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Grammy Predictions 2014: Best New Artist

As award season has truly kicked into gear, many of us entertainment fans await with baited breath to see who is going to be nominated for each award show. The one that I particularly look forward to every year is The Grammy’s, which is set to take place in early February. This happens to be the biggest social networking event of the year, besting other award shows and even The Super Bowl.

Now with nominations expected to be announced on December 6th, I wanted to share with you my predictions on who is most likely to be nominated at next years ceremony. My first category is Best New Artist, an award that has gone to Adele, Maroon 5 and most recently Fun! (Something I truly don’t agree with). Here is who I think will be the 5 up for the big award this year.

Lorde- talk about a late in the game entry. The 16 year old New Zealand native blasted onto the scene in the late summer of 2013 with her hit “Royals” which has been at the top of the alternative charts as well as dethroning the current cockroach of pop Miley Cyrus’ song “Wrecking Ball”. Lorde has a great deep falsetto and is reminiscent of everyone from Etta James to Amy Winehouse. A good contender in my books.

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis- The Grammys tend to nominate people who aren’t necessarily new in this category, yet if these two are eligible they are a shoo in to be nominated and I believe win. This will be their night unless JT has something to say. “The Heist” is an incredible effort by these two, churning out hits like “Same Love”, “Can’t Hold Us” and hrs pivotal “Thrift Shop”. Expect these two to take home Grammy gold that night.

Florida Georgia Line- the perennial country nominee but won’t win, they never do. FGL had quite the year with their platinum selling album “Here’s To The Good Times” which features their huge hit “Cruise”. The song became even bigger with the help from Grammy winning hip hop artist Nelly, whom in my opinion made the song that much better. Expect at least a win in the country portion for this song, but they are the long shot for this one. Sorry guys.

Imagine Dragons- Alternative is slowly making it’s way back into the mainstream thing, and this band has done a pretty great job in aiding that. Fueled by the biggest alternative song of the year “Radioactive” from the almost double platinum selling “Night Visions”, these guys plan on making a name for themselves on Grammy night. Expect “Radioactive” to be a huge contended in Record and Song of the year categories as well.

Kendrick Lamar- usually in the BNA category there is only one hip hop nominee, yet if they don’t nominate Kendrick they are fools. Dude is the best thing to happen to hip hop in a long freaking time and he deserves credit on Grammy night. “Good Kid M.A.A.D. City” is one of the best hip hop albums in a long time and I am really hoping that the nomination committee recognizes him in this category and many more.

Honorable Mentions-
Kacey Musgraves
Avicii
Ellie Goulding
Emeli Sande
Capital Cities

Who do you think will be nominated this year? Voice your thoughts and check out the official Grammy site for more info.

2013 MTV Video Music Award Noms- The List is out…

by Ryan Shea

The Video Music Awards are the one award show I look forward to every year because beyond anything it tends to be pretty freaking awesome. It ranks as one of the most social events of the year and has birthed and revamped many careers over the past three decades. Now in it’s 30th year (crazy), the VMA’s are set to take place back where it all started- New York. It will be broadcasted live on August 25 at the brand new Barclay Center right in the heart of Brooklyn. Heck, even the classic Moonman got a great redesign for only this year. Truth be told, this will be another one for the record books. How can I tell? All the great people are nominated this year. Let’s break down each category.

Video of the Year-

The ultimate, the biggest award of the night has got to be “Video of the Year”. In recent years, R&B Divas like Beyonce (Single Ladies) and Rihanna (Umbrella, We Found Love) have taken the trophies yet over it’s 30 year history has seen this award go to a bevy of legends such as Madonna (Ray of Light) and Eminem (Without Me) just to name a few. This year three R&B crooners, a hip-hop legend in the making and one of the biggest female stars on the planet all under one category. Robin Thicke has his first set of nominations this year with his number one chart topping “Blurred Lines” featuring Pharrell Williams and T.I. That song has been voted by several publications as the song of the summer, and boy has it been good to him. Justin Timberlake returns to the VMA pool with the second single off his album The 20/20 Experience with “Mirrors”. He has been in this category twice before for “What Goes Around… Comes Around” and “Cry Me A River”. Country-turned-Pop diva Taylor Swift has her first Video of the Year nod with the second single off her album “Red” called “I Knew You Were Trouble”. Rounding out this category is R&B hit maker Bruno Mars “Locked Outta Heaven” and who I think will and should be the winner, Macklemore &Ryan Lewis’ “Thrift Shop” which currently sits as the biggest selling song of 2013. It’s also a rad video. Yup.

Best Hip-Hop Video-

This category has been around since 1999 (it changed from Best Rap Video) and has been won by quite the bevy of artists such as Beastie Boys, Jennifer Lopez and Missy Elliott. The nominees this year scream out for the fresh new faces that are taking over the industry and keeping it hot and hopeful for the years to come. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, who are up for 6 this year, come in again in this category with “Thrift Shop” but they have some truly stiff competition in place. Newbies in the game from Kendrick Lamar (Swimming Pools), A$AP Rocky (F***ing Problems) have their first shots at winning a moonman, and perennial favorites such as Drake (Started From The Bottom) and J. Cole (Power Trip) are looking to make their mark in this category. “Thrift Shop” will most likely win in this category as well, but there is a crowded room for anyone to come out on top.

