Drake Leaks, Elmo & All Things Grammys with Musician Cohost Matt Blankenship Jr!

This was a doozy of an episode homies. Join host Maddy McClain and guest cohost (and brother / musician of @TheSometimesIsland) Matt Blankenship Jr for your entertainment news breakdown. There's a CHEEKY piece of news that is NSFW to begin with, so please skip to minute 12 if you'd rather avoid :) One that has to do with our good friend Drake.
Elmo's X/Twitter account lead to the internet dumping on the Sesame Street social media account and people are wearing Apple's new Vision Pro headset to courtside NBA games...
And of  course, we cover all things Grammys 2024 including first-time award winner, Miley Cyrus, Killer Mike's arrest and album announcements. Among other things, all with a musician's perspective!

Enjoy homies, cheers! Follow on IG @easilyentertainedpod 😜

Sources / articles mentioned:
- Apple Vision Pro (The New York Times)
- Elmo How Are You Doing Twitter (Hollywood Reporter)
- Jay Z Grammy Award Speech (YouTube)
- Grammys 2024 Complete List (The New York Times)
- Stiff Person Syndrome (Yale Medicine)
- Killer Mike Grammys Arrest (Variety)

Transcript

 Hello homies, and welcome to another episode, another week, another succession  of seven days, give or take, has gone by. Hope you guys are doing great, because we got a great show.  Scheduled for you guys. It's been an it's been an active week in pop culture. That's for sure so, of course, we're gonna talk about the Grammys and A few pop culture updates for you to know but number one, I buried the lead We're here with guest co host Matt Blankenship, Jr Hello, welcome 

back it's good to be back.

Um, it's good to be on the schedule,  uh, and be back on the pod talking about pop culture. I actually rely on your pod for most of my entertainment news. Like, I don't, anything I randomly stumble across, I will know. But, um, this keeps me, like, with the times a little bit. So thank you for your service. 

Oh, man, that, that's what I, that's what I live for right there.

Uh,  don't worry, I live for other things too, but um, thank you, that means a lot, I'm glad to hear it. I spend a lot of time going into internet deep dark black holes, so I'm glad it's, it's, it's come to a good use. So, that's always nice to know.  Continue my bad habit.  

Yeah, you gotta shake it. Shake what you got, you know?

Shake, exactly, exactly. How has this week been for you? You're in a LA torrential downpour, aren't ya? 

The sun has emerged. Uh, it was raining for like three days. I mean,  I think some bad stuff happened, mostly in Northern California, but uh, in, in LA, like, It's a whole thing seemed a little overly dramatic to me.

I mean it would be a big storm anywhere But like  okay is state of emergency like  let's look slower roll a little bit I think that we're all gonna just be a little like have to use the umbrella that Like, we're like, where did I put that thing? I never use it. That's really about it, uh, in my humble opinion. 

That's 

good to know because the headlines, holy shit, I, it, it made it sound like the, the flooding of Los Angeles was imminent. And it was, it was like about to happen, like we're about to lose Los Angeles and that kind of part of the country. It took 

me a good 15 minutes. Looking around to find a video of a street that actually looked flooded and it was like, yeah, it was flooded there was about like eight inches of standing water in the street and like that would suck especially if it like got in your House or something, but uh,  I mean, yeah, nobody's nobody's like getting airlifted out with a helicopter Off their roof as far as I know.

I think a tree fell on a house and a guy was killed  Northern California in LA. Yeah. It was just kind of like,  uh, let's all freak out. You know, yeah, let's let's send out a million of those like frickin phone alerts that like go  like right when you're Lying down to you know  pass out or you're brushing your teeth or something and it's like the third time It's done it saying the same thing  So thank you for that  

Just making sure you're all we are 

tax dollars at work  Yeah  Yeah, well, I don't reminded me.

Sorry, go ahead. It reminded me of a story that I don't know. It has nothing to do with anything.  

