Favourite Grammy 2022 Performance

[Devil Marlena Nylund]

Whose performance was your favourite at the Grammys? Pick up to 5 that stood out to you. I included the rooftop performances even though they were all rudely interrupted by commercial breaks.


Silk Sonic  "777"

Olivia Rodrigo "Drivers License"

J Balvin "Qué Más Pues?" (with María Becerra) +"In da Getto"

BTS "Butter"

Aymée Nuviola "La Gota Fria"

Lil Nas X Medley: "Dead Right Now" "Montero (Call Me by Your Name)" "Industry Baby" (with Jack Harlow)

Billie Eilish "Happier Than Ever"

Brandi Carlile "Right on Time"

Nas Medley: "I Can" "Made You Look" "One Mic" "Rare"

Chris Stapleton "Cold"

Maverick City Music "Jireh"

John Legend, Siuzanna Iglidan, Mika Newton, Lyuba Yakimchuk: Tribute to Ukraine "Free"

Lady Gaga Tribute to Tony Bennett: "Love for Sale" "Do I Love You?"

Billy Strings "Hide and Seek"

Cynthia Erivo, Ben Platt, Leslie Odom Jr., Rachel Zegler In Memoriam Segment: "Not a Day Goes By" + "Send in the Clowns" + "Somewhere"

Jon Batiste "Freedom"

Justin Bieber, Giveon, Daniel Caesar "Peaches"

H.E.R. "Damage" (featuring Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis) + "We Made It" +  "Are You Gonna Go My Way" (featuring Travis Barker and Lenny Kravitz)

Carrie Underwood "Ghost Story"

Brothers Osborne "Dead Man's Curve"

[upsidedown]

Definitely Billie. Felt she had the most "star power" but there were certainly many great performances. Olivia was great, while Brandi, John Legend, and Chris Stapleton all sounded amazing.

BTS, Lil Nas X, and Peaches were the worst IMO.

[Devil Marlena Nylund]

I'll try to summarize some thoughts:

First off, I'd say this was probably the most I've enjoyed a Grammys in years. Last year's show was also really good so two back-to-back award shows is a good look for the Grammys after years of seeming stale and dry in a lot of ways. It's also impressive considering mainstream music itself hasn't always been super dependable, and even if a lot of the winners weren't what I would pick - and a lot were predictable, I don't feel ripped off after watching the show.


👍 Trevor Noah is a decent host. He's not boring by any means and he keeps things moving. There were some points that I felt him venture into too informal territory with some of the "skits", but I also realize that might be me allowing myself to be stuck in old ways of doing things and one of the Grammys' biggest faults (and a lot of award shows I guess) is their delay in evolving. I fondly remember Grammys of the 90s and compare every show to those, which was weird when a few weeks ago I watched half of the 1984 Grammys on YouTube.

👎 Didn't care for the venue. Or maybe it was the outdoor portions of it. I like that the Grammys have the elegance to them that other music award shows don't. This crossed a bit into VMAs territory for me - at least it seemed like it wanted to, but it was able to maintain its composure. On that note:

👎 Rooftop performances: why show them at all if you're going to cut to commercial half a minute into the performance and then come back to the last half minute. I think the AMAs did this too with Latto and a few other performers last year, who were basically the house band? Idk. Just seemed like an odd choice to me.

👍 Olivia Rodrigo and Billie Eilish were my picks for top performances. Mainly due to their respective stage setups, but they both gave really compelling performances. "Happier Than Ever" really lends itself as a good award show performance.

👍 You know what, I'm going to give BTS a thumbs-up here. At the risk of Meg seeing this and thinking I've "come to my senses" again, or whatever it was she said about me on Twitter last year, I believe in giving credit where credit is due. They put on a good performance. The song is a paint-by-numbers pop song obviously written by computers, but if the goal is to entertain, they did just that. Now mind you, once they start appearing on every award show (well, they already are) doing the same type of thing, it will get less interesting. They do need to up their actual song game, but it was nice to see them not "live" via video.

👎 When I saw Justin Bieber at the piano at the start of his performance, I thought oh! Justin can play piano! But then he started playing and I'm like, oh, maybe he can't. I'm sure he can to some degree, but the way he introed himself set my expectations higher than they should have - and it didn't help that his piano-led Peaches portion wasn't that good.

😑 There weren't a lot of stand-out performances in the way that we'll be talking about them for years to come, but there weren't a lot of terrible performances either, and I'd say that's a win. But there were some middle-of-the-pack performances by performers we expect to steal all the buzz. Lil Nas X usually does but his performance was just there, and why did Jack only do half his verse? Gaga is another that seemed to not be well-received. Honestly, I liked it! I get that her jazz vocals aren't up everyone's alley (and there did seem to be some silly bits last night, I won't lie), but seeing her embody her jazz persona, I couldn't help but think, is there anything she can't do? To see her go from her ARTPOP days, to this, on top of everything else she's done - and doing so interchangeably, I'll forgive her if she doesn't always nail it 100%.

