Awards that recognize talent are great but when it becomes a popularity contest the shows lose all meaning
I’m drinking coffee that is far too weak for a Monday morning. I’m drinking weak coffee because it is Monday morning. You know, the kind where you think you’re pouring the beans into the grinder but half of them are actually missing and falling onto the floor kind of morning. As a result, my coffee is very much like last night’s American Music Awards: Weak and bland to the point of nearly being useless.
What, you didn’t realize that the American Music Awards (AMAs) were last night? Welcome to the club. I woke this morning to something in my newsfeed about Ariana Grande thanking her fans for sticking by her during her emotional collapse this year. I’m not making light of serious mental conditions when I respond with: YAWN. She’s had a rough year. That’s not a problem. She’s surviving and that’s wonderful. But does that deserve a music award? Probably not.
Maybe I’m the only one who feels this way, and if so then I’ll apologize, but it seems to me the preponderance of awards shows, especially in the field of music, has become so numerous that it dilutes the value of all of them. Even the Grammy awards, which I still consider the best of the group, has lost some of its sparkle because, hey, if you didn’t win one of those then we’ll just for the next awards show and get you one then. If we’re going to bother giving out awards, they need to actually mean something. Otherwise, it’s just a group of musicians getting together, patting each other on the back, and exchanging tour dates. Those who genuinely enjoy music deserve more.
Music has a PR problem
I realize I’m reaching back before the dawn of time for some of you, but I remember watching two awards shows when I was a kid: the Grammys and the Oscars. Those were the big ones because my parents had made the decision that those two were culturally significant enough to justify my staying up past my bedtime to watch. The awards meant something, were reflective of our values as a society, and established a bar for the level of performance. Slowly, other awards shows started popping up, but I didn’t get to stay up late for those. My parents deemed them questionable both in terms of value and content.
Since then, the list has expanded even more, especially in the field of music. In addition to the Grammys and the AMAs, there are multiple MTV awards and people’s choice awards and country music awards and rock music awards and music video awards, and the list just keeps growing. Add in all the culture-specific awards shows and one could pretty much attend a music awards show every week, sometimes two. The number has exceeded any amount of reason. There is no requirement for quality in music for awards shows and many of the industry’s problems are reflective of that fact.
Of course, it doesn’t help a bit to have someone out there who goes on long rants then walks out on his own concert before canceling another. I don’t understand why anyone bothers to buy his concert tickets anymore. The industry also isn’t aided by excessive attention over performer’s personal lives rather than their music. Do we really need to know whom Taylor Swift is dating this week? Could Ariana Grande’s problems possibly stem from fans who can’t mind their own damn business and a media that encourages such invasion of personal lives? Surely, we would all do a lot better if we focused on the music and ignored those who only win because they have a huge Instagram following, Zayn.
Music With Meaning
Am I just an old man ranting about all this new-fangled music? I suppose that’s possible, to some extent. Although, I routinely surprise my 18-year-old when I know the words to more popular music than he does. My playlists regularly include Maroon 5, Lady Gaga, Beyoncè, and Bruno Mars. I’ll even toss in some Taylor Swift and Adele every once in a while. I like to think that I’m not completely out of touch. Yet, when I look at the list of last night’s winners, I see a list divided between sentimental favorites (Prince’s Purple Rain for top soundtrack—didn’t we do that already?) and Instagram stars of questionable talent (explain, please, why only having one name is good, Zayn).
Granted, the AMAs have never been known for their quality picks. The awards program began in 1973 as an “alternative to the Grammys.” In other words, a group of people decided that they were tired of their favorite artists not getting awards (largely because their music sucked) and decided to go off and do their own thing. The modern version of the AMAs does the majority of its voting online. As a result, the winners are simply those who are most popular, not the ones who have presented the best music in the previous year. So, we get a former boy band member winning Best New Artist when The Chainsmokers and Shawn Mendes were obviously better (see, I actually listened to the music). All the nominees for Tour of the Year were old school (Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, and Beyoncè). One has to wonder whether those who voted Blake Shelton Best Male Country Artist really listened to his latest album or his marriage-busting relationship with Gwen Stefani.
