Grammy notebook. Show joined in progress (I don't have the stomach to watch the entire thing).

8:58. Oh Christ. Jon Stewart is the host.

8:59. Billy Joel and Tony Bennett. These guys look to be about the same age.

9:02. JS comments on the performance, saying "that's unbelievable" with all the emotion of a ten dollar hooker panting "oh yeah, right there". Then he insults Creed. All is forgiven.

9:08. Dave Koz, Natalie Cole and P. Diddy present Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. Talk about an unlikely threesome. Puffy's been relegated to being the token homie presenting this second-rate award while lumped in with two jazz artists. There is a G-d.

If they're going to play only three seconds of the nominated tunes, then why bother playing anything at all?

9:21. 5871 country and bluegrass artists do the "O Brother" thing. This reminds me of the Junos a couple of years back, when 3692 Canadian "urban" performers were packed into a five minute live montage. It's like "OK, we've taken care of *that* all in one shot, now let's return you to the important music".

9:23. What is that oversized Dixie Chick wearing? A curtain??

9:32. Alicia Keys + Joaquin Cortez + orchestra. This is the type of performance I like seeing at the Grammys -- a combination of performers and styles that we wouldn't normally see -- even if I can't see the big deal about AK for the life of me.

9:58. Best Country Song and Album aren't presented on the main show? Are they trying to avoid overlap with the proliferation of country music award shows?

10:03. Bob Dylan and his band perform in a dark corner. You don't need dancers, wildlife, and a stage the size of a football field to make an impact.

10:09. Mother of Pearl! "O Brother" wins for Best Album. I figured this was U2's to lose. The orchestra starts cutting off T-Bone Burnett's acceptance speech after about a minute. OH COME ON. It's the freaking ALBUM OF THE YEAR. One of these decades, the Grammys are bound to wake up and smell 1970, understand that albums drive the music business, realize that this is the most important award of the evening, and therefore start presenting it last.

10:21. Elvis Costello (rightly) points out that Song of the Year is a songwriters award. Of course, 1965 was 37 years ago, so all of the songwriters in this category are the artists themselves.

10:33. Awkwardly sandwiched between tributes is an anti-internet music downloading tirade by the Prez of the Recording Academy. It's so over the top that I figure he's being a bit tongue-in-cheek, until I peer deep into his eyes and see reflections of Shawn Fanning huddling for warmth in a damp cave next to Osama.

10:47. Outkast smash through "Ms. Jackson", a performance which recalls Beethovens' "Pastoral Symphony". Greenness and happy children playing in the background give way to darkness and storms which give way to redness, sunrise and rebirth. This should be Record of the Year in a fair and just world.

10:52. Nelly Furtado sings "I'm Like a Bird" accompanied by Steve Vai on solo guitar. Please reread my comment at 9:32 and reapply here.

11:03. Alan Jackson performs "Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning?" with a giant video screen depicting blue skies and childrens' drawings -- plaintive pictures of burning skyscrapers and American flags. Simple, touching, tasteful, poignant, with no handwringing, patriotic gesticulating, or ex-presidents.

11:08. Jon Stewart ruins the moment with a shameful attempt at a ZZ Top / Taliban joke.

11:13. "So Fresh, So Clean" plays instead of "Ms. Jackson" when the Record of the Year nominees are announced. I predict that Outkast won't win this award.

11:14. "Walk On" wins. U2's worst ever single?

11:21. The finale. I fear excess.

11:25. No excess, just a rousing gospel medley. But you'd think that Al Greens' Lifetime Achievement distinction would earn him more that 45 seconds of solo airtime.

11:28. Show over. The gospel rave-up continues, the credits roll, and the audience does their best to look bored. G-d bless the Grammys?

In 1998, I branded a Skam Records compilation as the successor to 1988's "Techno! The New Dance Sound of Detroit", Virgins' seminal (yes, that's the correct word) collection of Detroits' seminal (yes, again) godfathers and innovators. Boards of Canada, Jega, Bola, and the rest of the Skam crew had made the most original, fascinating, and emotional leap forward in the recent evolution of the techno music form, as different from what came before it as the original Detroit compilation was from the house and electro music of its day.

