Herbie Hancock Wins Album Of The Year At The Grammys? Seriously?

Well, I'll give it to the Grammys: At least they're consistent in being wholly, utterly out-of-touch. In the stunner of the year, Herbie Hancock, a pianist/composer who, to be fair, is an incredibly well-regarded and influential jazz musician (though most people probably know his name because of Tommy Boy) and scored a video hit in MTV's early years with the song "Rockit" (see it at the top of this post), won album of the year at the 2008 Grammys over the likes of Kanye West, Amy Winehouse and Foo Fighters, just to name a few. The native Chicagoan (woot! woot!) won for his tribute album to Joni Mitchell, River - Letters To Joni.

This result shouldn't surprise anyone whose paid attention to the Grammys. A few years ago, Steely Dan beat out Eminem for album of the year and, back in 1989, the Grammy gave the first "Best Heavy Metal" album award to Jethro Tull. Their competition that year? Metallica, who the year before put out their poorly-mixed-but-nonetheless-classic-thrash-metal album ...And Justice For All.

And now they've given album of the year to Herbie Hancock.

Congrats?

(Jonathan Graef)