Speaker 1: I'm t T and I'm Zakiah and this is Dope Labs.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Dope Labs, a weekly podcast that mixes hardcore
Speaker 1: science with pop culture and a healthy dose of friendship.
Speaker 1: The Grammys are in a week on February first. Who
Speaker 1: do you think is taking home like Best New Artist? No,
Speaker 1: I don't want anybody I like to take on Best
Speaker 1: New Artists. I want them to have like Album of
Speaker 1: the Year. I hear you, I hear you. Our boy
Speaker 1: Leon Thomas. You yes, you've mentioned him a few times
Speaker 1: on the show. He's up for Best New Artists. He
Speaker 1: is not new to us, you know, right, And that
Speaker 1: made me start thinking, like how does all of this work?
Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Because you've been talking about Leon Thomas for a long time,
Speaker 1: and I remember Leon Thomas from like Victorious, you know,
Speaker 1: like the Disney channelist stuff like that, and so I'm like,
Speaker 1: he's not new, but the Grammys are saying he's new,
Speaker 1: and so that makes me question a lot of things
Speaker 1: that comes to these awards ceremonies. Yes, you know, I
Speaker 1: think it's time we lift the curtain and say what's
Speaker 1: going on with the awards. The Grammys specifically let's jump
Speaker 1: into the recitation. So what do we know? I know,
Speaker 1: the Grammys and low key, a lot of awards shows
Speaker 1: feel like they are removed from what I personally am feeling.
Speaker 1: You talked about. Leon Thompson doesn't feel like a new
Speaker 1: artist to me, but he's up for new artists there,
Speaker 1: and I feel like when it comes to that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, the only award I really trust to be
Speaker 1: for the people and by the people is a Teen
Speaker 1: Choice Awards at Nickelodeon. Okay, that's it. They always get
Speaker 1: it right and they get into the slime just right.
Speaker 3: Okay, Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of huge artists that are
Speaker 1: highly decorated and get a lot of Grammy Awards, but
Speaker 1: then there's also like this other murky side where there's snubs,
Speaker 1: and the snubs you feel impersonal and I don't know
Speaker 1: how this works out. I'm like, who, wait before we
Speaker 1: start jumping into the questions. Let's okay, let's figure out
Speaker 1: what we want to know. And so my very first
Speaker 1: question is who are these people? Who is the academy?
Speaker 1: It feels very like Illuminati, but it's not because I
Speaker 1: think you can find out who's a part of the Academy.
Speaker 1: We just never see these people, and so who are they?
Speaker 1: How are they chosing? I like to take the Academy.
Speaker 1: Who is that? How do they choose the nominees? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and how do they decide who goes into what category?
Speaker 1: You know, we talked with cold before kol Kushna about
Speaker 1: genre and categories, and new categories are popping up every year.
Speaker 1: How do they decide? Yeah, somebody like Doci, it's hard
Speaker 1: to put her in just rap. She does, she does singing,
Speaker 1: she does rap, she does pop like, she does a
Speaker 1: lot of different types of music within her music. And
Speaker 1: so I don't know how they make those decisions. And
Speaker 1: so that's when we start to get into snubs, and
Speaker 1: the snubs are feeling personal, and I begin upset and
Speaker 1: I will turn the TV off. I don't care where
Speaker 1: we are in the award show. If the person who
Speaker 1: I feel like should get it doesn't get I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: and that's why I'm not watching with you. You need to
Speaker 1: learn to control your emotions.
Speaker 3: Leave the TV on, turn the TV off, turn the
Speaker 3: TV off, turn the TV off, turn the TV off.
Speaker 3: To answer all of our burning questions, because you can
Speaker 3: see we have a lot we reached out to Sydney Madden.
Speaker 4: Hi, my name is Sidney Madden. I'm a music and
Speaker 4: cultural critic for the.
Speaker 1: People like me, like Zukiya, who only see the red carpet?
Speaker 1: Can you can you explain what the Recording Academy is,
Speaker 1: who are they and what the Grammys represent.
Speaker 4: The Recording Academy and the Grammys were created back in
Speaker 4: nineteen fifty eight, and it was an award created to
Speaker 4: recognize professionals, musicians and people working in the music industry,
Speaker 4: almost as an alternative because their qualifications wouldn't allow them
Speaker 4: to get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Speaker 4: It's very much an accolade that has come to have
Speaker 4: more meaning as time has gone on, but it's definitely
Speaker 4: on the pomp and circumstance type beat. It is an
Speaker 4: achievement unlike any other in the music industry because it
Speaker 4: touts itself as the only award that is purely peer voted.
Speaker 4: There are other award shows all throughout the year when
Speaker 4: it comes to music and entertainment.
Speaker 2: So if you think about the.