I mean, we love a good story. All I was going to say is that Austin, I mean, it's not like we're any better. We're like, as soon as it, the weather drops below, like Really 50 degrees, but especially 40. Oh my god.

We're all like, you know,  all the people that have like a bunker are feeling really good about themselves And everyone is about to prepare for the apocalypse, but  yeah, it's 

alright. Snow days in Texas, you know, like an inch of snow everything shuts down everywhere else. They're like, all right  Just keep going  

Schools called off.

Yeah.  

The story that it reminded me of was when they, uh, Do you remember when, uh, there was like a false alarm Nuclear missile attack alert that Somebody like hit the wrong button And sent that to everyone in Hawaii that like North Korea had Launched a nuclear missile and Everyone was gonna die and they had like A little  while to call their families Yeah, and then they were like Holy shit! 

That happened  

How did I forget about that? That is wild. That person was fired immediately. They 

literally pushed the wrong button. That was the official, that was what happened.  That 

was the panic button.  

Yeah.  Yeah. Maybe like, put like a, are you sure? Like a little pop up for that button.  

We get it for fucking everything else.

But 

not before the podcast, we were just talking about how this browser we're using, you have to hold down the quit button for it. For sure.  

Yeah, my, my TV, I don't know if it's a TV thing or individual streaming services, apps or whatever. But it's also reminds me of like, when you try to leave like Netflix, it's like, Are you sure?

And you have to go all the way down, like press the down arrow, and then all the way to the right.  Yeah, that's some dumb 

shit. Yeah, but once you're in, they're like, are you still watching? Do we really have to pay royalties on this?  Can you just be on the app, but not spend money? Just pay the subscription, and then that's it. 

Hey, just checking in.  

Yeah.  

Life. Yeah. It's fun. Life is fun. Life is fun. You know, let me tell you something today.  Yeah, I can't even get it together enough. Uh, so well, sorry factual correction of myself yesterday,  I You know, it was an average Tuesday. I was getting some good stuff done Mm hmm, and then I get an alert that Drake has Some, uh, there's a Drake leak. 

Like, oh, his new, do you have new music that he's dropped? Like, that no one's heard or got leaked? Like, sucks for him, but that's great for us. Only to discover it was not that kind of leak.  

What?  

Drake's dick pic basically a sex tape got leaked across the internet and at first people are like is this shit real and Because not too long ago.

There was a  like a Deepfake. Deepfake. Of Taylor Swift. 

Yeah, I heard about this.  

Let me, first, let me just 

send you. Is this a dickfake?  

By the way, I'm  not passing this along, because that would be  

I don't want that.  Maddie has her phone out right now. Are you texting? Are you, are you texting your brother a dick pic? 

All right, well that wraps it up for my appearance on this show.  See you guys later. Have a great episode. 

Now you have a, um, a gift waiting for you after this podcast, but, um,  holy shit,  that was better than any kind of Drake league songs that could have been out there, um, but basically he confirms, like nonchalantly, that yes. That was him some random like live streamer that I haven't heard of by the name Please hold  Aiden Ross  He was live streaming and I guess he's homies with Drake and sends him this like this voice note about how they all He had just seen Drake's, uh, Dingle Dong.

And he was like, dude, dude, what the hell, like, have you seen these? Like, are you good? And it's allegedly like taken on his private jet. And he responded with a bunch of just like laughing face emojis. But there's a reason that he's willing to accept this as his image because  It's not something to be ashamed of in terms of quality, I 

suppose.

It's a quality,  it's a quality dick. I don't know, I think like,  can you see enough of like the background to like know where the dick is located at the time of the picture?  The thing 

is, it looks 

like Like, is it a side profile shot? Like, how do you see the background? Like  No, 

it's like I don't have 

a It says except taking a picture  of the wiener. 

Usually means a, uh, front facing photo. 

It's front facing.  And it is like,  it's not, it's not like ready to rumble, okay? It's at,  it's not at attention, right? Like, 

like flattened, yeah. 

