No matter how they try, the American Music Awards will never be able to escape the shadow of being the Grammys’ bastard little brother. Which is why today’s announcement of the nominees was met with a resounding yawn. The show gets ignored for several other reasons too. The awards are voted on by a select poll of consumers, which means we get hit with travesties like Milli Vanilli’s sweep in 1990 and C&C Music Factory’s sweep two years later. There have also been long-standing rumors that AMA winners are tipped off before the show airs, meaning that the winners are a lot more sure to be in attendance.
This year’s nominees are fairly predictable. Alicia Keys leads the pack with five, followed by The Eagles and Coldplay. Other multiple nominees are Mary J. Blige, Rihanna, Lil’ Wayne, Kanye West, Garth Brooks, Carrie Underwood, Usher, and several others. The only head-scratching category, oddly enough, is Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Group, where the nominees are G-Unit, Three six Mafia and Wu-Tang Clan. Jordin Sparks’s submission in the Adult Contemporary category is also a bit of a head scratcher. Something tells me the nominating committee struggled long and hard in order to come up with those names.
The show will be hosted by the usually entertaining Jimmy Kimmel and will in all likelihood be live-blogged by yours truly. Expect the usual snark and wishes for a Michael Jackson sighting.
The show airs on November 23rd, and in a new wrinkle, they’re allowing the public of the wide world of internets to vote on the winners. You can log on to vote here.
As I stated in February, I decided to stop buying actual CDs and buy all my music through iTunes. Let me update you on my iTunes journey.
The month of April saw me purchase three full albums through iTunes. The first was Diddy’s anti-bitchassness group Day26. The album was standard R&B fare and earned Diddy another number one record, but failed to set the world on fire. But what does these days? Marketed as a new New Edition, the boys from Making The Band put together a few songs that worked like Silly Love, the first single Got Me Going, the dreamy Co-Star, and hard hitting Exclusive.
Next was Mariah Carey’s not so fulfilling E=MC², which should’ve been titled The Emancipation of Nick Cannon. Just kidding Nick. Actually, I’m impressed that the dude had it in him. Before, I remembered him most from giving the movie audience that serious drumming face in the movie Drumline, but now he’s the guy that put that ring on Mimi’s finger. Though I didn’t like the album much and thought it was smack dab in the middle of her career works, iTunes did give me one extra song that wasn’t on the CD version. Though, I’m not sure if it was a truly bonus or not because it was the track 4real4real featuring Da Brat and though she might’ve been cool in 1994, the words “featuring Da Brat” might be the worst marketing in music today. Ok, that was wrong of me. But actually, at least we know that Da Brat is still working. Also included with the extra song was a digital booklet (iTunes version of the physical CD booklet) and the Touch My Body video, which is impressive for how well a late 30s Mimi looks.
The third full album was the best of the bunch. Before I even tell you what it is, I have to ask, “Who is the most consistent music group in the game today?” You probably wouldn’t answer The Roots, but if they aren’t the most consistent, they are close. Their latest gem is called Rising Down and it’s probably the best album I’ve bought all year. From the killer Rising Up, with Chrisette Michele on the hook to the Talib Kweli assisting I Will Not Apologize, there’s not a bad song on the record. While they might not have the one or two head turning tracks on this album like they usually have, it’s still just damn good. Also included as an iTunes bonus is their duet with Fall Out Boy, Birthday Girl, which was vetoed off the original album and as first single for not sounding Roots enough. I kind of dig it, but I understand where they’re coming from.
I also bought a bunch of one off songs. If you remember, April was the month of “Idol Gives Back” and instead of donating money, I bought a few tracks including Carrie Underwood’s George Michael cover of Praying For Time, the group version of Rihanna’s Don’t Stop The Music (my kids can’t get enough of this one), and Snoop Dogg’s Can’t Say Goodbye featuring Charlie Wilson. On that same day, I also purchased Bon Jovi’s Bad Medicine and Fuel’s Leave The Memories Alone with the latter being the theme song to the Nature Boy’s Ric Flair retirement. I just had to throw one wrestling reference in.
Lastly, I purchased Digital Underground’s silly song Kiss You Back. One day, it was in my head and I decided to get it so I could hear it a few times. Without iTunes, I would’ve had to find a used copy of Sons Of The P, and that wasn’t going to happen without making a trek to a used record store some 30 miles away.