Best Collaboration-

This award, only given out in 2007, 2010 and 2011 has been won by all the big divas in recent years such as Katy Perry (E.T. with Kanye West), Lady Gaga (Telephone with Beyonce) and Beyonce and Shakira (Beautiful Liar). The divaness in this one is not on the mainstage, as the five nominees couldn’t be different from each other. Robin Thicke shows up again in this category with the saucy “Blurred Lines”. Hot dance tracks such as Pitbull & Christina Aguilera’s “Feel This Moment” and Calvin Harris & Ellie Goulding’s “I Need Your Love” populate the crowd as well. The two that I see truly going neck to neck on this is Justin Timberlake & Jay-Z’s “Suit & Tie” and chart-topping “Just Give Me A Reason” by Pink and Nate Truess.

Check out the full list on MTV.com. Who is your pick to win? Be sure to watch the MTV Video Music Awards live on August 25th and see if your favorite wins!

Is Macklemore the new Eminem?

by Ryan Shea

I don’t think that title is really premature in saying what a lot of people are thinking. Macklemore really can be the next Eminem if he plays his cards right. The Seattle native continues to take 2013 by storm again last night with his performance of his new single “Can’t Hold Us” featuring Ray Dalton at the 2013 MTV Movie Awards. Many said that was the highlight of the night and this is a freaking movie award show (then again it’s MTV, so we are lucky it wasn’t a Best Teen Mom Shore Buckwild Show).

Macklemore was known by many a hip-hop tastemakers for a while now but no one really understood who this guy was until late 2012 whe a song about a thrift shop came into play. Little do people know this guy, who turns 30 later this year, has been in the game for over a decade now, right around the time that Eminem broke through.

He released his first full fledged EP back in 2000 under the name “Professor Macklemore”. He quickly dropped the professor aspect of things but substance abuse plagued his chances of really becoming the star that he is today. These substances had him relapse on a number of occasions, most recently in 2011. Yet during this time he released some truly amazing music, such as “The Unplanned Mixtape” and “The VS Redux” in 2009 with his constant companion and DJ Ryan Lewis. That is some of his best work in my opinion, as you can tell what he was going through during that time.

Now with his album “The Heist” in full swing, “Thrift Shop” topping the charts for weeks and his subsequent song “Can’t Hold Us” climbing up the charts, we gotta wonder, is he the next big thing? The next Eminem? Let’s weigh this in and see.

Going beyond race, Eminem truly defines what an MC is and how, at least for my generation, he was our Kurt Cobain. He was our Elvis Presley, he was our Michael Jackson. He was a movement in itself for the simple fact that he went so far outside the boundary lines of what an artist is supposed to do and speak from his heart on what he was going on. “The Marshall Mathers LP” and “The Slim Shady LP” are in my opinion two of the best hip-hop albums ever with the former being the best one to be released in the new millennium. He has even impressed as a featured artist on other people’s tracks, most notably Drake’s “Forever”. He truly understands his gift of gab and uses it to its best extent.

What i just wrote is something that Macklemore is getting the hang of. “The Heist” is an amazing second album and is reminiscent of things that Eminem did. They both have that juxtaposition of being able to do funny songs (Thrift Shop) and then serious ones that really make you think (Wings). The stand out track here is “Same Love”, written in the support of same-sex marriage. It’s truly an amazingly written song and something really out of left field when it comes to a straight dude and hip-hop head writing about a very controversial topic. This can parlay to any of the controversial topics that Em wrote about, including anything from “Love The Way You Lie” about domestic violence and “Stan” about a deranged fan. Regardless, they make you think, something other rappers can’t seem to make you do.

So what is the verdict overall with this? Macklemore could no doubt be the next Eminem in my book. No doubt, even though he has been in the game for a minute, that he will be all over the Best New Artist categories at a ton of award shows and be on everyone’s forefront similarly to how Eminem is. Could they do a duet one day? Only one can hope. For me, he’s got it in him to go the long haul. Best of luck to him in the future.

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis top, J Tim gains on Billboard

by Ryan Shea

Two hip-hop songs emerge as victorious on the Billboard Hot 100 in a rather stale and non-movement week otherwise.

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ “Thrift Shop” featuring Wanz shot to number one this week, dethroning Bruno Mars’ “Locked Out Of Heaven” which spent a total of six weeks in the top spot, according to Billboard today. This is the first number one song for the duo, and it only took sixteen weeks to get to this spot. This is a relatively short time for an artist largely unknown in the typical top 40, poppish type songs that always seem to carry the number one spot, and a unique song as well. This is the first time also where a song about a thrift shop is number one. Yes, that is accurate.

Much of the reason why this song has hit number one is it’s gain in digital sales and that it currently sits at number one on streaming songs with 1.68 million in one week. Streaming pretty much means being placed on apps like Spotify and Rhapsody to name a few. This was a problem for Taylor Swift, where her record label refuses to put her song “I Knew You Were Trouble” on streaming. It sits at number five even though it was a huge success in radio and digital sales.

Justin Timberlake, who has had a triumphant return to music after a seven year hiatus, sees his song “Suit & Tie” skyrocket from number 84 last week to number four this week. The song features hip-hop legend Jay-Z and has been met with quite mixed reviews since it’s release. It opened on the digital songs chart with 315,000 copies beating his previous best for “Sexyback” by nearly 100,000 copies. Expect it to linger in the top ten for quite sometime.

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