Yeah, and it is,  it's like, people have made jokes like holding up this long droopy churro, like that's  Like a long, like droopy  and it's weird the way he's like,  

I didn't see the video.

I feel like he could be, like, it's just as easily true that he could have a tiny dick and he, uh, did this on purpose because we are spending so much time talking about Drake and that he has a large dick. 

Like,  Like, that's every man's dream, really. I was thinking about how 

different And And Famous for a long time.

He knows how to manipulate the media.  I'm sorry, I think you liked that song, but when the pandemic first started and he is like, lift a slide,  you know, like, I'm just gonna make up a dance Juy slide and see if I can have, uh, like a Macarena,  like Uhhuh. I think he does this kind of shit when he is bored, but, uh, I don't know.

I'm just guessing I haven't seen it nor. Will I?  Unless Addy just sends it to me right now. Please don't.  

You're gonna, I already did, so you're gonna have to avoid my texts. 

You already did. Okay, cool. I have my phone on airplane mode, so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go in and block you  and take it off airplane mode and then unblock you.

And it should just be off into the ether, we'll see if that works.  

My brother's gonna block me forever for doing that. Look, I guess that's a little warranted. Just for a minute.  Anyways, uh, I just thought that'd be a fun way to kick things off. Break the ice. Yeah. Yeah. 

That was fun. 

Ah, man. So, we'll see.

Maybe he  has a song about it coming out. We'll see about 

that. If he does, then I know for sure that wasn't his dick. Anyway. Moving on. 

Okay, and then another internet thing that got passed around. I don't know if you saw this, but, um, Elmo uncovered this because a social media manager posted on X on this past, I think it was on Monday, last Monday, maybe,  um,  Just a question saying, Elmo's just checking in. How's everybody doing  and thousands of people responded back  And just started trauma dumping that became the thing on Elmo's Twitter account on this thread  So I had to read some of these responses received like 200, 000 likes and about 30k responses of all. 

Okay, let's pull it up on 

Is Elmo down there in the comments too, playing therapist? Or is he just  being 

a trauma sponge? It became so overwhelming. A trauma sponge. Eventually, after everybody responds, says,  Oh, Elmo has realized the importance of checking in on your friends. Here's a link to mental health resources.

Yeah, he needs to get Burt, Ernie, and Cookie Monster in there, at least just hearting all the comments.  So they feel heard.  Oh, 

some people did. We got Every morning I cannot wait to go back to sleep. Every Monday I cannot wait for Friday to come. Every single day and every single week for life.  He's not doing okay.

The light inside has broken but I still work. Well 2024 feels like 2020  plus four so dot dot dot.  I'm at my lowest, thanks for asking.  Um, and it just goes on and on and there's no Can you 

send this and not the dick to me so I can like, go in here and like, mine song lyrics?  Yes. Like, write an entire emo album? 

It's got, I mean it's got all the lyrics ready.  Ready for you. Really. 

Yeah, it struck me as very poetic from the jump. So  

It turns out everybody needs a little bit of help. Elmo, I just got laid off. Oreo cookie responded, ran out of milk. Do the math.  People aren't doing well. But another way that I've, I, I'm curious to get your, your thoughts on this.

Have you seen the Apple Vision Pro? No, 

I've never heard of it. What is it?  

It is a,  it, I mean it is a VR headset, but the way that it's different from like Meta's version or where you've had, just the, the already existing VR headsets. It is a fully  immersed computer processor where you can also come in and out of between seeing real life in your goggles and you're like, basically in your computer screen.

So you're fully. Invested but then like you can also see where you're going but it just looks crazy and it is  like you could log on to your macbook pro on your apple vision glasses  it's pretty crazy and people have said they take they've done the demo and that it's it really is a wild experience and it's the best they've seen but it's also.

3, 500. 