Looking through the entire list of nominees, I don’t see anything that was actually good on the list. Why? Because all the good music at the moment is coming from independent and small-label artists who don’t get the airplay, or more importantly, don’t have the huge social media followings. You aren’t likely to see those folks at the awards shows.
Your Support Makes A Difference
Entertainment fields are unlike political elections where your vote doesn’t always seem to matter. You vote for movies and music with your wallet. What you buy, matters. What you watch, matters. If you’re buying CDs from a local band, it may not seem like much at the time, but trust me, someone notices. That $5 you just spent on music from your favorite local band is five dollars that didn’t make it into the hands of a major label and they’re watching every penny at this stage of the game.
The same applies to awards shows. If you want a local band to make it big, then they need a ton of support all across social media. We’re not just talking about liking their page or their Instagram account, but sharing songs and photos so that other people have a chance to become familiar with the band or singer. We are living in an age where it is entirely possible for unsigned talent to make it big. Follow them on YouTube. Share their videos. As the numbers grow, the people who run the record labels and awards shows begin to notice.
At the same time, if you’re as tired of the nonsense as I am, then there are some groups and individuals you need to avoid. For me, and this is a personal decision, Zayn falls into the same dumpster pile as that Bieber kid. I didn’t like the group he was in, I don’t like his solo work either. You create your own list. That’s how the system works.
The music industry exists to make money. From your local radio station to your Pandora and Spotify accounts, what matters is where you are spending your money. So, do us all a favor. Stop supporting the folks whose music requires 15 people to write and can’t be covered with a single microphone and a guitar. Stop supporting alleged artists who walk out on their own shows or cancel without good reason. Support artists who are passionate, who write songs you’ll still want to hear 30 years from now. Buy their stuff. Share their stuff.
And turn off the damn awards shows. They need to just go away.
Morning Update: 08/03/24
The AI Edition
Having finished the first week of school, everyone is exhausted this morning. I’m the only one awake at 8:00 and even I slept until 7:00, The cats have been fed, the dogs taken outside and fed, and it occurs to me that, to a limited extent, taking care of them isn’t that much different than working with a small herd of cattle and a couple of horses. The biggest difference is that I don’t have to trudge all the way out to the barn and shovel shit. The kids are still adapting to going back on their meds for school. Kat never gets enough sleep. I know she was up in the middle of the night, around 4:00. We’ll let them rest as I focus on other things.
I don’t know what to do about the lawn. It’s still too wet this morning, thanks to last night’s rains. The East side is growing so thick it’s going to be tough to get the lawnmower through it. I’m not much help, either. If I get much weaker, I’m going to have trouble sitting upright. As it is now, I’m leaning on the armrest to help keep me steady as I sit here and type. I thought we were getting better, but this past week has been a major setback. I’m wanting to go to the fair next week but I’m not sure I should risk it. Even if someone goes with me, I can’t be sure that I’ll make it past the first row of buildings. Knowing that Travis Little has a new art piece on display requires that I at least make an attempt to go see it.
I don’t know if it was an act of collusion or what, but AI seems to be on everyone’s mind this morning. Reuters is leading with a story about how lawsuits filed by major recording labels to stop AI platforms from stealing opens up some severe holes in Copyright Law. Reuters starts the story by telling how easy it was to create a song “in the style of (country star) Tift Merritt) on the Udio platform. You can hear the song here. While Merritt said the AI-generated song would “never make the cut” on one of her albums, it underlines the danger of a world of AI-generated sound as the technology continues to grow. We’ve long known that there’s a strong relationship between math and music. That relationship makes it pretty much just a matter of time before AI can generate music faster and better than any human. I gotta tell you, that hurts my feelings.
This new story comes as video game actors have been on strike all week saying that AI endangers their jobs. “The models that they’re using have been trained on our voices without our consent at all, with no compensation,” “Persona 5 Tactica” voice actor and video game strike captain, Leeanna Albanese, told Reuters on the picket line. This is just the latest AI-related work stoppage. You’ll remember that union actors and writers went on strike last fall for similar reasons. Anyone in any creative field is concerned about the degree to which AI is going to endanger their jobs.