It wasn't too long before I realized that I had been wrong. Bola's "Soup" was jaw-dropping in certain places (the beginning and the end), but tended to meander toward electronic funk with uninspired results. Jega decided to become the next Aphex Twin, releasing albums of scatterbrained ambition with the main intent of creating genres that hadn't been invented yet -- shave off half the material and you may have a great album. Boards of Canada released a good, but far from great debut (a fixation with the moodscape of Kraftwerk's "Radio-activity" cost them much in the inventiveness category). Now, Skam unleashes acts like Team Doyobi, where yet again, the overwhelming emphasis is on quirkiness, instead of the understated soul and warm soothing dronetones which led me to sing their praises four years ago.

"Geogaddi", the new album by Boards of Canada, is similarly problematic. True, there's an unmistakable beauty in everything they do, as comfortable as a warm hug on a soft rug. But it's often schizophrenic. Of the album's 23 tracks, about half of them are gorgeous, melancholy interludes. But interludes are all they are allowed to be, for they don't allow the heaviness to fully develop into extended tracks. The beats are heavier and funkier than on the debut, but lack the inherent playfulness that made it such an enjoyable listen. I'm certainly not one to complain about heavy music (of volume, mood, or density) but if that's what BoC were striving for, then they didn't fully commit. They'll get funky, and then lighten up a bit (as if to say, "don't get all depressed and upset now, we were just trying to spook you a bit"), and then go dark all over again with an interlude before turning back toward more forceful beats once again. Their overall message is fuzzy -- like the Mona Lisa, are they smiling or serious? Did they decide beforehand? Or are we supposed to do it for them?

Every once in a while, I catch a bit of 102.1's "Ongoing History of New Music", and within five seconds I am invariably screaming at my radio and damning Alan Cross' ignorance to hell and back. This is both horrifying and fun. Horrifying because (presumably) people listen to this show and actually buy into Cross' version of history. Fun because I could put my brain into deep freeze for 167 hours a week, but thaw out for an hour each Sunday night and still have enough material to spew plentiful amounts of bile onto this web page each week in perpetuity.

This week: Britpop. The Smiths, he claims, were great because of Morrissey's outspokenness and socio-political wit. "This Charming Man" is played as support. First and foremost, Morrissey's lyrics connected with adolescents who abhorred the soullessness of synth pop because those lyrics spoke directly to their feelings of insecurity, angst and alienation. If he wanted to demonstrate Morrissey's obsessions with politics or Oscar Wilde, he could have played "Cemetry Gates" or "The Queen is Dead". Instead, he discreetly plugs the "Ongoing History of Music" CD available in fine shops near you by playing the extended version of "This Charming Man". Knowing Morrisseys intense hatred of remixing and dance music (not to mention the extensive remixing and repackaging of that very song -- has Alan Cross ever heard "Paint a Vulgar Picture"?) it is difficult to think of a worse choice. Later on, he speaks of the Smiths penchant for writing strong three minute singles, but plays the six and a half minute "How Soon Is Now?"

Then, he talks about the Manchester scene, and how the music was highly danceable fodder -- perfect for shaking along with your bowl haircut --, filled with droning organs and psychedelic effects. He rightly asserts that nobody did it better than the Stone Roses, but he clearly had "Fools Gold" in mind, because the above description applies perfectly to that, but not at all to the song he actually played, "I Am the Resurrection". True, Madchester was heavily influenced by acid house, but this was barely evident on the Roses debut. Thanks to John Leckie, the band's trippier exploits were subdued in favour of the 60's flavoured jangle-rock that the Roses re-popularized, at least until the "Fools Gold" (which was produced by Paul Schroeder, not Leckie). All was not for naught, for least he played all eight minutes of this magnificent album closer, although he could have adequately set it up by explaining how every British album released for the next six years was legally mandated to contain an extended guitar epic as its final track because of the example the Roses set.