Yeah. Um, How do you like open a folder on your desktop?  Like blink at it? I think 

you like  touch at it. Probably too. Yeah. It's coming up.  Um, now it's, it's very cool and it is, Apple always has like  sleek looking products at least, and mind you, I also did, you know. Work with them, for them, whatever. So I'm a little, I'm already an Apple geek, but for 3, 500 and um,  I don't know, just more people becoming even more sucked into the,  the metaverse, so to speak, and looking like idiots, walking around like some kid who was on the, um,  he was like, had floor seats at a Lakers game or something, was sitting in It was probably an ad or something, now I think about it, but someone sitting on the, like, court side had on his Apple Vision Pro, and was just, like,  moving his arms around all weird, and also watching the game, I suppose, but 

Yeah. 

My opinion on that, um,  I'm just going to wait until the price comes down because there's also the social aspect of it of like, you know, moving your hands around like it's minority report or whatever. I remember the first time I saw somebody, uh, on FaceTime  while walking down the sidewalk, uh, near USC.

And I was like, what a weirdo.  That was my thought. 

That's so true. That was a weird thing to see. 

Yeah, to just have full arm extended and be like talking to your phone from the angle that makes you look good. I, like, I think this will be normal, shockingly quickly, but, um, that's too expensive, that, like, Apple probably should have figured out a way to get the price down, because if they don't overcome the social stigma of, like,  you know, casting spells, like you're some sort of, like, maestro conducting a symphony or whatever, Uh, we're gonna decide as a, as a unit that this is like  dumb and rejected.

Like we're not into it. Yeah. I would have said Apple needs to get it at least under 2, 000 and there, it's almost, it's a little less than twice that. So  good luck.  We'll see. I'm not going to buy one.  No. 

Yeah.  I think it's. Yeah, I, I would agree with that. And interesting coming on the heels of like, literally Facebook changed its name to Meta  to like, highlight the, the direction in which they were planning to go, and I think they still are, and maybe it's just they were the first monkeys.

to enter the circus. Yeah. And we were definitely not ready when they came out with all of that. 

But no,  uh, Facebook strikes me as a gang of like the leadership as like a gang of dorks who do not have their, their fingers on the pulse of culture at all. They just have a large user base and they think that the two things are the same.

It's like, uh, you need you need like a young, hot upstart. That's cool to come in.  And, uh, change something or make it cool. Facebook is not going to be that thing and changing your name to Meta isn't going to make any of us forget,  you know, I don't know. Right.  

Yeah.  Everything, who you are and  

yeah, Mark Zuckerberg. 

Should have probably just changed his name and just left it named Facebook. What's 

your style? What is with these companies changing their names so late on? Like Twitter just  should have stayed Twitter. You just 

Twitter didn't change its name.  Elon Musk, got the bed.  Like,  

ahhh.  Can you imagine being so rich that you're like, your little side hobby, your crafting hobby, like,  is buying a business and then just like, throwing it against the wall and being like, I can't have it, no one else can, meh.

And just  

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. You would have to be the kind of person that's selfish enough to amass, uh,  more wealth than you would need in a thousand lifetimes. 

Who? Him? Yeah. 

No. Who could I possibly be talking about?  Yeah. Yeah. So that's my take on, uh,  the fuckin Futuristic shit. Yeah, 

what else is 

new? Let's talk about the Grammys, why don't we?  That's been going on.  So, for me, there's been a shitload of award shows, like a lot of backlog from the protests, Hollywood protests or strikes rather, not, I mean, I guess they're both, but, uh, pushed a lot of these award shows into early this year.

And, for the most part, like, They're boring to watch, like from start to finish, they kind of are, but my favorite of them has to be the Grammys for me. I don't know if it's just a different personality type that just makes sure like shit's bound to happen at these award shows comparatively to the Grammys, although they're all similar.

Entertainers. Well, 

I mean, yeah, musicians are fun. Actors are a nightmare. Everything has to 

be just so. Everybody's all fake nice to 

each other. That happens in music too. But, like,  I don't know. We'll probably get into it, but I was like, I didn't watch the Grammys. I don't really watch award shows, but I did see Killer Mike getting walked out in handcuffs for, like, starting a fight or something.