Speaker 4: Mtvvmas, the BET Awards, or the American Music Awards, those
Speaker 4: are awards based on streams or commercial numbers, selling numbers,
Speaker 4: or just pop culture relevance and a publications co sign
Speaker 4: of an artist. But the are fashioned as the only,
Speaker 4: or I should say one of the only, because now
Speaker 4: we have the Latin Grammys and the CMA.
Speaker 2: Is the Country Music Awards.
Speaker 4: It really just marks the top of the mountaintop in
Speaker 4: the music industry because you have all of these people,
Speaker 4: all of these voting members of the Recording Academy, going
Speaker 4: into their specific genre and giving you an official co
Speaker 4: sign of your art.
Speaker 2: That you submit.
Speaker 4: So it just has this relevance and reverberation in culture
Speaker 4: because it is supposed to be the pinnacle of peer
Speaker 4: reviewed art and recognition.
Speaker 1: That's interesting. We have something like that in science, whereas
Speaker 1: peer reviewed I.
Speaker 4: Was gonna say, I was lucky, gonna say, there's very
Speaker 4: few things that can eclipse the Grammys. And if you
Speaker 4: think about it, it's like, yeah, maybe we'ren't winning a Pulitzer,
Speaker 4: which one of our Grammy nominees that we're going to
Speaker 4: talk about this year has already been.
Speaker 2: But he hasn't one album of the air, but he's
Speaker 2: won a Pulitzer.
Speaker 1: So very interesting. I noticed you were saying, like Academy
Speaker 1: members first of all, I think it's great because you
Speaker 1: gave us that history. There's an understanding of like the
Speaker 1: Grimmers weren't always the only game in town and now
Speaker 1: they're at the top. But when we talk about that
Speaker 1: peer review, who are like the Academy members and what
Speaker 1: do you have to do to get into that field?
Speaker 1: Like who says like, okay, we deem you worthy to
Speaker 1: be an Academy member or can you or do you apply?
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's definitely tears in the Recording Academy and to
Speaker 4: be an Academy member. You can be an Academy member,
Speaker 4: but that doesn't mean you get to vote on the Grammys.
Speaker 4: To be a voting member in the Recording Academy, you
Speaker 4: have to be a music maker. So you have to
Speaker 4: be an artist yourself, a songwriter, an engineer, a record exect,
Speaker 4: a manager. You have to be someone who works in
Speaker 4: the music industry very actively, who opts into Recording Academy
Speaker 4: activities and buys into the Recording Academy all year round,
Speaker 4: and I mean like buying culturally. And I think there
Speaker 4: is a dues process that goes along with it as well.
Speaker 4: But you have to be an active member in good
Speaker 4: standing and you have to be someone who touches music
Speaker 4: at some point, you have to be someone who creates
Speaker 4: music and puts it out in the world or has
Speaker 4: a hand in it.
Speaker 1: That's really interesting because I thought it would be like
Speaker 1: a bunch of like old folks, because sometimes the people
Speaker 1: who win, I'm like, who does that hurt?
Speaker 4: That was low key a problem for a long time,
Speaker 4: and that was a big critique of the Grammys. Like
Speaker 4: a long running critique of the Grammy Awards is that
Speaker 4: it's often behind the times.
Speaker 2: Of what is actually covering, which is the music industry.
Speaker 4: So someone like Chance the rapper being the first person
Speaker 4: to ever be nominated off a mixtape when we know
Speaker 4: in hip hop mixtapes have been around since like the
Speaker 4: inception of the whole art former culture and genre. Or
Speaker 4: I'm reminded of when the former CEO of the Recording Academy,
Speaker 4: Neil Portneau said in twenty eighteen, women aren't getting nominated
Speaker 4: enough for the Grammys because women need to quote unquote
Speaker 4: step up in creating their music, which.
Speaker 2: Is ridiculous, I mean sexist.
Speaker 4: Number one and just wrong because pop women in pop
Speaker 4: and R and B ran the twenty tens, and he
Speaker 4: said that in twenty eighteen, and he got a lot
Speaker 4: of flak for that. I know, artists like Mariana Grande
Speaker 4: called him out very explicitly for the sexist overtones of
Speaker 4: that statement. And I think there has been a conscious
Speaker 4: effort and a shift to diversify the voting pool in
Speaker 4: the last few years. Neil is not no longer the CEO,
Speaker 4: and the new CEO is a black man. There's new
Speaker 4: black music coalitions that work within the Recording Academy, and
Speaker 4: there's been a push to get younger, more diversified people
Speaker 4: in the voting pool. Because what happens with the process
Speaker 4: of even being nominated is you, as an artist or
Speaker 4: a label or a management company, you submit for nominations right,
Speaker 4: and then it goes through whole checks and balances process
Speaker 4: where people who are considered genre experts they have to
Speaker 4: decide if you're submitting in the correct genre. And so
Speaker 4: if the genre experts who are doing these checks and
Speaker 4: balances aren't really someone who has their finger on the
Speaker 4: pulse of what's happening in that genre contemporarily, that's why
Speaker 4: a lot of stuff gets filtered through the wrong ways,
Speaker 4: and that's why a lot of things sometimes fall through
Speaker 4: the cracks and become ineligible. But I think with diversifying
Speaker 4: the voting pool in the last few years, we've started
Speaker 4: to see somewhat of a shift in the categories and
Speaker 4: ultimately in who wins.
