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"White people don't do [soul music] very well because we don't want to let go. Nihilism suits us." -- Bono, 2000 |
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"White people don't do [soul music] very well because we don't want to let go. Nihilism suits us." -- Bono, 2000 |
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Dave Karger, Entertainment Weekly, and Alan Light, Spin Magazine, Discuss the Grammy Nominations
NBC News Transcripts,
January 05, 2002
Anchors: David Bloom; Soledad O'Brien; Kelly O'Donnell
Reporters: Janice Huff David Bloom, co-host: This morning, we begin a weekly series, Today's Best Bets, covering the newest in entertainment from movies and DVDs to record releases and book reviews. Today, the Grammys nominations and a batch of new DVDs top our list. Dave Karger from Entertainment Weekly will do the DVDs and videos, and Alan Light from Spin magazine has the Grammys. Guys, good morning. Mr. Dave Karger (Entertainment Weekly): Good morning, David. Mr. Alan Light (Spin Magazine): Good morning. Bloom: Allen, let's start with you. Grammys: U2, eight nominations. Did that surprise you? Mr. Light: The most nominations for anybody went to U2, even after they were the biggest winner and the biggest story last year. Last year, only the first single from the album "Beautiful Day" was eligible. This year the whole, All That You Can't Leave Behind album came up. Bloom: Let's go through this list for album of the year of the five nominees. The first is Love and Theft by Bob Dylan. Second one is Acoustic Soul by India.Arie. Third is by Stankonia by Outkast. Fourth is O Brother Where Art Thou which is the soundtrack from the movie. And last but not least, of course, is U2 with All That You Can't Leave Behind. Let's-- let's play a clip from U2 first, because this video... (Clip from U2 music video) Bloom: ...was essentially a video montage of the aftermath of the attacks. Mr. Light: Well, it was such an extraordinary year for U2 from the beginning to the end, they had the-- the biggest tour of the year. In all these nominations, it's also not like they had one song that shows up over and over again. There's three or four songs that got different nominations this year. And after September 11th, I think U2 really clicked into focus as a band that was doing something that nobody out there is doing. Bloom: Are they the hands-on favorite to win album of the year? Mr. Light: This is a good list. And-- and, you know, Bob Dylan, the record is my favorite record of the year. It has to be in contention. And the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack was such an extraordinary left-field surprise. Bloom: Right. Mr. Light: You know, nobody expected this was going to sell three million records, and I think that's got a shot, too. Bloom: Let's talk about the category, record of the year. Because -- essentially song of the year and go through the five nominees. The first is "Video," again by India.Arie. The second one is "Ms. Jackson" by Outkast. Eight is "Drops of Jupiter" -- great song, I love that -- by Train. Fourth is "Walk on" by U2. And fifth is "Fallen" from Alicia Keys. Alicia Keys was the one, I guess, that everybody expected to get a lot of nominations this year. Why? (Clip from Alicia Keys music video) Mr. Light: Well, going in the thought was this was going to be an Alicia Keys sweep year. She is sort of a Grammy voter's dream. She hits all the right notes, a new artist who is an R&B singer/songwriter, classically trained, hip-hop inflected. You know, if you made up the checklist, you couldn't do any better than--than Alicia Keys. She had one of the biggest records of the year but also one of the most critically acclaimed records. So it's no surprise that she got a stack of awards. And even though there are other -- there are other stories that emerged in the nominations, I still think in the end Alicia's going to win some of these awards. Bloom: So let's do best new artist -- because you mentioned her, she's certainly in that category--of-- of the five nominees in best new artist, the first is Nellie Furtado, the second is David Gray, thirdly, Linkin Park, Alicia Keys, you mentioned, and lastly India.Arie. And India.Arie, let's play a clip from her video. (Clip from India.Arie music video) Bloom: It-- it seems to me to be the real surprise here that she got so many nomination. Mr. Light: Well, no question. The surprise out of this list was India.Arie. Everybody, again, expected Alicia Keys and thought, "OK, there's a new R&B... Bloom: R&B... Mr. Light: ...singer/songwriter, that's taken care of." The fact that India.Arie got actually one more nomination than Alicia Keys, and Nellie Furtado got a number of nominations, it was a clear message that the Grammys wanted to get behind these new developing artists rather than the superstars who kind of dropped the ball this year. Bloom: I'm going to shift quickly to Dave because we've got these new DVDs, videos to walk through. Moulin Rouge, disappointment at the box office but nonetheless getting a lot of attention now. Mr. Karger: It's had this amazing resurgence at the end of the year as the early, you know, pre-Oscar awards have been coming out. (Clip from Moulin Rouge) Mr. Karger: It tied with the most Golden Globe nominations with six. The video and DVD release is very well timed because it puts the movie back in people's consciousness, and it really helps the Oscar chances which are really coming up. Bloom: OK. The flip side of Moulin Rouge is this movie Fast and Furious which nobody thought would explode at the box office, yet it did. Mr. Karger: Yeah, had a $40 million opening, it made $140-plus million overall. A very big surprise hit. I would tell you what it's about but I don't really remember. (Clip from The Fast and the Furious) Mr. Karger: Because all you really need to know is who is in it. Paul Walker, Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez -- these hot, young stars. And it's about drag racing, which is why it did so well. Bloom: OK. Third movie, DVD, which I've never heard of, Wet Hot American Summer. But you, Dave, loved this movie. Mr. Karger: Right. Here's the thing about this movie. It only made $200,000 at theaters. Bloom: I'm shocked, clearly I am. (Clip from Wet Hot American Summer) Mr. Karger: That's because the-- the film company, USA Films, didn't put it in enough theaters. Check out this cast: Molly Shannon from Saturday Night Live, Paul Rudd, David Hyde Pierce from Frasier, Janeane Garofalo. It's a summer camp movie spoof. The cast even lived in cabins in a summer camp in Pennsylvania. It's just a real trippy wild, fun, funky movie that hopefully will get discovered on video. Bloom: Hopefully. Last movie is Ocean's Eleven. And, of course, we're not talking about the one that's out there right now... Mr. Karger: Absolutely. Bloom: ...but the rat pack original from the '60s. Mr. Karger: Yeah. Now that the new one's doing so well, maybe some people want to check out the original. Obviously not a classic great movie, but it's Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin playing the roles that Don Cheadle, George Clooney and Brad Pitt play now. Might be fun for some people to check out. Bloom: Dave and Allen, thanks so much. We'll be watching the Grammys. When is it? February 27th. Mr. Light: Twenty-seventh. Bloom: Yeah. Mr. Light: Right at the end of the month. Bloom: Thanks again, guys. And we'll be right back. *** Bloom: OK, so quickly, we want your album of the year choice. You've got Bob Dylan, India.Arie, Outkast, O Brother Where Art Thou? and U2. Soledad O'Brien, co-host: I think U2 is going to win, but I would personally pick India.Arie. Janice Huff Reporting: Yeah. Bloom: Kell. Kelly O'Donnell, anchor: Probably U2. Huff: I'll pick U2, but I like India.Arie. Bloom: It's a U2 clean sweep. Coming up tomorrow on Today, when you grow kids-- when you have grown kids, and you want to come back... O'Brien: Oh, no, I'm rubbing off on you. Oh, no! Bloom: It's something about families, we'll tell you about it after this. O'Brien: Try that again. We will see you tomorrow, everybody. Have a great day! That's a smooth ending. © NBC News, 2002. All rights reserved.
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