👎 I can't say there were too many performances (and maybe there were), but I do wish there were more awards presented on air. This has been my complaint for years now. Does anyone know how many awards they presented on-air back in the 80s and 90s? I am curious as to whether it's always been this way or if it was a conscious decision and when. It's a bit of a balancing act, I'm sure, but the first award comes 20 minutes after 3 performances, and then another award isn't given out until half an hour later.

👎 John Legend again... The Ukraine tribute was lovely, but surely there could have someone else to accompany the artists from Ukraine, or even just letting them have the stage to do their piece.

👎 Maybe they declined or couldn't for whatever reason but it would have been nice to get a performance from Megan/Dua and/or Doja in there. Overall I'd say the lineup was pretty good, and there will always be some gaps, but since they were all present, the opportunity might have been there already.

👍 There was a good mix of wins and I do like a nice surprise with Jon Batiste winning Album of the Year. Admittedly I haven't heard his music before the Grammys but I'll check him out for sure. His performance last night was another highlight and he seems like such a fun guy!

I think that's all. TL;DR, it was a good show overall. A bit front-loaded, but some of us do have bedtimes so.

[thezatch]

My Top 5:

Billie
Olivia
The "In Memoriam" segment
Carrie
Brothers Osborne

Least fave: Bieber

[Ｓｏｕｎｄｃｌ🕤ｃｋ]

Olivia and Billie (the real SOTY and ROTY winners)

[ilikemilk]

Drivers License easily because it is the best song on it. How am I going to like a performance of a song that I do not like?

[upsidedown]

Yeah the problem with the show now is that there are just not that many memorable performances. There used to be so many huge "GRAMMY" moments while now, even though some were really great, none are going to be remmebered.

[Ling-Ling]

I think Jon, Billie and Brandi were tops. Billie had a nice set and the build-up was great. Jon's performance was so joyful and it really put me in a good mood, even though some of the vocals were shaky. And Brandi served vocals and musicality per the usual.

BTS, Bieber and Gaga were the bottoms for me. I admittedly think BTS are good dancers, but everything about that setup had me cringing. And I wish they could sing. Bieber's acoustic arrangement was embarrassingly bad and I'm not sure what the heck was going on once he left the piano. And I don't have a problem with jazz Gaga, she's given some great performances in that avenue. But her vocals were plain off/bad last night. I have no idea what happened, but she was basically cracked out Ella Fitzgerald up there.

The ehs! Lil Nas X was just there for me, I find that he consistently gets swallowed up by his stage production. J Balvin was just there as well. And I consistently find HER so frustrating. She was up there giving drum and guitar solos, performing rock songs and she was still SLEEP SLEEP and low energy. And her vocals were flat and passionless.

I felt like everyone else was solid and enjoyable.

[Devil Marlena Nylund]

Apr 4, 2022 10:44:24 GMT -5 ilikemilk said:

Drivers License easily because it is the best song on it. How am I going to like a performance of a song that I do not like?

Maybe it’s something that comes with maturity but you can still acknowledge if something is done well, even if you don’t personally like the song itself. With performances such as many of these, there’s more to consider than just the song itself. A performance encompasses vocal ability, choreography, harmony, stage presence, effects, and on and on.

[Music Fan]

1. Billie
2. Brothers Osborne
3. Olivia Rodrigo
4. Chris Stapleton
5. Jon Batiste

[Mirago]

Gaga’s performance while heartfelt bordered on a little morose to me because it seemed like Tony was dead (with their best-of moments flashing on the video screen) but he’s not. Considering her entrance number felt bouyant and liberating it ended sad.

Peaches was flat out ruined due to the technical workout effort to bleep out every single sh*t - and there are several, I’m sure it was better at the show. Also when he got up from the piano he didn’t take foreground to me like he should at that point, he felt background, reserved, held back..

Kudos to Billie and Jon on their refreshingly high energy level performances, my faves of the night.
Thumbs up to BTS as well, their choreography was much more on point then the last time I’ve seen them.

Best quote goes to Bruno Mars, ‘Because of you guys we’ll be singing this song forever’
And Best dressed goes to Dua and Megan looking fine af in black/gold Versace

[🇯🇲 lucy88 🇯🇲]

My top 5:

Silk Sonic
J. Balvin
H.E.R.
John Legend
Jon Batiste

[SabrinaFan]

1. Lady Gaga
2. Olivia Rodrigo
3. Silk Sonic
4. Carrie Underwood
5. Brothers Osborne

[kimberly]

it's honestly kind of hard picking 5 performances I thoroughly enjoyed. I guess I'd say

Olivia Rodrigo
Billie Eilish
Jon Batiste
Lil Nas X
H.E.R. ? or Silk Sonic?

worst of the evening: Peaches & Butter.

[chartfreak]

Never had heard of John Batiste before, but something about his performance really captivated me.