THAT’S QUITE THE HORN SECTION
British singer takes one more than Beyonce and Pharrell, but underdog Beck beats him to Album of the Year
Madonna performs “Living for Love” Sunday night at the Grammy Awards in Los Angeles. British newcomer Sam Smith was the night’s big winner, taking home awards for best new artist, song of the year and record of the year.
The 2015 Grammy Awards bet heavily on young British soul singer Sam Smith’s staying power on Sunday night, sending the 22-year-old newcomer home with top honours in four of the six categories for which he was nominated.
Smith was dubbed Best New Artist over Iggy Azalea, Haim, Bastille and Brandy Clark near the beginning of the Grammy ceremony, swiftly picked up another trophy for Best Pop Vocal Album for last year’s In the
Lonely Hour and eventually closed out the night winning both Record of the Year and Song of the Year for his monster hit “Stay with Me.”
Beck managed to hold Smith off in the race for Album of the Year, managing a slight upset with a victory for Morning Phase, while Pharrell Williams — who tied Smith and Beyoncé Knowles for most nominations heading in this year with six — and his apparently inexhaustible “Happy” edged out “Stay with Me” in the Best Pop Solo Performance category.
“This is the best day of my life,” said Smith at the end of it all.
“I’d like to thank the man I fell in love with last year for inspiring this song. Thank you very much for breaking my heart. You got me four Grammys.”
During his second trip to the podium, Smith — who also went diva-to-diva with Mary J. Blige during a gospel-tinged, orchestral performance of “Stay with Me — added that he’d tried very hard to get noticed in the early days of his career by trying to cater his appearance and his sound to an imagined market.
"Before I made this record I was doing everything to try and get my music heard," Smith said. "I tried to lose weight and I was making just awful music. It was only when I started to be myself that the music started to flow and people started to listen."
Beck was a mildly surprising Album of the Year winner for his sombre, folky Morning Phase, besting far bigger sellers such as Beyoncé’s Beyoncé, Smith’s In the Lonely Hour, Williams’ GIRL and Ed Sheeran’s X. Morning Phase also earned the genre-bending troubadour Best Rock Album and Best Engineered Album (Non-Classical).
“My God,” said Beck, looking slightly stunned, upon accepting his Album of the Year trophy from Prince, before drolly adding: “My prince.”
Kanye West, who famously interrupted Taylor Swift when she beat Beyoncé at the MTV Video Music Awards, almost walked onstage when Prince announced Beck’s name. Some in the audience seemed shocked, from Pharrell to Questlove, but Beck made light of it: “Come back, I need some help,” he told West.
Beyoncé — who was tied with Pharrell and Smith for the most nominations heading into the show with six — took Best R&B Song and Best R&B Performance for her duet with husband Jay Z, “Drunk In Love,” while her surprise-released Beyoncé album sounded nice enough on expensive stereo systems to take the slightly obscure Best Surround Sound Album title.
Rosanne Cash, meanwhile, cleaned up in the roots categories, notching Best Americana Album for The River & the Thread, and Best American Roots Performance and Best American Roots Song for that album’s “A Feather’s Not a Bird.” Unlike Beyoncé, however, none of her victories allowed her a trip to the podium on the actual Grammy broadcast since all three awards were handed out in the pre-show ceremony.
Williams’ GIRL took home Best Urban Contemporary Album, while a live version of his seemingly inexhaustible megahit “Happy” won Best Pop Solo Performance and Best Music Video.
He also performed the tune on the Grammy stage with unlikely backing from classical pianist Lang Lang.
Smith, for his part, was picked by many observers as the act to beat at the 2015 Grammys and nabbed a biggie right off the bat, Best New Artist. In the Lonely Hour, won Best Pop Vocal Album mere minutes later as it made its way toward a final reckoning against Beyoncé, Williams, Beck and Ed Sheeran for Album of the Year.
“I’ve gotta try and say something now without crying,” he said upon collecting his first Grammy before offering the obligatory shout-out to mom and dad.
Grammy night was awash in double winners, making it difficult to predict who might ultimately pull ahead when the curtain dropped. On the performance side, the 2015 Grammys were the usual hodgepodge of superstar attention-getters and bizarre matchups.
The superstar stuff was interesting, if somewhat spark-free after a riproaring double-shot of AC/DC to open the show and a sassy strut in the spotlight by Miranda Lambert’s “Little Red Wagon” toward the beginning. Madonna debuted a disco-fied new single with a troupe of horned, bare-chested male dancers that was kind of business-as-usual and Kanye West toned down the bravado to perform an ambient ballad co-written with Paul McCartney. More compelling were the collaborations, which tended to work a touch better than they’d initially looked on paper.
British singer/songwriter Ed Sheeran was the big surprise, holding his own during a slightly stiff but respectably funky jam with Herbie Hancock, Questlove and John Mayer, and fannishly joining Jeff Lynne’s revived ELO for a tune shortly thereafter. A duet between Annie Lennox and newbie Hozier was a bit selfimportant and another between Gwen Stefani and Maroon 5’s Adam Levine a bit pointless, but there was fun to be had elsewhere.
A three-way pile-on from Kanye, Paul McCartney and Rihanna on their new single “FourFiveSeconds” was endearingly enthusiastic and not quite the completely awkward matchup it had threatened to be, despite the featherweight tune’s songwriting shortcomings.
Canadians weren’t terribly well represented at the Grammys this year and fared accordingly. Drake lost out in the two rap categories where he was nominated; the twice-nominated Arcade Fire’s Reflektor lost Best Alternative Album to St. Vincent’s St. Vincent; techno weirdo Aphex Twin’s Syro trumped EDM superstar deadmau5’s While (1<2) as Best Dance Album; and Tegan and Sara’s Lego Movie soundtrack tune “Everything is Awesome!!!” lost out to Idina Menzel’s monster hit “Let It Go” from Frozenas Best Song Written for Visual Media. Neil Young’s A Letter Home, meanwhile, failed to woo the Best Boxed Set or Limited Edition Package vote.
The night ended with a powerful performance of the gospel song "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" by Beyoncé, and John Legend and Common performing the Oscarnominated song "Glory" from the movie Selma.