Speaker 1: That's so interesting. Yeah, because I used to think ineligibility.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, they must have had too many samples,
Speaker 1: like that is all I thought before.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, no, I mean it's not really I should say, like,
Speaker 4: as a disclaimer, I'm not a voting member of the Academy,
Speaker 4: so I'm just saying this from a purely reported point
Speaker 4: of view.
Speaker 2: I know, for example, this year, there's going to be like.
Speaker 4: Ninety five categories being voted on, and two of the
Speaker 4: new categories being introduced this year are Best Traditional Country
Speaker 4: Album and Best Album Cover. So you can see how
Speaker 4: the Recording Academy is starting to evolve with things that
Speaker 4: hold so much cultural capital and cultural residence in these
Speaker 4: specific genres. But also you can see where these delineations
Speaker 4: are being made. After Beyonce finally one Album of the
Speaker 4: Year for Cowboy Carter last year, they're starting to be
Speaker 4: even more specifications in what is considered a traditional country
Speaker 4: album and a contemporary country album and you see those
Speaker 4: goalposts being moved very often in the face of a
Speaker 4: big industry shaking win like Beyonce had last year after
Speaker 4: so many years of not getting AOTY.
Speaker 1: When you said that new category for traditional Country, that's
Speaker 1: exactly what popped into my head. I was like, this
Speaker 1: feels like a direct response to Cowboy Carter, which is
Speaker 1: so unfortunate because I mean, they're saying the quiet part
Speaker 1: are aloud essentially, and it's really disheartening because that was
Speaker 1: a country album. I don't understand what the problem is.
Speaker 1: She's from Texas, like, she knows this music, she has
Speaker 1: the co sign of some of the country music greats
Speaker 1: on her album, and it just seems like the industry
Speaker 1: itself is pushing back on that.
Speaker 4: When she finally won for Cowboy Carter in twenty twenty five,
Speaker 4: first of all, it was a direct response to Jay
Speaker 4: Z calling out the Recording Academy in their own house
Speaker 4: in twenty twenty four saying, this is one of the
Speaker 4: greatest artists of our whole lifetime and she's never one
Speaker 4: Album of the Year.
Speaker 1: World year, so even by your holy mestrige, that doesn't work.
Speaker 4: And she finally won, it felt like a bit of
Speaker 4: a bitter sweet moment because it really should have been
Speaker 4: for self titled. It really should have been for lemonade.
Speaker 4: It really really really should have been for lemonade.
Speaker 2: But now the fact that.
Speaker 4: She has that long sought after accolade to her name,
Speaker 4: a lot of people were like, Okay, well now she
Speaker 4: can rest, what could she do next? And I'm like,
Speaker 4: we're still not actorly till out, first of all, And secondly,
Speaker 4: it's kind of the idea that she once after so
Speaker 4: long that goes back to the point I was saying
Speaker 4: before of sometimes the voting members being behind and not
Speaker 4: really having their finger on the pulse of what's happening
Speaker 4: in their genres and what's happening in these fan bases,
Speaker 4: and what this music is doing to move whole communities,
Speaker 4: whole countries. With this usic is doing to shine a
Speaker 4: light on people who never have felt empowered in these
Speaker 4: spaces before, right like what Cowboy Carter did to empower
Speaker 4: black people who love country but never felt welcome in
Speaker 4: the country space. Ironically, because country is a black and
Speaker 4: indigenous art form like so many other things in the
Speaker 4: United States of America, So shining a light on that disparity,
Speaker 4: shining a light on the irony and the racism baked
Speaker 4: into a whole genre over time, but also low key
Speaker 4: doing some things that let's say like play by the rules,
Speaker 4: having that Dolly part and co sign, having that Willie
Speaker 4: Nelson be the DJ, be the smoked out DJ. Those
Speaker 4: are all very by the book moves that not only
Speaker 4: made it this stamp of the flag and this dissertation
Speaker 4: of a body of work, but also showed like, see,
Speaker 4: these are the greats.
