Super Bowl Update

Ahh, Awards Season Continues. Tonight we get the Grammys. The awards show with a million categories and only about 10 awards presented on stage. The rest of the time it's performances by top nominated artists and lots of other celebrities acting the fool with their crazy ways as presenters. The Grammys knows what the audience wants!

Though I suspect this year's top honors will all belong to Adele, the ceremony itself should belong to Whitney. How could it not be? J.Hud is on hand to headline a last minute tribute. If there's a voice out there that can do justice to Whitney's songbook, it's her. Let's see who else does themselves justice with their live performances and who flops! Here we go!

BRUUUUUUCE! And E-Street. But no Clarence Clemmons. :( Already we are aware of artists we've lost. Wherever this flag's flown. We take care of our own. We could take better care of our own. They are rocking pretty hard. Well, played, Springsteen. Well played.

LL Cool J is on hand to host. He reads a nice prayer for Whitney. And we get a little clip of her singing I Will Always Love You. Awesome as always. LL keeps talking and talking. He's trying to rev everyone up. But everyone is revved up. Let's just get on with it.

Bruno Mars. He's hot-or-miss for me, but I think this is one of his better live performances I've seen. He also gives a shout out to Whitney. He's singing Runaway Baby. It's solid.

Alicia Keyes and Bonnie Raitt In the House! They also mention Whitney. But they are hear to sing for Etta James. OMG Bonnie Raitt is amazing. LOVE.

By the way, it's 25 minutes into the show and we are finally getting to the first award. Best Solo Pop Performance. ADELE WINS! She had some tough competition, but it looks like the Adele Landslide is already underway. She thanks her co-songwriter and her doctors and then it's offstage with her. She can thank other people when wins other awards later. She does not mention Whitney.

Chris Brown. Not a fan. His back up dancers are dressed like flying squirrels? He's dancing on what looks like the pyramid from Q-Bert. His singing is not up to the standard set by Bruno Mars. That's all I'm going to write about him.

OMG, I just checked the commentary for  EW's live blog and people there also thought it looked like Q-Bert! I am not alone!!!

Kelly Clarkson is coming up next! Will she also name check Whitney? We will find out after the second set of commercials. New season of Survivor is coming! Sigh. I'll be there, Probst. I wish I knew how to quit you. 

Fergie is looking mesed up and Marc Anthony looks like his normal self. Best Rap Performance goes to... Jay-Z and Kanye for Otis. Jay-Z and Kanye are not in the house for the Music's Biggest Night??? WEAK.

Kelly Clarkson and Jason Aldean! Kelly's album wasn't released early enough for Grammy consideration, otherwise Stronger would be all over this joint. They are performing on... the touring set of Wicked? I don't get it. Kelly sounds a little raspier than when I saw her on tour a couple weeks ago. All that belting on tour takes its toll! :) At the end they just seem to switch off Jason's mic even though he's still supposed to be singing. He seems confused. This wasn't a great live performance. It didn't really add anything to the recorded version. Still I hope she wins another Grammy tonight!

Have I mentioned how horrible I think that John Carter movie looks? I first saw the extended commercial at Disney World and thought it was for some cheap Direct to Disney Channel Movie, and couldn't believe it was actually the long in the works John Carter movie. I just think the CGI looks really unconvincing.

We're back to the show, and Jack Black is talking loudly outside the theater. I want him to stop. And then it's Foo Fighters! YES. These guys truly rock. Love Foo Fighters.

Here comes Rhianna and Coldplay. She found love in a hopeless place. She also found a whole squad of back up dancers in that hopeless place.  I'm scanning the dancers to see if I recognize any SYTYCD alums. I don't. They are probably there though. There's a lot of dancers out there on stage. Chris Martin is looking healthy. Sometimes he looks overly skinny. The momentum of this set has fallen off drastically. Let's move on to something else.

Downton Abbey has started taping! I can't wait to watch it once the Grammys are over! I have given up on The Walking Dead. I'll keep reading the comic, but I've gotten all I need out of the show itself.

Mario Manningham and Victor Cruz and that lady who usually wears the braids in her hair on NCIS. Cruz does his salsa. Best Rock Performance goes to...  Foo Fighters! Woohoo! They want you to be effing artists not some voice cycled through a computer. Word. And then our Computer Overlords shut off his mic.

Seacrest announces a Beach Boys reunion! And then introduces... Maroon 5? I think they sound terrible and slow and boring on Surfer Girl. Just my opinion.

Foster the People sound better on Wouldn't It Be Nice... initially. And then it sounds terrible. And they look PETRIFIED. And they change the lyric from sleep together to stay together? WTF? They are now murdering the song. How did this fall apart so fast?

