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Hey, hey, hey, hey. Welcome back, everybody. Welcome to episode 52 or 53. I'm blanking. I'm not going to check because I don't want to restart. It's your boy, Julian. Welcome back. Something wrong with the podcast? Today's episode's focus is, is solely on the Grammys. Yes, we have a music only episode and I'm quite excited because I was really. I mean, it's music. This is like a major part of my being in existence. And Grammys really do something to me. As much as we downplay their significance and try to change the course of what matters and put the public's opinion over those that are, you know, the powers that be, there's still something about the Grammys. There's something about those, that level of talent all cramming into a single theater, dressing to the occasion. It's. It's a unifying event. Meaning, like, everybody rises to the occasion. Unless you're Bieber and you show up in pseudo underwear, which we'll get to in a second. But just such a boss move, but, like, everybody conforms to and puts on a show for the event. Because at the end of the day, the Grammys, the event is about these artists, but they're also taking part heavily in making this event a memorable thing as it is. And then they're making history in the process. So these artists are not only nominated, they're performing that night, you know, and they're doing these red carpet walks at night, do these little interviews, like, they are the show is for them, but they are the show. So. And these are, you know, natural performers. So it's, it's quite a fun dichotomy to see, like, this whole balance between artistry and celebration and celebrity. But nevertheless, let's get right into it. The biggest winner of the night, to no surprise, at least to me, was Kendrick Lamar. He took home five Grammy awards. He is, I'd say finally, but rather quickly surpassed Jay Z as the most winning rap artist with 27 current Grammy nominee Grammy wins. Pardon me, to Jay Z's 25. Let's go over the awards he won this past weekend. He won record of the year for Luther. And I do want a little quick note on record of the year, because people get record of the year and song of the Year confused. Song of the year is about the writers. It's basically the writers award, while record of the year is about the producers, the engineers, the clearances, and basically everything on the back end that really goes into making a record. And I wanted to call that out specifically for this year because I thought it was really special that when Kendrick accepted this award, he led with thanking the Vandross family. There's a. Obviously, the song is called Luther. There's a heavy Luther Vandross sample on the record itself. And I think it was really cool that they. How much he shared with the room and us as the viewers, how much them clearing that meant to them and also sharing with the rules of the record that the family came, because that is something that can happen if someone, you know, if the Luther estate owns the record. They can, you know, say, hey, you know, they obviously have final say over how their song is used, but also you can hit stipul stipulations on it, like, hey, no cursing on my song, which is what they did here, which is very sweet. And Soundwave did an incredible job on this beat. And I'm so excited that he got to get up there and speak on behalf of the production duo on this record. And it was really. It was just. It was beautiful to hear them all celebrate the legacy of Luther Vandross. And then, furthermore, the Vandross estate gets a Grammy as well. That's a Grammy that also goes to the family and accounts for Luther's legacy. So it's a pretty incredible moment. And I'm sure any artist that grew up, you know, listening to any genre, but certainly, you know, in the black community, I grew up listening to a lot of Luther Vandross. My dad religiously had on Luther Vandross's hits In the House and in the Car. He's very much ingrained in my early developmental years in the home. So I'm just thinking, even from my perspective, I had the opportunity to give back to somebody to that degree at the highest level, at the highest honor, to give back to re honor their legacy and re inject them into the cultural zeitgeist. I think that's such a cool thing that Kendrick and Sza were able to accomplish. So kudos to them and I'm happy for the way that he went about that speech. Really giving it up to the Vandross family. Let's continue. That's one of his five awards. The other one he won is best Rap Song. Again, to no surprise, he won that. Which was. What was it? It was TV off with Lefty Gunplay. Pretty cool to see Lefty Gunplay win a Grammy. It's incredible. Good for him. Best melodic Rap performance again, it was record of the year. To no surprise, Luther won that as well. Best rap Performance. This is. Kendrick won this award as a feature. This is clips. Shout out to clips. I'm so happy that they won this award. I am selfishly just going to turn a blind eye to the Epstein file stuff for now regarding Push's involvement and just celebrate this Grammy win. How about this? More so for Malice. Good job, Malice. You're. You're incredible. And Kendrick. So that was another Grammy of his. That was Best rap Performance. Rightfully so. I remember I shared. I did go to that tour. I went to their shows right before New Year's. I think it was the day before New Year's Eve at Brooklyn Paramount. So much fun. Kendrick was not there. But like the performance of that record, they do such a good job with it. It's really great to see that live. And I believe that was it for the night for Kendrick. Huge, huge night for him. All well deserved. And again to no surprise, Kendrick's momentum doesn't seem to be slowing down now. Remember, GNX was the project that he put out as like the final nail with the seemingly the final nail in the coffin after the. The feud with Drake. This is like the post beef victory lap, so to speak. So now we're in the phase of like, has the dust from that settled? I don't think it ever really will. But in terms of like Kendrick's release schedule, will he go back to releasing what I would say Kendrick level albums? And it sounds like I'm dissing gnx. But to me, and I said this when it came out, gnx, I think it threw its. Even through even how it was released, like a surprise drop. And through the features on it and the sound of it, it to me plays like a mixtape. So I mean going by my rules, if this mixtape won all these Grammys, then shit, kudos to him. But I'm very curious to see how Kendrick moves forward when he's creating