Speaker 2: And they say, I'm undeniable. So what you gonna say?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 4: And I think in her winning for Cowboy Carter after
Speaker 4: all of this time, if we are not explicit and
Speaker 4: distinct and even repetitive, listen a hit dog will holler,
Speaker 4: there's a possibility that it can now become revisionist history
Speaker 4: that she wasn't denied that accolade for so long on
Speaker 4: a prejudice of her not playing by the rules according
Speaker 4: to the music industry standards.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4: I think about that a lot when we're getting into
Speaker 4: this year's nominees, with Kendrick Lamar being going into the
Speaker 4: ceremony being the most nominated artist again, I mean that's
Speaker 4: not an anomaly for him. Every time he drops an album,
Speaker 4: he comes through the next year being one of the
Speaker 4: most nominated artists, if not the most nominated. You know,
Speaker 4: if Taylor Swift and him don't drop the same year,
Speaker 4: he's going to be the most nominated. I think he's
Speaker 4: actually the only solo artist to have every single one
Speaker 4: of his five consecutive albums be nominated for Album of
Speaker 4: the Year, but he's never won it. And going back
Speaker 4: to what I said earlier, this man got a Politzer Prize.
Speaker 2: But I've never won an Album of the Year.
Speaker 4: It's just those anomalies and those quiet laugh to keep
Speaker 4: from crying type ironies that are baked into the Awards
Speaker 4: show every year that I'm always on the lookout for.
Speaker 4: I think it's gonna happen very much again with the
Speaker 4: storyline of Bad Bunny and dba's photos.
Speaker 2: I think it's going to happen with.
Speaker 4: I pause to say it, but kind of like Redemption
Speaker 4: arc of Justin Bieber and him being experimental and unabashed
Speaker 4: in his R and B and like almost indie rock space.
Speaker 4: But that goes into everything I'm saying. The Grammys represent
Speaker 4: playing the long game in the music industry. That's, you know,
Speaker 4: if you want to go really macro and broad spectrum
Speaker 4: with it. The person who when the Grammy is not
Speaker 4: necessarily the person who makes the album or who makes.
Speaker 2: The song or the art that moves the culture.
Speaker 4: It's the person and the machine around them who play
Speaker 4: the game, who are very strategic and methodical and scientific
Speaker 4: about telling the story that goes along.
Speaker 2: With the music.
Speaker 4: The idea that this is one night when everybody is
Speaker 4: just tuning in and you can get put onto some
Speaker 4: new music, you can learn about new artists. It's one
Speaker 4: night if you're not consciously looking at music the music
Speaker 4: industry all year long.
Speaker 2: But for anyone who's ever putting out an.
Speaker 4: Album, whether that's on a major label or an indie
Speaker 4: distribution deal, or you're one hundred percent just indie yourself,
Speaker 4: if a label wants to go for the Grammy, they
Speaker 4: are baking that Grammy strategy and that campaign to get
Speaker 4: you a Grammy. They're baking that into the role out
Speaker 4: plan before the public ever even hears the music.
Speaker 2: It's that methodical.
Speaker 1: I think this is such a good point because when
Speaker 1: you just tune in, it feels like an upset when
Speaker 1: you're like, this album was everywhere in my community. Everybody
Speaker 1: was talking about it. Everybody was saving up to go
Speaker 1: to the concerts and to see the tour. And then
Speaker 1: you see it that it doesn't get recognized, but you've
Speaker 1: just outlined that it's not just was it on the
Speaker 1: tip of everybody's tongue? Was everybody reciting these lyrics? Was
Speaker 1: it a hashtag all over? You know, you're telling us
Speaker 1: kind of you're peeling the curtain back a little bit
Speaker 1: and showing us like that there are campaigns that already.
Speaker 1: I'm like, that introduces to me so much bias, because
Speaker 1: who can campaign? What does a campaign even look like?
Speaker 2: Money?
Speaker 4: Money, money, and connects, money connects power.
Speaker 2: It's very similar to Hollywood.
Speaker 4: I think about, like what's happening with Sinners right now?
Speaker 4: We know that Sinners was the movie of twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: We all know that.
Speaker 4: That's not hyperbolieve like it was a box office smash,
Speaker 4: was a cult phenomenon. It's gonna go down as a
Speaker 4: cult classic. It's inspired academic studies.
Speaker 2: It's inspired so many people.