The NY Times is asking if AI is going to take over “meaningless” jobs and, if so, is that really a bad thing. They’re looking specifically at jobs in areas where rote copy/paste bores workers to tears, or software development that’s ultimately never used. One might see an argument for letting AI take the pain away, but where, then, do those workers look for more substantial employment? We’ve been talking on Facebook about a WRTV story romanticizing the days when local teens spent their summers detasseling corn. The general assumption is that modern equipment, most likely AI-based, would do that job now. After hearing one friend talk about how he sprained both wrists in that job, it’s difficult to see any AI development there as a negative.
But at the same time, there’s the story of Sabrina Javellana, a young Florida woman whose political career has been upended by deep fake AI-generated porn that uses her face. Trolls and political enemies have made her life a living nightmare. After talking with attorneys that specialize in revenge porn cases, she was told that there was little she could do that would stop anyone from continuing to produce material that was ruining her career. It’s impossible to defend AI producers in situations such as this.
Good solutions? They don’t exist. Music AI startups Suno and Udio slammed record label lawsuits in court filings and it seems likely that courts could find some merit in their arguments. AI is popping up everywhere. Even as I sit here typing, there is a prompt on the right-hand side of the page offering to “help” me write. Or re-write. I don’t use it primarily because AI doesn’t tend to curse about really bad situations and I like having the ability to say “fuck” whenever it feels appropriate. But does that mean that one day in the future AI could save me a couple of hours’ worth of time? Probably so. We’re going to have to keep working out the kinks and finding some common ground on this issue. AI is not going away, so we have to find ways to work with it.
Moving on, I want to wade into the international argument about Olympic boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan. A lot of people are upset because the Russian-led International Boxing Association, which has been banished from the Olympics by the IOC in a yearslong dispute, banned the two boxers claiming that their unproven and unspecified gender-based tests disqualified both women. Allegations have been flying around social media claiming that Khelif is trans and that her short-lived fight yesterday against Italian competitor Angela Carini was unfair. Some of the most ridiculous comments have come from known transphobes such as J.K. Rowling and the Orange Felon, neither of which should ever be taken seriously ever again. IOC President Thomas Bach came to the girls’ defense last night, saying that the comments were unacceptable, but then the IBA announced that it was awarding the promised $100,000 prize to Carini. This Olympics has really brought out the worst in conservatives worldwide and friends, we’ve gotta call them out on it. Both Khelif and Lin were born women. End of story. To suggest otherwise is nothing short of ignorance and stupidity that doesn’t deserve an audience.
Okay, it’s after 9:00. Here are some other things worth noting. Children of freed sleeper agents learned they were Russians on the flight to Moscow. Seriously. They thought they were Argentinian. Imagine the culture shock the poor kids have coming to them, and the conversations around the dinner table now that they know their parents were Russian spies. Aerosmith retires from touring, citing permanent damage to Steven Tyler’s voice last year. Are we surprised? No, but there’s still this nostalgic feeling of loss as we deal with the fact that the musicians we love are … old. Some Yankee Stadium bleachers fans chant `U-S-A!’ during `O Canada’ before the game against the Blue Jays. This is just stupid. The Jays have been a part of MLB for over 50 years. Such distasteful displays of nationalism need to stop. A Florida attorney has pleaded guilty to using a rifle to try to detonate explosives outside the Chinese embassy last year in Washington, D.C. Why? Because Florida breeds insanity. That’s the only logical reason. I think it’s something in the water down there.
Lastly, you may remember the fuss I made a couple of days ago about the three inmates at Guantanamo getting a plea deal. U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday revoked plea deals agreed to earlier this week. Susan Escallier, who oversees the Pentagon’s Guantanamo war court, was relieved of her authority to enter into plea deals. Austin says he’s handling the matter personally now. Goddammit, we finally do something sane and this fool gives in to conservative backlash and cancels it. At the same time, President Biden is reiterating his intention to close the facility at Guantanamo before he leaves office. Something’s going to have to give somewhere.
Okay, we both need to move on with our days, you and I. There’s still other news, but perhaps we’ll cover that tomorrow.
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