Hippies, at one point, were arguably the leftist conscience of the musical and political world.

Notwithstanding the (supposed) fact that all of the 1960's hippies grew up to become lawyers and accountants and moved to the suburbs and are now voting Republican, being a hippie in 2002 is about the safest thing around. There's nothing daring or threatening or groundbreaking about being crusty. Standing in a field listening to noodling guitar solos is bereft of inventiveness, it's the same stuff "our parents" did, which means it's established commercial shlock coming to a classic rock station near you.

When I wasn't watching the greatest Superbowl ever, I felt I was watching Live Aid 2002.

Artist after artist after artist, an international spread of talent all paying tribute to the same cause. Suddenly, at around 6:30 PM, I remembered there was a football game to be played.

I'm still not sure why they had the mid afternoon marquee with Barenaked Ladies, No Doubt, et al. It wasn't part of the Superbowl agenda per se, it was solely for the TV audience, and therefore probably just an excuse for Fox to rake in a few extra advertising dollars off the names of celebrities.

It went on and on, as the ex-presidents blasted the shlock factor clear through the roof of the Superdome in their opening slot for Mary J. Blige and Marc Anthony. With all the heavy-handed sincerity surrounding Sept. 11, it sure was nice of MJB to wear that frayed black top so that hundreds of millions of people could see her breasts and be reminded of the truly important things in life.

The extravagance was more reminiscent of the Olympic opening ceremonies, and we'll have an appropriate basis for comparison as we are bound to get the exact same tributes and auras four days from now. Paul McCartney's "Freedom" is actually a half-decent song, and Mariah was welcomely non fruitcakey with her National Anthem. Not even a stupid smile and a pixie-ish wave to the crowd. How's that for good fortune? She gets dumped from her contract, but of course, she's got the high profile Superbowl gig to boost her image and convince people that she's still important. If her career resurges in the next couple of months, don't say I didn't warn you. Mariah could be 2002's Queen.

Finally, the show. U2 put on an incendiary performance, effortlessly recreating the intimate vibe of their last tour, complete with heart-shaped stage and screaming fans. The last I'd heard, they were scheduled to perform three songs, with "Walk On" being one of them. Good for whoever put the kibosh on that, because "Walk On" is ten thousand times less poignant than it wants to be, and if this allowed them to stretch out and play an untruncated version of their best song -- "Where the Streets Have No Name" --, then bravo. I'm not sure why the curtain came down toward the end -- there may have been something in the air, as Fox had loads of technical problems with their bad camera angles and non-synchronous video/sound feeds -- but I'm hoping it was an embarrassing error, because watching that curtain fall made me remember ... and that would be extremely tasteless.

It may be the worst time of year for new releases and gigs, but the music news is as amusing as ever.

Is there anything funnier than Mariah Carey getting dumped from her contract? In the last year, her reputation has headed in the exact opposite direction as her breasts -- way, way down. Sure, $28 million will ease a lot of the pain and embarrassment. But it's difficult to feel sorry for her. She was nuttier than a fruitcake long before she was medically diagnosed as such. Her wickedly ditzy interviews made the guest actress commentators on Iron Chef look like CJ Cregg in a briefing room on The West Wing. For years, her videos have been a living, breathing advertisement for Temptation Island. She was jettisoned so swiftly from EMI that I can't make up my mind if it's more hilarious or scary. It's scary because a proven commercial success like Mariah, who I has the third or fourth most #1 hits in the history of music, was dumped like day old bread at the first sign of weakness. She'll probably return strong in a year or two, but POP is about the bottom line, and in two years, EMI could release 329 albums by boy bands and make their money that way before that gravy train dries up.

