Now That We Found Love

I had a dream last night that I was on a bus.  A black woman in her 30s was also on the bus, and she was railing against contemporary culture.  Politics, art, fashion, film, and (most importantly) music were all criticized for their shallowness, their violence and misogyny, their lack of aesthetic couth.  With a final rhetorical flourish, she addressed all of us riding on the bus, laying the blame on her fellow riders for all that was lacking in society:  "I love this city, but I hate its people!"  And with that, she got off the bus.  

The ghost of Heavy D (yes, really) suddenly appeared sitting to me right.  He tapped me on the shoulder, leaned over, and said:  "I don't know, man.  I love the music."  

End of dream.  

I have no idea what that means, but I think it's kind of telling that I remembered this dream, when I hardly ever remember any of my other dreams.  I'm not sure this dream has much insight into either the past year or the year to come; I seem to be suffering from a general lack of insight all around.  But I love the music, too.  See you in 2012. 

Album of the Year

The Grammy nominations came out this week.  As is customary, the nominations elicit an equal number of thumbs-ups and WTFs.  One of the more bizarre items on the list is Bon Iver's nomination as Best New Artist (snubbing Pittsburgh native Wiz Khalifa).  There's really no universe in which Bon Iver can be considered a new artist.  The Grammy time lags lead to all sorts of weirdness, including the fact that Rihanna's Loud (released in November of 2010) is still eligible this year, when she has already released another album, Talk That Talk.  Similarly, Kanye's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy has to compete against his duet album with Jay-Z, Watch the Throne--not sure where I stand on that battle.  

Anyway, I just made a playlist of all of the albums nominated for Album of the Year.  So, that's 21 by Adele, Born this Way by Lady Gaga, Doo Wops and Hooligans by Bruno Mars, Wasting Light by the Foo Fighters, and the aforementioned Loud by Rihanna.  Wasting Light is the wild card on this list for me:  I haven't heard a single thing from it.  Everything else has been played pretty incessantly on pop radio that you would had to have made a special effort to avoid, for example, "Grenade" or "Edge of Glory," to say nothing of "Someone Like You."  There may be a radio station somewhere that, in fact, only plays "Someone Like You."  Lord knows that may be a more successful format than some of the stuff you hear while spinning your FM dial.  

So this is going to be my gym mix this week.  In particular, I'm going to try to give the Foo Fighters a serious listen:  in homage to my 14-year-old self, if nothing else.  Right now, however, I think the smart money is on Adele winning Album of the Year--along with every other award for which she is nominated.  And, as I said to a few folks before the nominees were announced, I think Adele might win all of next year's Grammys, too--and then perhaps be awarded last year's Grammys retrospectively.  I'm not sure that 21 is my favorite record of this year, but it's a pretty stunning blend of chops and pop appeal.  Not many records get made like that.