Finally the Beach Boys are allowed to sing their own songs. They are OLD. Still they sound a million times better than the previous groups did. Foster and Adam join the Good Vibrations finale. No, send them away! They don't know the harmonies! And Adam looks mightily inconvenienced anyway. Well, the Beach Boys did a good job and deserve their moment on stage for lasting 50 effing years in the music industry.

Stevie Wonder is in the house. He is bringing it back to Whitney. It seems like he's going to sing Isn't She Lovely? He plays the harmonica and the audience starts clapping along, but he's just faking them out. Awkward. Then he introduces Paul McCartney! To sing the biggest bummer of a Valentine's song ever. Accompanied by a whoopie cushion? There's this weird noise that keeps popping up on the audio. This song is a total downer.

Chris Brown won a Grammy for best R&B Album. Not gonna deal with him.

The Civil Wars are the opening act for Taylor Swift. At first I think Taylor is on a set that looks a little but like she is in Dorothy's crashed house in Oz, but then I really it's just a Poor South version of the barricade set from Les Mis! She is singing Mean! Take that. Tom Hooper! She actually sounds a lot better tonight than usually does live. She seems totally stunned that people liked this performance. Was she attempting to phone it in and expecting a negative response?

NPH is here to announce Song of The Year... it's Rolling In the Deep! Adele and her producer run up on stage delighted, quickly say thanks and run away to hug and celebrate together. Love her brevity!

Katy Perry is on stage with a ton of dancers. Again I scan for SYTYCD alums. Still can't identify anyone. But I bet one of those boys was on my show of shows. She gave a very solid performance.

Best Country Album is going to.... Lady Antebellum! Swiftie denied! She looked really upset. There will be a song on her next album about this slight. Lady Antebellum dude should button his shirt. Actually a lot of these dudes should button their shirts. They don't have great chests.

ADELE!!!!!

Man she sounds so fantastic. And she looks amazing. I love the shorter hair on her. She REALLY starts to feel the awesomeness of the moment about a third into the song and then never looks back. Wow, she's the best. She gets several minutes to just stand there are take in the ravenous applause. Except for one skinny bitch in the balcony who is refusing to clap. Wow, that lady is heartless. What was she just listening to?

They are doing another tribute - this time to Glenn Campbell and I can't even concentrate, I'm still taking in Adele. This is really his Farewell Grammy Performance because of Alzheimer's. That's so sad! But it's nice that he gets this moment. Gaga is smiling! She hasn't smiled all night. She looked totally confused when the Beach Boys were on stage earlier. Like a rhinestone cowboy!! That was very nice! Plus he got a lifetime achievement award. So did Jobin! And Diana Ross! That's a solid group of artists.

Carrie Underwood is in the house. Here comes Tony Bennet too. They sing a straightforward duet of It Had To Be You. And then Best New Artist... is Bon Iver! Nicki Manaj looks WAY disappointed. Bon Iver would've been fine with her winning. But he'll accept the award anyway.

In Memoriam... Winehouse, Ashford, Jobs(??) Clemons, many many others. And then Whitney.

Jennifer Hudson does a great tribute to Whitney in her rendition of I Will Always Love You. It's a difficult position to be in, because it's such a signature vocal from Whitney, and J.Hud manages to sound a lot like her without sounding like she's trying to copy her. I thought it was really classy and sung very beautifully and it was a nice moment all around. Very very nice.

So now everyone on the planet is apparently doing a dance song. It starts with Chris Brown which is not a way to get me involved. When is this show ending? I need to watch Downton Abbey before bed.

Dead Mouse had a cylon face for a minute there! Now I like Dead Mouse.

Nicki Manaj. The level of crazy has gone up several notches in the Staples Center.

Lady Cerebellum returns! It's Record of the Year and as a surprise to no one Adele wins. She thanks radio DJs for playing the song and then again bounces off stage. One award to go. Almost there...

LL and Diana Ross announce Album of the Year and it's of course 21 for Adele. She is finally overwhelmed by the moment and cries and is lovely and thanks everyone and mentions she has a bit of snot and it's hilarious. Adele really ran away with the awards. How many did she win? Seven? She's amazing. Well-deserved.

McCartney is back. There is a guitar solo shredfest that I can barely describe but it was pretty hot and involved like a million awesome people including Springsteen who stayed around for the WHOLE SHOW to play again. That was nice of him. This year ADELE rules! We are all just subjects in her musical Kingdom. It's been fun y'all. Time for Downton!!