Also, Starsailor have garnered themselves a notable superfan in Phil Spector. He invited the band to his house, and they stayed for two hours. Before you shrug your shoulders, please note that Spector is probably the second most reclusive man in the world after Osama bin Laden. And he wants to work with Starsailor. The man's last production was in 1980. As a Spector worshipper, I'm both excited and jealous at Starsailors' good fortune (particularly because they're not all that great, they're reaching like mad to be a hybrid of 1995 Verve and Radiohead and falling far short, but mainly due to the not-easily-attainable high quality of those bands in that year).

Actually, the Spector-Starsailor pairing would be a good idea. It would churn out shimmery amped-up folk pop, sort of like the sound of Sigur Ros' "Agetis Byrjun" playing cover versions of Slowdive. But if Spector really wants to make himself useful, he should grab the nearest revolver, three of his bodyguards, get on a plane to the UK, go to Kevin Shields' house, stick a gun in his ear to wake him up at three in the afternoon, drag his ass down to the studio, and start making an album. First of all, it would be the greatest album ever. If there was a 1990's equivalent of Phil Spector, it was Kevin Shields. On the flip side, if there was a 1990's equivalent of Phil Spector, it was Kevin Shields. That is, the album would take 100 years to make and cost more than Microsoft is worth, provided that those two perfectionists could spend five minutes together without killing each other.

The soundtrack for "The Royal Tennenbaums" hasn't left my CD changer since I bought it. Now, that was only three days ago, but still. Black comedies are one thing, but this is a black soundtrack. With the exception of the 91-second head rush of the Ramones "Judy is a Punk", and a few of Mark Mothersbaugh's tongue-in-cheek playful interludes (i.e. "Pagoda's Theme") this is an album of dark, disturbing retro-pop posing as a cash-in companion to a major motion picture. It's one thing for a soundtrack to carry morbid symphonic weight, i.e. emotion rattling films such as "Schindler's List", "The Last Temptation of Christ", any war film, and about a million others. It's an entirely different seduction when you employ not one, but two Nico songs. The last time I checked, Nico wasn't the sort of chanteuse whose name and music are prone to drip thoughts of "Hollywood Glitz". Ditto Nick Drake. Ditto Elliot Smith's moody, empty, delicate "Needle in the Hay". And who was the genius who chose the Velvet's "Stephanie Says", the most criminally overlooked uber-classic in their deep back catalogue?

In fact, the whole CD is like a collection of jewels in the rough made by a vinyl-obsessed loner, whose sole purpose was to cull a soundtrack full of artists that never show up on Hollywood soundtracks. It's less a soundtrack that a mix tape traded between profoundly sensitive goth teens in love. Hmmm. Maybe there's a Hollywood film in there after all.

I sat through a "Biography of Grunge" on MMM last week. "Sat through" is a very diplomatic way of putting it. The program was awful, it was nothing more than a rapid-fire barrage of name dropping, soundclips, and quick facts. With the exception of the soundclips, the same ends could have been accomplished using a basic list of chronological events, the kind that appear in the appendices of history books. There was not a single mention of WHY grunge happened, i.e. WHY rock lacked soul and emotion in the 1980's, WHY Nirvana left from the middle of nowhere into mega-mainstream success, WHY people got bored of grunge in the mid-1990's (note to "Bio" producers: the "overexposure" excuse is overused to the point of no longer having any meaning, please be more specific next time if you want to make novel insights).

The main thing I took away from this program is how downright crappy most of grunge was, and how AWESOME Nirvana were compared to all their contemporaries. I was completely unenthused with grunge when it broke, so unfortunately, it wasn't until a few months after Kurt's death that I realised how great Nirvana really were. Now, hearing their songs alongside those of every other grunge band only accentuated how much brighter they shone (and still do shine) in comparison.

Oh, and I was glad about a couple other things: not a single mention of poseurs-extraordinaires Stone Temple Pilots. And they made fun of Silverchair.

Next time, maybe they'll think of mentioning the greatest grunge album ever made, that being Teenage Fanclub's "Bandwagonesque". But I doubt it.

TOP 10 ALBUMS OF 2001.