The next edition of “No Plastic” will feature the return of some Boston boys and a man on a mission to get some grown assed respect.
Ah, the month of June. In just a couple of short weeks, it will officially be summer. Let’s see what’s heating up the music charts this week! (as usual, all chart info reprinted courtesy of the good folks at Billboard):
Top 20 Albums:
1) “3 Doors Down” 3 Doors Down
2) “II Trill” Bun B
3) “Julianne Hough” Julianne Hough
4) “Nothing But the Best” Frank Sinatra
5) “Narrow Stairs” Death Cab for Cutie
6) “Spirit” Leona Lewis
7) “E=MC2” Mariah Carey
8) “Rockferry” Duffy
9) “Hard Candy” Madonna
10) “Home Before Dark” Neil Diamond
11) “We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things” Jason Mraz
12) “Taylor Swift” Taylor Swift
13) “35 Biggest Hits” Toby Keith
14) “Departure” Jesse McCartney
15) “Fight With Tools” Flobots
16) “Carnival Ride” Carrie Underwood
17) “Crayons” Donna Summer
18) “Now That’s What I Call Music 27” Various Artists
19) “Jordin Sparks” Jordin Sparks
20) “Daughtry” Daughtry
Top 20 Singles
1) “Lollipop” Lil’ Wayne feat. Static Major
2) “Bleeding Love” Leona Lewis
3) “The Time of My Life” David Cook
4) “Take a Bow” Rihanna
5) “No Air” Jordin Sparks & Chris Brown
6) “Love in This Club” Usher feat. Young Jeezy
7) “Sexy Can I” Ray J. feat. Yung Berg
8) “4 Minutes” Madonna feat. Justin Timberlake
9) “Pocketful of Sunshine” Natasha Bedingfield
10) “Viva La Vida” Coldplay
11) “Damaged” Danity Kane
12) “Leavin’” Jesse McCartney
13) “Touch My Body” Mariah Carey
14) “Bust it Baby Pt. 2” Plies feat. Ne-Yo
15) “Dream Big” David Cook
16) “What You Got” Colby O’Donis feat. Akon
17) “It’s Not My Time” 3 Doors Down
18) “Apologize” Timbaland feat. OneRepublic
19) “Last Name” Carrie Underwood
20) “Love Song” Sara Bareilles
*This week’s charts are all about two things: “American Idol” and advertising. To wit:
*Contestants from 4 different seasons of “American Idol” can be found in this week’s Top 20 charts. Aside from David Cook’s two top 20 singles chart debuts (which we discussed a couple days back), 2007’s winner, Jordin Sparks, can be found in the Top 20 of the singles and albums charts, as can 2005’s winner, Carrie Underwood. Meanwhile, 2006 finalist Chris Daughtry is still hanging around, moving up 10 spots to re-enter the Top 20 with his 18-month old debut album.
*”American Idol” is also to blame for the resurgence of “Apologize”. The Timbaland/OneRepublic song, which has now appeared on the pop, Adult Top 40, Adult Contemporary and R&B charts, re-enters the Top 20 after OneRepublic performed it with “AI” runner-up David Archuleta on the season finale. The resurgence should be short-lived, as I can’t imagine there being too many people out there who aren’t completely sick of this song.
*”Idol” also juices a major comeback, as Queen of Disco Donna Summer appears in the Top 20 of the pop albums chart for the first time since “She Works Hard for the Money” in 1983!! “Crayons” is actually Summer’s first album of original material since 1991. Toot-toot…hey…beep beep!! Here’s some old school Donna for ya!!
*Meanwhile, continuing Ameria’s insatiable appetite for extremely generic rock bands, 3 Doors Down enjoys their second straight debut atop the album charts with their self-titled fourth effort. This band’s success may come as something of a surprise because they’ve traveled so far under the radar. However, not only has the band enjoyed a fairly uninterrupted stream of hit singles since their 2000 debut, but they are the third biggest-selling group of the decade so far, behind Nickelback and…crap, I forget who the second band is, but they’ve sold more records!!
*Apple’s current advertising campaign is juicing Coldplay’s current success. “Viva La Vida”, the song used in the latest ads for Apple/iPod/iTunes, scales back up the charts this week, becoming Coldplay’s second top 10 hit. Lead singer Chris Martin also scores his first charted single as a solo artist, as Kanye West’s “Homecoming” (which features Martin as a guest artist) enters the singles chart at #96.
