster the People-Beach Boys duet to let me watch it.
Anyway, here's is a lovely thing that
Ben Ratliff of the New York Times wrote last week about the Beach Boys, who are enjoying their 50th anniversary this year. They are charter members of a club that includes the Rolling Stones, El Gran Combo and the Chieftans.
Janine – All becomes clear: they put the **** Beach Boys covers in so that the actual Beach Boys would look better in comparison.
9.14pm: AWARD! Foo Fighters win the Grammy for best rock performance for Walk.
Rebecca – In the battle of the beards, Dave Grohl has emerged triumphant. Neat, groomed and manly. Wait, this wasn't the best facial hair category category? Are you sure? This Grammy seems to have fallen to Foo Fighters by default, since they were the only rock band doing rock music in the running for best rock performance. I wonder if Chris Martin could grow a beard like that?
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9.07pm: Performance – Rihanna and Coldplay[/h]
Joshua: This Coldplay-assisted version of "We Found Love" is really working for Rihanna. The visuals are a little retro though. And I'm almost certain I mean retro in the negative way.
Brian: I'm sorry, I just fell asleep. I'll get back to live blogging as soon as Chris Martin's voice stops changing. These are hard times in a young man's life and I commend his bravery for performing in public.
Janine: This will be playing over a montage of X Factor losers shortly.
Related: We're getting a Chipotle ad here in New York which features a a cover by Willie Nelson of Coldplay's The Scientist, r
econfigured as a hymn to traditional agricultural methods. It is my favourite thing about the Grammys so far and I am downloading it now.
Willie Nelson covers Coldplay in a Chipotle commercial [h=2]
8.58pm: Performance – Foo Fighters[/h]
Brian – Everyone noticed that Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters is wearing a Slayer t-shirt, right? Which makes perfect sense given the obvious influence Slayer has had on this song. He's 43, though, and I can only hope to look this good when I'm 43. In mumblenumber years. This song, Learning to Walk, is really weak though. Remember when Grohl was in Nirvana?
8.37pm: AWARD! Jay-Z and Kanye West win the Grammy for best rap performance for Otis.
Joshua – Jay and Kanye aren't there to pick up their award. Maybe they're in Paris getting f'd up?
Rebecca – No denying that Jay-Z and Kanye's Otis was the standout rap performance among a lacklustre shortlist, though it's a shame Nicki Minaj didn't win, if only because it would have been nice to see the Pope spitting a few bars.
Brian – Yo Kanye, I'm really happy for you, I'ma Let you finish, but you already flipped the best Otis Redding sample of all time – OF ALL TIME – on Gone, off of 2005's Late Registration. Otis is seriously
thin in comparison: