2013 GRAMMYS

The Gramophone Awards, now called GRAMMYS, reflect the music of today.  Last year Adele won all six major awards.  The biggest winner last night was a group,l The Black Keys, with four.  There were 81 trophies bestowed.  Hawaii got shut out.

My initial reaction was that a tectonic shift is happening with acts like the The Black Keys (Dan Auerback and Patrick Carney):

and Mumford and Sons, which got Album of the Year for "Babel":

Who are they?  Four of the five Best New Artists/Groups were white, and the awardee was fun..  yes, a lower case f with a period at the end:

Where did they come from?  Well, they are an American indie pop band from New York.  Their "We are Young" won "Song of the Year."  Record of the Year was "Somebody I Used to Know" by Gotye (yes, he too sings indie pop and is also known as Wouter "Wally" De Backer), featuring Kimbra (right):

What is the difference between Song and Record?  Okay, did some research, and record has to do with performer and producer, while song recognies the songwriter.

Look back again at those photos.  Do you notice anything odd for recent GRAMMYS?  Well, they're all white.  There were still four rap, six religious and eight classical Grammys, but none was shown.  There were only four country and western trophies, but my sense was that, if what I saw was representative, black music is being replaced by white country plus this retro American indieish sound that leans towards the former.  Anyway, the combination of major winners and programming gave that impression.

In any case, I did not recognize even one song winning an award, showing how out of touch I am with the reality of today.    I posted on the 2012 GRAMMYS and kind of enjoyed that one. Not this year.  But hear are some photo highlights with  Taylor Swift:                                                                                                                                                                               

Frank Ocean:

Did he steal from the Eagle's Hotel California for his American Wedding?  No suit yet.

A mash of Bruno Mars, Sting and Rihanna with two Marleys, Ziggy and Damian, in a tribute to their father:

And Justin Timberlake must have really been owed something from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the USA for giving him center stage for his sneak preview of a new JT next month:

When I awoke this morning I saw this enormous rainbow which was three-fourths of a full circle.  I rushed to get a camera, but by the time I took the photo below only a few seconds later, all I got was this typical Honolulu rainbow:

I know a full circle is possible because I saw this a couple of times a year from my Coronet penthouse in the 80's.

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