From Time To Time, Modern Popular Music And I Actually Collide

Grammy nominations are out, and I am actually vaguely interested, since two albums I bought this year have gotten some nominations. The most recent Pearl Jam album is missing from the list of noms (a plain text version of which can be found here), but the newest releases from Bob Dylan and the Dixie Chicks are on the list (each in multiple places). First, the Bob Dylan nominations:

Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance (Someday Baby)
Best Rock Song (Someday Baby)
Best Contemporary Folk/Americana Album (Modern Times)

Yes, that's right. The song is nominated twice in the Rock field, but the album from whence it came is nominated in the Folk field. The Grammys are really hit and miss like that. While I suppose it's nice that Dylan was nominated for his work this year, I'm a little bit surprised that he wasn't nominated for Album of the Year. This new album, Modern Times, the third in what is purported to be a trilogy of sorts (along with Time Out Of Mind (1997), which won Album of the Year, and "Love And Theft" (2001), which was nominated for Album of the Year), is in the same vein as the previous two, and just as good, in its own way - what it manages to do is take the gritty, dark mood of Time Out Of Mind and bring it together with the playful sound that underpinned "Love And Theft". Here's the list of Album of the Year noms:

Taking The Long Way - Dixie Chicks
St. Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley
Continuum - John Mayer
Stadium Arcadium - Red Hot Chili Peppers
FutureSex/LoveSounds - Justin Timberlake

I don't know enough about the Album of the Year nominees (apart from the Dixie Chicks album) to be able to say whether any of them are more or less deserving of the nomiation than Dylan might have been - except to say that it sort of makes my skin crawl to see that Justin Timberlake and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are up for the award. I'm sure they are all fine albums, but something makes me wonder if they are quite as good as the Dylan album. Like I said, though, modern popular music and I rarely collide, so I'm probably just behind the times.

Next, the Dixie Chicks nominations:

Record of the Year - Not Ready To Make Nice
Album of the Year - Taking The Long Way
Best Country Performance, Duo/Group w/Vocal - Not Ready To Make Nice
Best Country Album - Taking The Long Way

I had originally intended to do a whole post on the new Dixie Chicks album, shortly after I saw the movie Shut Up And Sing, but I never got around to it. The album is an amazing blend of country and rock (or maybe rock and country), with liberal sprinklings of blues and bluegrass in there, too. So much of what they have gone through since Natalie's comments on stage in London in 2003 made it onto this album - as evidenced by the fact that this is their first album on which the three members of the band claim whole or partial songwriting credit on every track. Emily Robison is listed as lead songwriter on all but one track, and that other track lists Martie Maguire as lead songwriter. And that's really just a long way of saying that they have grown as musicians since 2003, that they have done much more than survive the mountain that the backwoods rednecks made out of the molehill of Natalie's remarks.

If there is a better story out there among the Album of the Year nominees, a better distillation of that better story into an album of great songs, I'd honestly be surprised to hear of it. But by all means, if anyone out there knows of one such better story or album, let me know. In the meantime, I'm rooting for the Dixie Chicks to win Album of the Year for Taking The Long Way.