an album and what is the new character that he's going to develop. What's the new story that he's trying to tell. And what. What messaging does he like? I'm genuinely curious. What. What is his focus moving forward as an artist? And how will the last few summers affect his creative process in developing these characters? Will he be miss morale and the big steppers? Where will he revisit this character of, like, you know, a downtrodden, like, scorn, like a bad lover? Or will he, you know, the obviously good kid, mad city, this journey of, like, getting out the hood. Like, what is this next phase for Kendrick look like? I think it's gonna be really, really interesting. And I'm excited to see what he's got next. And I feel like it's gonna come sooner than later, if I'm being honest. Let's continue, though. Again, so much good music and so many awards to talk about. Do I jump right into my favorite part of the night? Yeah, come on. I mean, I think I've said this before, and if I haven't, you, like, it's. If you know me, you know I am a belieber, which sounds crazy. When I was a kid, I wasn't into Bieber stuff, to be honest. I came across. Well, Purpose came out on my birthday in 2015 or 16. It was November 13, 2015. I fell in love with that album immediately. And then I went back and loved Journals. So it really. For me, it's like the journals, it was purpose first. Then we'll go back, fell in love with journals and then from there it's been like, Bieber's been fucking incredible. This album Swag and Swag 2 are fantastic. Bieber put out like over 40 records this past summer, none of which won a Grammy. Bieber came home with zero wins. But beside Kendrick, I'm here to stamp that Bieber won the night and I'll explain why in a second. Bieber was nominated for only two awards tonight. No, sorry. He was nominated for. Let's just run through him. He was nominated for album of the year, best solo performance, best pop vocal album, and best R and B performance. Zero like goose egg on the night. He has two Grammy wins. You want to talk about someone that should have a beef and a Vendetta? Bieber has two Grammy wins over in 23 nominations. This guy's like. He's just. His batting percentage is terrible. He's like fucking Shaq from the free throw line. But we can shelf the disappointment of him not taking home any hardware. His performance of the night I Yukon. If you're not familiar, go listen to Uconn if you're not familiar, go listen to the Grammy performance of Yukon because that shit is like crap. Give me that right there. It is just crack. It's a rush of blood to the head. Shout out Coldplay. Great album. This performance. I mean, I'm not joking when I say I've probably watched it. I downloaded it. It's on my phone. I probably watched it or listened to it. Not really watched it because I'm, you know, working and stuff. I listened to it probably 20 times today. Then I went back and listened to both of his tiny desk. Well, his one tiny desk and then his like at home garage thing he did of journals, which I love journals live on YouTube. Check it out. But they, they call it. What's the. What did Drake say? You know, the, the Bieber face. Like the Bieber effect, whatever, what have you. I'm looking at some charts right now. They have like the spikes with Justin Bieber's performance and the viewership and how much higher his spike is over. Everybody watching all at once. And his. The amount of Google searches that were made for him during his performance, I mean, he still has a gravitational pull and weight that no other artist. I think he was just like the perfect mix at the right time. And he really popped as a child superstar in this era of celebrity, of the new era of celebrity, and grew with social media and just became just, you know, a meteor. He's. He's still somehow getting bigger. Pause, but like. So let's talk about the performance though. Bieber takes the stage. He's. He's just got a loop paddle of a guitar playing, which he has a guitar as an accessory on. He doesn't actually come out playing it in the performance itself, but he's in what looks like underwear, but it's probably just, you know, just a shorter pair of shorts in socks. Walks out on stage. The loop is playing the guitar loop is playing and there's a set of keys and I believe that. I don't know if there was a B pad. There was a pad there because he was doing some hot cues. The two chains. Yeah, like he dropped that a couple times, but he was playing keys and just sultry, just really sultry, really slow. And you know, I saw some think pieces like, look what men can do versus, like, look what the women have to do to put on different shows. And I think, like, they're just misconstruing, like what creative direction really is. I think the beauty of this performance is ever since that song came out Yukon, people were starved for the real vocals from that song. And they had leaked at one point after the album came out, not prior. And people were like, oh my God, this song. It was already incredible. It was already charting, but it just got so much better. We need these live vocals. We need these live vocals. So I think Bieber rather geniusly knew that this is what people were wanting and were clamoring to. And instead of giving us the full production and full stage set and show, which if you watch the award show throughout the night, hats off to Tar the creator. The guy's. He's cemented as an actor. Obviously he killed it at Marty supreme, but he put on, you know, a live theatrical performance. Sabrina Carpenter did this whole thing on like this airplane, you know, Runway build out, which was super. Again, theatrical and like moving all over stage, getting pushed all over the place and outfit changes and all getting lifted up and moved all over. And Lady Gaga doing everything Gaga does is always a set and show. She's always in a crazy costume. She looked like a Mortal Kombat character. There's no shortage of budget and there's no shortage of creativity when it comes to a live Grammy show. That being said, Bieber, which is usually honestly one of my favorite things that people do is when they take something that is so pushed in one direction and then just do the inverse of it and give people exactly what they wouldn't expect. So much so that he not only stripped down the performance, but he stripped down himself to the costume and he basically deflated the room just like how I just did right there. You feel. You just feel like in that, in that pause I just did, you can feel the weight of all the talking and all the momentum and everything I've just said. Just kind of.