Lorde Was The Only Person Nominated For Album Of The Year Who Wasn’t Asked To Perform Solo
Lorde was the only artist nominated for Album of The Year who didn’t get asked to perform solo at last night’s Grammy Awards ceremony. Lorde was also the only woman nominated for Album of The Year for her sophomore album Melodrama. According to Billboard, some are calling this discrepancy a mere mathematical matter of limited stage time and some are calling it sexist as fuck. Sexist? The music industry? Knock me over with a feather.
Fellow nominees Childish Gambino, Kendrick Lamar, eventual winner Bruno Mars all enjoyed the spotlight with solo performances. While Jay-Z was asked to perform, he declined. You’d think at the very least that would open up a spot for Lorde, but nah. Sting it was. Billboard reports that the powers that be, Recording Academy President Neil Portnow and Grammys executive producer Ken Ehrlich see no problem whatsoever with a good old fashioned sausage fest.
“These shows are always a matter of choices, and we know we have a box and the box gets full and filled up,” Ehrlich told reporters. “She had a great album, album of the year is a big honor, but there’s no way we can really deal with everybody. Sometimes people get left out that shouldn’t, but on the other hand, we did the best we can to make sure that it’s a representative and balanced show.”
According to Variety, Ken went in even harder with his nuanced and profound understanding of the types of obstacles women face in the industry. And luckily, he has some really simple solutions for how to even the playing field. Ladies, just work a little harder and maybe they’ll let you in the game.
“It has to begin with… women who have the creativity in their hearts and souls, who want to be musicians, who want to be engineers, producers, and want to be part of the industry on the executive level… [They need] to step up because I think they would be welcome. I don’t have personal experience of those kinds of brick walls that you face but I think it’s upon us — us as an industry — to make the welcome mat very obvious, breeding opportunities for all people who want to be creative and paying it forward and creating that next generation of artists.”
Thank you, Ken! That is super helpful. Only I missed your “welcome mat”. Was it the one that said “No Girls Allowed”? Sadly, the message is lost on some of your more strident feminist types. Take Lorde’s mother for example, she’s a lippy woman who thinks actual facts and statistics mean something when what a man “thinks” is right has already been stated.
this says it all –@nytimes January 26, 2018 pic.twitter.com/R3YdHwieXf
— Sonja Yelich (@sonjayelich1) January 26, 2018
Lorde was offered the opportunity to preform in an ensemble in tribute to Tom Petty which but declined. She did perform at a pre-Grammy event and covered Silver Springs by Fleetwood Mac and kicked it with Stevie Nicks. Lorde also had a not-so-secret message to the to world sewn into her Grammy dress. Like mother, like daughter; these broads are never satisfied! What’s wrong with the patriarchy? This type of thing hurts Ken’s feelings.
Lorde should have spent less time daydreaming and getting super crafty with her dress and spent more time touring and selling millions of albums. What’s that? Oh, never mind.
Pic: Wenn.com