Speaker 4: To even get into screenwriting because of the ascension of
Speaker 4: Ryan Coogler and his evolution from going from small budgets
Speaker 4: to Marvel Movies to now owning his voice and his
Speaker 4: artistry outright with it, right, like we know what it
Speaker 4: is right that is undeniable, and yet you're going to
Speaker 4: see over and over the kind of like the disappointment
Speaker 4: and it be passed over for other movies that came
Speaker 4: out this year, that came out on a bigger studio,
Speaker 4: or had a bigger budget, or just have the right people,
Speaker 4: the right agents, the right lobbyists, honestly, Like that's what
Speaker 4: it is like. You're lobbying for these awards every single
Speaker 4: time you have the right people in your corner. I
Speaker 4: think of a lot about how honestly, it's like a
Speaker 4: pattern that happens in Hollywood a lot like a Nora,
Speaker 4: for example, the studio behind a Nora, they spent more
Speaker 4: money campaigning for Mikey Madden listen, to get that oscar
Speaker 4: and to sweep the award show then it even costs
Speaker 4: to make the movie, you know what I mean. It's
Speaker 4: all like people kind of in the movie business, like
Speaker 4: you big that into post production, the marketing of it,
Speaker 4: the schmoozing that has to happen, the campaigning that has
Speaker 4: to happen to get an Oscar is that behind the
Speaker 4: scenes work that so many people who are just a
Speaker 4: casual moviegoer or just a casual music listener they never see.
Speaker 4: But it's very methodical, and there are people whose whole
Speaker 4: job it is to just tap in and check in
Speaker 4: with Recording Academy members and see, like start conversations and
Speaker 4: keep conversations going about the validity of the album, about
Speaker 4: the artistic vision, about the technical proficiency on display, about
Speaker 4: the production value, all of these things. It's a strategy.
Speaker 4: It's very political.
Speaker 1: We were talking about the Grammys and now you're talking
Speaker 1: more like movies and like the Academy Awards, And this
Speaker 1: is something that means a Keia actually talked about like
Speaker 1: I think yesterday the day before when Tianna Taylor won
Speaker 1: the Golden Globe for one battle and after another, and
Speaker 1: we're also proud of her, but then you think of
Speaker 1: this machine and then people saying, oh, she wasn't really
Speaker 1: that good. It's like there's this tension there where it's
Speaker 1: like we want the recognition and so how are we
Speaker 1: supposed to feel about this Tiana Taylor Golden Globe? Was
Speaker 1: it the right person? Was it the machine?
Speaker 4: The role?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Yo, don't even get me started on that, because
Speaker 4: the two truths can exist at the same time. Tianna Taylor,
Speaker 4: we know, we followed her career. This is definitely a
Speaker 4: crowning moment for her. That is kicking the door of
Speaker 4: Hollywood in for her. But we know what she's been
Speaker 4: capable of from jump. Really, if we don't talk about
Speaker 4: real art, she should have won something for one thousand
Speaker 4: and one, Yeah, twenty twenty four, Yes, like that's really
Speaker 4: what it should have been. But that portrayal of black
Speaker 4: womanhood and perseverance and resilience and quiet beauty and just strength,
Speaker 4: they don't, like, that's not really what be rising to
Speaker 4: the top in Hollywood. And that's that's the disparity of it.
Speaker 4: It's like, yeah, she's gonna play this over sex, gunslinging
Speaker 4: Trader and she's honestly like the super nova in the movie.
Speaker 2: She's she's not even in majority of the movie. And
Speaker 2: you know, the script is written.
Speaker 4: Written by white guy, so obviously he's not going to
Speaker 4: be able to have the dimension of the character that
Speaker 4: you want. But so the true truths can't exist. She
Speaker 4: can absolutely deserve the Golden Globe and this crowning moment
Speaker 4: in her career and this arrival in a new space.
Speaker 2: But for us who've always known her and who've always
Speaker 2: known her as.
Speaker 4: A champion of black womanhood, it can also feel very
Speaker 4: tenuous because we know what she's capable of, we know
Speaker 4: what she represents she we know who she talks to.
Speaker 4: I think that's why she I think that's why she
Speaker 4: said that in her acceptance speech.
Speaker 2: But it is a very classic pattern in.
Speaker 4: Hollywood that the black roles that actually win the biggest
Speaker 4: awards are the roles that showcase abuse, or are pandering
Speaker 4: or very stereotypical. I think you think of Lupita Niango
Speaker 4: and Twelve Years a Slave. You think of Halle Berry,
Speaker 4: who's literally the only black women in the history of
Speaker 4: the entire Academy Awards to win the Oscar, and she
Speaker 4: went it for Monsters Ball, not like Dorothy Dandres.
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying. It's a classic pattern.
Speaker 4: Same thing for Denzel, Like Denzel winning for Training Day Again,
Speaker 4: he was the villain.
Speaker 2: He wasn't that complex in that movie.
Speaker 4: He acted the hell out of the role and we
Speaker 4: remember him for it, But there are so many other
Speaker 4: roles he's chosen over the years in his filmography that
Speaker 4: represent us and our versatility, our beauty, our strength.
Speaker 2: But like that's not what Holly is about.
