Grammy nominations are slightly less terrible this year!

It’s no secret that the Grammy awards are useless and irrelevant and horrible. I mean, when you give awards to Kings of Leon and Green Day, what do you expect? But this year (THIS YEAR) the nominations are a leeeedle bit better! Taking my notes are you, Grammy people? Well you might be able to raise your eyes from that chair in the corner, to see the world’s crossed arms and rolled eyes, in hopes that your award might eventually be allowed to play again. There’s always hope, Grammys. As usual, the highlights:

• The Alternative Album award, the one we indie-snobs keep an eye on, will go to The Arcade Fire (a very good album!), Band of Horses (I guess for diversity or something?), Black Keys (very good! but mandatory rock indie album), Broken Bells (disappointing, but dammit we need a hip-hop voice SOMEWHERE in there!) or Vampire Weekend (because they are very very popular).
• The Album of the Year award, the one that really matters or something is between Arcade Fire (still! very good!), Lady Antebellum (still don’t know who that is), Eminem (a white guy who does hip-hop??), Lady Gaga (The Fame Monster) and Katy Perry (the fame monster). I guess Arcade Fire should win this one? Lord knows none of the other nominees made anything worthwhile (I can’t speak for Lady Antebellum because I still don’t know who that is. What are they, country? Rock? Folk? Somebody help me out here).
• Best New Artist pits well-respected indie “&” bands Mumford & Sons and Florence & The Machine against the likes of Drake and Justin Beiber. Also Esperanza Spalding, whoever that is. This category doesn’t really matter because whether or not Beiber wins, the world will flood with the salty tears of screaming girls everywhere (give them anything just make them stop!).
• Black Keys, Oh No Ono and Devandra Banhart are all up for Best Recording Package! and Roky Erickson with Okkervil River are up for Best Album Notes! Hey now that’s really something, huh?

If you really care which awful artists win which awful awards, you can check out the full nominations at the Grammy website. Or you can just go play some slime volleyball! Hey, remember slime volleyball??