The 51st Annual Grammy Awards' Music Makes Us Ad Campaign

Did you know the Grammy Awards were this Sunday? The Blot would bet any amount of money that most of you didn’t, and do you know why? Because no one cares! The days when families gathered around their television sets to see who won such and such award are dead and gone. When was the last time one of these awards shows even drew huge ratings? The truth is while I love the Emmys and the Oscars, the Grammys lost me a long, long time ago.


Part of the problem is I don’t understand the award categories. While the Emmys and Oscars have Best Actor/Actress and Best Supporting Actor/Actress, the Grammys have awards for Best Song, Best Album and Best Record. Aren’t those all the same thing? Plus, the past few years the Album of the Year award has gone to albums no one has even heard of and acts well past their prime.

So why am I even talking about the Grammys this year? Because its new advertising campaign entitled “Music Makes Us” is ridiculous awesome! While the Music Makes Us ad campaign has been running on television, in print, online and on the radio for weeks, it’s the print ads that really have The Blot excited (click here or here to find out more).


It features current and former nominees with their likenesses made up of lyrics from songs that influenced and inspired them as artists. While some collages reference little known artists, others like Lil Wayne and Rihanna’s “pays tribute to Jay-Z’s ‘Can’t Knock the Hustle’ and” Destiny’s Child’s “Say My Name” respectively. (link) As you can see from the photos in this post, the Grammys’ new ad campaign features some seriously heavy hitters from the music industry including Coldplay, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, Lenny Kravitz, Kanye West and Stevie Wonder.


Evidently the Celebrate The Music Makes Us ad campaign was created in direct response to “the Grammys suffering their lowest ratings since 1992,” but for whatever the reason I think this is a bold move in the right direction for the world’s preeminent music awards show. (link) Just think, if the ad campaign is this revolutionary what might they have in store for the actual ceremony? It might just be just enough to get me to actually tune in this year.


The 51st Annual Grammy Awards air this Sunday, February 8, 2009 at 8/7c on CBS.

Michael Phelps To Host Season Premier of Saturday Night Live

14 time gold medal winning United States Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps has been tabbed as the host of the season premiere of Saturday Night Live’s 34th season. (link) Phelps, who recently won eight gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, is the latest in a long line of the world’s greatest athletes to host NBC’s legendary sketch comedy show. Previous athletes to have hosted SNL include Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, LeBron James, Tom Brady, Lance Armstrong and best of all, Peyton Manning.


Joining Phelps on Saturday Night Live’s season premier as the show’s musical guest will be hip-hop superstar Lil’ Wayne. (link) This will be the rapper’s first appearance on Saturday Night Live and it could not have come at a better time. This year has seen Lil’ Wayne finally achieve the type of mainstream success many hip-hop fans knew he was destined for. It is nice to see Weezy finally be recognized as one of, if not the, best hip-hop artists of his generation. His latest album, 2008’s Tha Carter III, “sold over 1 million copies in its first week of release, a feat not achieved since 2005.” (link)

Be sure to tune in to see both Phelps and Lil’ Wayne on the 2008 season premiere of Saturday Night Live on September 13, 2008 at 11:30/10:30c, and as always, only on NBC.

The Blot Is Your Homeboy

Two years ago The Blot bought one of his favorite T-shirts of all time. Before I go on let me preface that in no way am I a Dallas Mavericks fan, but the shirt was such great bull and so creative I just had to buy one. The shirt in question is my trusty blue Dirk Is My Homeboy shirt which you can still buy by checking out the official Dirk Is My Homeboy MySpace page.


It’s a spoof of the trendy fad started back in 2004 (by Kanye West I believe) to wear the old school styled Jesus Is My Homeboy shirt but replaces Jesus’ face with the face of 2007 NBA MVP Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks. Since I thought the idea of the Dirk is My Homeboy T-shirt was so great, I’ve been keeping eyes peeled on the web for the next Jesus Is My Homeboy rip-off to add to my T-shirt collection. Yesterday was the day I found not one, but two worthy additions.

The first shirt I found while surfing the web also happens to tie in nicely with all of the recent media attention this person has been garnering over the past two years. It is my great pleasure to introduce to you the Obama Is My Homeboy T-shirt, which you can still purchase at NoStarClothing.com. Both this shirt and the next one I’m going to mention only come in black, which is kind of disappointing since I’m more of a random color type of guy. But I’ll learn to make do since the shirt is pretty cool. On the plus side the caricature of the Illinois Senator does look remarkably like him, much better than some of the other Barack Obama shirts I’ve seen on the web. I tried finding a decent Hillary Is My Homegirl shirt to be fair to both sides but the only shirts I could find were way too horrible to post.


And finally I’m happy to report for all you hip-hop fans out there that I found a Weezy Is My Homeboy shirt at Mix Unit’s hip-hop shop. Now this shirt I think I’m going to have to buy ASAP as it immortalizes one of the most prolific rappers of the past few years, Lil’ Wayne. Coming from the south you can’t go a minute listening to the radio without hearing a Lil’ Wayne track or a cameo by him on someone else’s song. I think even after all this time I can still listen to Weezy make it rain all day long.


If anyone’s got any other good “Is My Homeboy” shirts hit The Blot up.