Speaker 1: You know, there has to be a payoff, right for
Speaker 1: people to spend this much money on the art, for
Speaker 1: people to spend this much money on the campaigning, more
Speaker 1: money on the campaigning than the art. Sometimes, like you
Speaker 1: just told us about what's the payoff? When you win
Speaker 1: an award like a Grammy.
Speaker 2: A Grammy is special for a few reasons. Like I
Speaker 2: said before, it's the.
Speaker 4: Only award as a musician that you can tell that
Speaker 4: really says. It's peer reviewed and peer voted, and it's
Speaker 4: like recognized by a jury of your peers of your
Speaker 4: excellence in your artistry, like the master of your artistry.
Speaker 4: So that's why it hits a little different, because it's
Speaker 4: like people you know who work within your spaces all
Speaker 4: the time are giving you that co sign and giving
Speaker 4: you that recognition. And secondly, it's one of the most
Speaker 4: recognizable awards internationally. So like I was saying before, you
Speaker 4: can win You can win a BET award, you could
Speaker 4: win a VMA, but those are based on the publications
Speaker 4: themselves or the networks themselves, and they still exist in
Speaker 4: a smaller cultural bubble. A Grammy exceeds all that.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 4: For example, last year, one of the big breakout stars.
Speaker 2: Was Chapel Roone.
Speaker 4: Right, you think about it, like a lot of people
Speaker 4: didn't even know who Chapelerone was until she won that Grammy. Right,
Speaker 4: this is when you got to remember, like we all
Speaker 4: do live in our own feedback loops, because I knew
Speaker 4: who chapelone was twenty nineteen, but I also work I
Speaker 4: worked at MPR, right like that, the it was my
Speaker 4: job to know these things, right, And then she had
Speaker 4: a tiny desk that went a little viral. But again
Speaker 4: it's still little pockets, it's still little bubbles. All of
Speaker 4: a sudden, if you want a Grammy, you could be
Speaker 4: on a you could be on the cover of a
Speaker 4: magazine and somebody like who would never have heard of
Speaker 4: her before, is now gonna hurt. It's a platform and
Speaker 4: a level of promotion that is.
Speaker 2: Unlike anything else.
Speaker 4: You don't win a cash prize, but it's one of
Speaker 4: the biggest stages you're ever going to be on.
Speaker 2: Right, similar to the super Bowl.
Speaker 4: You don't get paid to do the super Bowl, but
Speaker 4: the payoff tenfold is you get to save for the
Speaker 4: rest of your life. You are a Grammy winner, you
Speaker 4: are a Super Bowl halftime performer.
Speaker 2: It's one of those accolades.
Speaker 4: That like, it'll never get it'll never get old, it'll
Speaker 4: always ring bells, that.
Speaker 2: Gramophone will never lose its tarnish.
Speaker 4: It's gonna hold value well after the years of you.
Speaker 2: Being on the top of the charts or whatever it
Speaker 2: may be.
Speaker 4: It solidifies you as as a great in your as
Speaker 4: a legend. And I say that kind of with the
Speaker 4: asterisks in a caveat, because to me, it's not the
Speaker 4: only thing that can solidify you as a legend and
Speaker 4: as a culture shifter. I always think about how Bob Marley,
Speaker 4: who is one of the biggest artists of any time,
Speaker 4: not our time, not our generation, past generations. I've traveled
Speaker 4: all over the world and I say, I'm Jamaican, and
Speaker 4: I'm like, oh, Bob Marley, Like that's what it is
Speaker 4: and what he did for the entire genre of reggae,
Speaker 4: Like we're going to be feeling those reverberations for the
Speaker 4: rest of our lives and well after. You know, he
Speaker 4: didn't win a Grammy in his lifetime, so it's not
Speaker 4: the only marker of success. It's not the only thing
Speaker 4: that stamps to you as an icon. But for people
Speaker 4: again who are casual listeners, it is really that stamp
Speaker 4: of approval that is gonna just put you over the top.
Speaker 4: It really matters about what you do after it, like
Speaker 4: that level of ascension that you work towards after the
Speaker 4: Grammy to keep that spot and to keep that prevalence.
Speaker 4: But it's so much about I think that is so
Speaker 4: much about your own artistic stretching and your own aspiration
Speaker 4: to keep climbing and doing more.
Speaker 1: After that, you're able to see the cracks in the
Speaker 1: Grammys that the casual viewer might not end in the
Speaker 1: music industry as a whole. So for you, if you
Speaker 1: were designing like the sid Man Grammys, how's it looking?
Speaker 1: What's different or is it the same?
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that is such a hard question. Okay.
Speaker 4: The big critique I have is that the Grammys move
Speaker 4: a lot slower than the culture does, and in erecting
Speaker 4: their icons, in signaling who's actually shifting things, who's actually
Speaker 4: moving the needle when it comes to music and evolution
Speaker 4: and pushing envelopes. It's kind of like when news breaks
Speaker 4: in the first place you're looking is TikTok or x
Speaker 4: or Instagram.