1. SPIRITUALIZED -- LET IT COME DOWN. Jason Pierce is one of the finest musical geniuses of our lifetime. Deal with it.

2. LABRADFORD -- FIXED:CONTEXT. The band retreated from their shimmery, orchestral trademarks, headed into the studio with Steve Albini, and emerged with an album so full of lingering, tantalizing empty space that it was practically agoraphobic. Everything moves in slow motion, as the album passes by in some of the most lethargically forever thirty-seven minutes you'll ever hear. A brooding, meloncholy gem.

3. MOGWAI -- ROCK ACTION. Not as intense as their live shows but every bit as epic. "Young Team" had more fury, "CODY" had more conviction, but "Rock Action" carries more emotional weight. If they can put it all together on the same record, you can't help but feel that Mogwai, one day, could make the greatest album of all time.

4. DEADBEAT -- PRIMORDIA. Rumbling basslines and swampy (ahem) effects quake throughout this expansive masterpiece. The influences loom large (i.e. Chain Reaction) but this is darker and nastier than just about any predecessor. And it's painfully minimal in the best possible way.

5. DRUGSTORE -- SONGS FOR THE JETSET. Drugstore, who hadn't been heard from in years, returned from their brief brush with B-list stardom and got back to basics with a folky, lo-fi, understated gem that reminded you why anyone had cared about them in the first place. The album likely sold fewer copies than Mick Jaggers latest solo effort and will unfortunately be forgotten, if it hasn't been already.

6. A SILVER MT. ZION MEMORIAL ORCHESTRA AND TRA LA LA BAND -- BORN INTO TROUBLE AS THE SPARKS FLY UPWARD. At first, the expansion of ASMZ from a trio to a collective seemed to blanket the serenity that had been their trademark. Upon further listening, more turned out to be less. That is, they use more instuments to play fewer notes, with incredibly effective results.

7. NEW ORDER -- GET READY. Say what? The years best pop album was made by New Order? As infectious as anything they've ever done, "Get Ready" is "Brotherhood" squared and forces the dredging of the phrase "dance-rock" from the cuss words of yesteryear. Who cares, New Order invented the damned thing anyhow.

8. ARAB STRAP -- THE RED THREAD. The years' most distinctive Verve release. It may ramble (beautifully) in its weakest moments, but when its on, it invokes pangs of contempt, disgust, lust and longing, all at the same time, and often with reference to the same person.

9. PULP -- WE LOVE LIFE. The impossible has happened. Five years ago, who would have guessed that Pulp would be making some of the most challenging music in pop? This album, like its predecessor, will take months to fully digest. What makes the world go round? Sex, class struggle, fame, and now nature.

10. MARKUS GUENTNER -- IN MOLL. A fine extension of the "Regensburg ep". Gas-like beats crop up in spurts, but mainly this is beatless, serene, twinkling ambient music of the highest order. A grower, to be sure.

When I finish putting together my list of the year's top albums (weekend-ish), I'll have some explaining to do.

So I might as well cut to the chase and start explaining right now.

For someone who hums and haws about techno as much as I do, two albums in the Top 10 might seem a bit scant. Considering the time and money I spend on techno music, a mere 20% of the year's best albums would indicate that I'm either wasting my effort, or there just aren't many great techno albums out there.

I blame it all on the vinyl. Maybe it is true that there haven't been many great techno albums this year. But there's been a load of great techno. The best of it was released on vinyl. So, in past years, the solid techno stomp of Planetary Assault Systems or K-Hand's transcendent "Detroit-History" may have been top 10 shoo-ins. But when most of the stuff I buy comes in the form of ridiculously killer twenty minute assaults from labels like Kennziffer, then my standards sway significantly toward the direction of impossibly high quality. Take the best twenty minutes of Michael Burkat or Green Velvet, and it fares magnificently next to any vinyl release I've heard. Such quality is difficult to sustain over an entire album.

Perhaps it's no surprise that those Top 10 albums are both by artists who I first discovered through their vinyl releases.