Taylor Swift, Kendrick Lamar: Two Americas and one big Grammy
|
Version 0 of 1. When the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences unfurls its list of Grammy nominees every December, it’s one of those news items that travels fast, especially in uncertain times. It’s a pompy declaration that satisfies our least imaginative hunches, giving us an opportunity to say, “I knew it!” when we don’t really know anything anymore. On Monday morning, we knew it. Taylor Swift had been nominated for three of the most coveted Grammys, including album of the year for “1989,” her quintuple-platinum, consciousness-devouring fifth album. [Grammy nominations 2016 list: Kendrick Lamar, Taylor Swift, The Weeknd lead nominees] Then there was that other thing that we only sort-of knew: “To Pimp a Butterfly,” a cerebral and virtuosic offering from California rapper Kendrick Lamar, had been nominated for album of the year, too. On top of that, Lamar had earned the most nominations overall, 11. That part was a surprise. And at an awards show that has long been bloated with trophies — an insensible 83 categories total — that’s the tidy, binary narrative we should expect to take hold over the next two months: Taylor vs. Kendrick, two very different pop stars whose albums have filled our psychic airspace with two very different portraits of American life. Taylor Swift’s America, according to “1989”: Falling out of love is complicated, loyal friends are rare, New York City is Oz for white people, and when society turns your private life into gossip, you must do your best to shake it off, shake it off. Kendrick Lamar’s America, according to “To Pimp a Butterfly”: Celebrity is complicated, the police are corrupt, this country is a nightmare for black people, and when society tries to annihilate your humanity, you must tell yourself that we gon’ be alright. Grammy voters tend to cast their ballots for music that feels comfortingly familiar, unabashedly populist, socially righteous and is commercially successful — and fans have heard complex combinations of all of those things in both “1989” and “To Pimp a Butterfly.” So it should be interesting to see whether and how Swift and Lamar attempt to stoke voter excitement between now and the big night. Working a crowd is one of Swift’s many gifts. Back in October, while the Grammy ballots were being drafted, a story was published about how she reacted to losing 2014’s album of the year prize to the French robots of Daft Punk. Here’s how Swift handled it: She skipped the parties and went straight home to shed a few tears. Here’s the message she was sending to Grammy voters: Please don’t make me cry again, you heartless scoundrels, thank you. Lamar plays the game, too. He never appeared more compromised than he did up on the Grammy stage last year when he was shoehorned into a nonsensical duet with Imagine Dragons, a Las Vegas rock band of astounding mediocrity. But what the Grammy machine wants, the Grammy machine gets — from artists who are eager to win Grammys, anyway. And when the 58th Grammy Awards ceremony takes place in Los Angeles on Feb. 15, we might see Swift and Lamar playing the game together. In May, Lamar put an odd smudge on his remarkable year by rapping awkwardly over a remix of Swift’s summer-owning single “Bad Blood.” Seven months later, the collaboration is up for the best pop duo/group performance and best music video Grammys. If these two end up performing it together on Grammy night, at least we’ll be able to say, “I knew it.” |