Speaker 2: We're looking in the palm of our hands.
Speaker 4: And then hours and hours later we're going to see
Speaker 4: it on the eleven o'clock news. That's how it feels
Speaker 4: a lot of times with the Grammys, accepted things a
Speaker 4: bit more because you know, we care so much about
Speaker 4: our fandoms. You know, the music is so important to us.
Speaker 4: It's the soundtrack of our lives. So the category, for example,
Speaker 4: the category is Best New Artists. I always watch that
Speaker 4: one and I gotta take it with a grain of
Speaker 4: salt because the only precursor to being a Best New
Speaker 4: Artist is you never have to have been nominated for
Speaker 4: Grammy before. So there's artists in that cat Yeah, Like
Speaker 4: that's the So everyone in the Best New Artists category
Speaker 4: this year and every other year, it's like we might
Speaker 4: have known about them for us like huge fandoms, but
Speaker 4: they finally when they finally like break in the industry
Speaker 4: and they have a moment, then they are nominated for
Speaker 4: the Grammy. And it's like, if you're nominated in Best
Speaker 4: New Artists, now you could be dominating all those other categories.
Speaker 4: So the only requirement to be in Best New Artists
Speaker 4: is you.
Speaker 2: You have never been nominated for a Grammy before.
Speaker 4: So people in the past, like Sabrina Carpenter, she was
Speaker 4: nominated for Best New Artists in last year's ceremony when
Speaker 4: she had dropped four or five albums at this point.
Speaker 4: Going into this year's ceremony, Olivia Dean. This is her
Speaker 4: sophomore album and it blew up and it really helped
Speaker 4: her crossover and explode in the American market this year.
Speaker 4: But if you are a super fan of British soul,
Speaker 4: British R and B, like she's been in the rotation
Speaker 4: a lot, I guess one thing I would change is
Speaker 4: I would get rid of Besting Artist because honestly, what
Speaker 4: even makes an artist new anymore? There's so much music
Speaker 4: being uploaded to streaming services all the time. The bar
Speaker 4: for discovery is a forever moving target, right, So that
Speaker 4: idea that you're now new because the Grammy's finally heard
Speaker 4: of you because the industry started to move their bells
Speaker 4: and whistles for you, I would definitely get rid of that.
Speaker 1: I did want to talk a little bit about out
Speaker 1: your hopes for winners in the Grammys this year. Like
Speaker 1: some of your I don't want to say predictions, more
Speaker 1: so who you feel like should be getting that Grammy
Speaker 1: for a Record of the Year. Who do you think
Speaker 1: should win?
Speaker 2: Okay, let me look it up.
Speaker 1: So that's DTMF, Bad Bunny, Man Child, Sabrina Carpenter, Anxiety, Dochi, Wildflower,
Speaker 1: Billie Eilish, Abracadabra, Lady Gaga, Luther, Kendrick, Kumar with Sizza,
Speaker 1: the Subway, Chapelerone and apt Rose and Bruno Mars. There's
Speaker 1: so many nominees, my goodness.
Speaker 2: A lot of nominees.
Speaker 4: The nominee ballads have gotten bigger over the years, and
Speaker 4: even like I said at the top, this year is
Speaker 4: going to be ninety five categories.
Speaker 2: That's the most categories it's ever been. It's very stacked
Speaker 2: up this year.
Speaker 4: I okay, who who should win versus who probably will win?
Speaker 4: Y'all don't make bets off me.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: I think who should win is Bad Bunny. I think
Speaker 4: who's likely to win is Billie Eilish, Kendrick or Lady Gaga.
Speaker 4: Because one, you could say number one, Billy Eilish is
Speaker 4: a Grammys darling right her and Phineas they're locked in
Speaker 4: as songwriters. So it's like going back to the argument
Speaker 4: we said before. Once you win, they keep you winning, right,
Speaker 4: Lady Gaga, this album, the myth making and the storytelling
Speaker 4: around this album was very big all year, and like
Speaker 4: I said, she had a huge headlining tour. Kendrick Kendrick
Speaker 4: is going into the Grammys as the most nominated act,
Speaker 4: and I think this collab with Sizza is one of
Speaker 4: the most pop leaning but also true to form collabse
Speaker 4: he ever done. It's like the perfect mix of airplay
Speaker 4: but still keeping his artistry and keeping what makes him,
Speaker 4: keeping that sauce intact. But Bad Bunny, Bad Bunny as
Speaker 4: a record, all the songs as an album, just what it.
Speaker 2: Did culturally this year.
