Grammy Goofs

The Grammy Awards will be handed out this week. This is supposedly the pinnacle of the recording industry. Why do I say "supposedly"? Well, the good folks who are members of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences who vote on these things have made some MAJOR goofs in their time. The prestige has almost been obliterated because of the way they have dished some awards out.

The most bizarre/unusual awards:

Best Country Song, 1958. Earth to NARAS: "Tom Dooley" is not a country song. It's a folk song. In 1958, we had great songs like "My Baby's Gone" by the Louvin Brothers, "Pick Me Up on Your Way Down" by Charlie Walker, "Life to Go" by Stonewall Jackson, "City Lights" by Ray Price, "Just Married" by Marty Robbins, and "Ballad of a Teenage Queen" by Johnny Cash. Did any of these songs get the Grammy? NO. Instead, the voters awarded "best country song" to a song that never made the country charts. Is it any wonder these people were later fooled by Milli Vanilli?

Album of the Year, 1960. Bob Newhart is, without question, a comedic genius, and The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart is one of the greatest comedy albums ever made by any comedian in any era. But "album of the year?" If a comedy album was the best thing released that year, 1960 must have been a terrible year for music.

Album of the Year, 1962. See above; however, this time the winning comedy album was Vaughn Meader's riotous impersonation of John Kennedy in The First Family. A funny album, without question; however, 1962 was the year Ray Charles' Modern Sounds in Country Music was released, so it is impossible to correctly give the Meader album the title of "album of the year."

Best Rock and Roll Recording, 1963. This went to the April Stevens/Nino Tempo song "Deep Purple." "Rock and roll?" If they say so.