Speaker 4: I just first of all, I love when an artist
Speaker 4: finally gets in that flow state and accomplishes what they've
Speaker 4: been trying to do.
Speaker 2: For a really long time.
Speaker 4: Like Bad Bunny in the Reggaetone space has evolved the
Speaker 4: space so much. He has never compromised promoting his culture.
Speaker 4: He never started to try and sing in English to
Speaker 4: cross over. He continuously has put on for Puerto Rico
Speaker 4: and the West Indian diaspora. So what he did in
Speaker 4: this album to kind of champion so many of the
Speaker 4: genres that have come out of Puerto Rico, the cultural currency,
Speaker 4: just like the richness of his culture. And also call
Speaker 4: the fact that there's so much displacement and gentrification happening
Speaker 4: on his island in very rapid secession and the aftermath
Speaker 4: of Hurricane Maria all the way till now, and the
Speaker 4: fact that again he's about to perform at the super Bowl.
Speaker 4: He had this insane record breaking residency in Puerto Rico
Speaker 4: that stimulated the economy of his island. On purpose, he
Speaker 4: made the cognizant effort to not tour in the US
Speaker 4: after so many years of touring in the US for
Speaker 4: a few different reasons, one of the reasons being he
Speaker 4: didn't want it to he didn't want it to be
Speaker 4: a hotbed for no ice raids.
Speaker 2: The fact that this is one of the biggest.
Speaker 4: Albums coming out of the US at the same time
Speaker 4: that these ice raids and this crackdown on the Latin
Speaker 4: community in the US has reaching its boiling point.
Speaker 2: Like that dichotomy is historic.
Speaker 4: This is what I'm talking about when it's like these
Speaker 4: are culture shifting moments. You know, He's made such a
Speaker 4: nod to show respect to his elders, to his cultural lineage.
Speaker 2: All the music that's coming out of Puerto Rico.
Speaker 4: He sharpened that line between the New Yorrican like New
Speaker 4: York Puerto Rico pipeline. He's invigorated so many people's interests
Speaker 4: in Puerto Rican culture. He stimulated the economy, like these
Speaker 4: are things that are actually gonna eclipse the Grammys the.
Speaker 2: One night of the Grammys.
Speaker 4: But it would be amazing to have the icing on
Speaker 4: the top to win the Grammy, to like to have
Speaker 4: that be part of the run. It's not the album
Speaker 4: with the most socio political and cultural impact or that
Speaker 4: makes the biggest ripple. That's not always the one that
Speaker 4: does win for Record of the Year, Song of the
Speaker 4: Year album.
Speaker 2: But in my opinion, that's who should win.
Speaker 4: If we're really making it about the artistry and the
Speaker 4: power of what music can do, that's who should win.
Speaker 1: I like the reasoning, and honestly, this lab has illuminated
Speaker 1: so much for me. It helped me get out of
Speaker 1: my own feelings. I was never at the p like
Speaker 1: utt where I wanted to turn the TV off, but
Speaker 1: I have been disappointed in the past. But I think
Speaker 1: I have a little bit more context now, absolutely, and
Speaker 1: it what Sidney, what you were able to do during
Speaker 1: this lab was really show that there is a science
Speaker 1: to awards. There's a science to all of these big
Speaker 1: awards that are given out, and that's something that we
Speaker 1: all just need to keep in mind as we are
Speaker 1: not only consuming music, to not let these awards make
Speaker 1: us feel like, oh, if our person doesn't get this award,
Speaker 1: then that means something about how good they are. It
Speaker 1: doesn't mean a thing because, like you were saying, Sydney
Speaker 1: is not really based on the fans. It's based off
Speaker 1: of the academy. These people who you know, work in
Speaker 1: the music industry, and so you know, you got to
Speaker 1: just take all of these awards with a grain of salt.
Speaker 1: Respect to the Grammys, but we're sprinkling salt on top
Speaker 1: of you. Season it up. You can find us on
Speaker 1: X and Instagram at Dope Labs podcast. You can find
Speaker 1: me tt on X, Threads and Instagram at dr Underscore
Speaker 1: t Sho, and you can find zakiya at Ze said so.
Speaker 1: Dope Labs is a production of Lemonada Media. Our supervising
Speaker 1: producer is Keegan Zemma. Dope Labs is sound designed, edited,
Speaker 1: and mixed by James sparber Lemonada's Senior Vice President of
Speaker 1: Content and Production is Jackie Danziger. Executive producer from iHeart
Speaker 1: Podcast is Katrino. Norvil Marketing lead is Alison Kanter. Original
Speaker 1: music composed and produced by Taka Yatsuzawa and Alex suki Ura,
Speaker 1: with additional music by Elijah Harvey. Dope Labs is executive
Speaker 1: produced by us T T Show Dia and Zakiah Wattley.