Yes. For Run the Jewels. Yeah.  Doesn't happen at the Oscars as much.  

No, the most exciting we got was the Will Smith slap, and I think that will be the most for until, you know,  the next time something 

that crazy happens. The fabric of space time, because stuff like that rarely happens. Like, 

whoa, wait, this isn't supposed to happen.

Killer Mike getting arrested for, like, assaulting somebody was literally like a footnote on  the Grammys  when I was looking tough. It truly 

was.  Yeah, so I didn't, I didn't fully realize this, but makes sense. It just seems like it's already long as fuck. But there's the pre televised portion that like we don't really see or audiences.

I mean, I'm, maybe there's a live, I'm sure there's a live feed somewhere. But, um, and that's when that had happened, which is interesting too.  I think Jay Z has some words to say about the way that hip hop is treated in, like rap and hip hop is treated within the recording academy or the, you know, the gods that be of the Grammys.

Yeah. Yeah. He's already like out of jail and stuff, but that's interesting. They let him, so Killer Mike won three Grammys. And they,  this was after he already had been involved in a fight. Yeah. Uh, I don't know how intense it got. No, the details were not very clear and I guess nobody had video to pass around.

Yeah. I could not figure out what had happened. Like it seemed all anybody knew is that he was. And getting walked out by LAPD.  

And that's it. That seems pretty, like, dramatic of a choice. To, to put him in cuffs and walk him out in front of everybody? Like, that's so  I don't know. Maybe it's not bad. Who knows?

I don't even 

know. I don't know. The LAPD is, uh, they just want their shine too.  They have, uh,  they have a checkered past.  

To say the least, for sure.  Yeah. A lot of other stuff went down, um, let's see. We can, I feel like at the end we can go into the dirty deets of a summarized, like, list of winners. But going into The Grammys  SZA had the most nominations with nine  in nine categories, but she came out with six, not six.

She came out with three Grammys  and.  I love her. She's great. I kind of, to be honest, I didn't get into her music until a few, like, years ago, really. Um, but she's been on the scene. And it was interesting because Lizzo presented the award to her for best R& B song for Snooze. And, um,  first of all, Lizzo,  she's basically in, like, under, uh, parole.

Not actually, literally, but, like, in,  in, she's in public opinion parole,  quote, air quotations. Right.  

She's 

being Let me just splice that, like, she's fake news, uh. 

She's being, uh, like, sued by her former dancers. For all sorts of stuff, um, 

yeah, it's a mixed bag of allegations, but it doesn't look good  

on her.

Yeah, have you done anything or talked about Lizzo on the pod? I can't remember if you haven't. Not 

yet, no, no, but I've been, I've been, it's on the list, I could do like a deep dive of what exactly is going on there, but there haven't been  many updates for a 

while. Yeah, let's, let's bookmark that for now.

Suffice to say, she's like,  Doesn't sound like a very fun person to work for at all. 

No, no, it doesn't at all. But, uh, it's cute because I guess in SZA's acceptance speech that she and Lizzo back in,  I think, like 2013, she had just part of her speech, she was like, You and me, this is so special. We were in this tiny ass, like, back room, uh, live.

Like we were putting on a show together, you and me and a couple other artists, and it was, no one was there, no one like really showed up, and now here we are, and you're like presenting me a Grammy award, like this is, I mean, she's also gotten, Lizzo has Grammys too, so it's not so like, Yeah. But, yeah, so that's pretty cool.

And she had, uh, at first it was weird, they called out her name to win Best R& B Song.  And they played, like, that awkward Grammys music for a solid,  like, few min like, minute? Okay, it was probably a little bit less than a minute, but, like, oh, where is she? She comes running on stage, holding her phone, and, like, she finally she's breathless, and she was, uh, she said she was changing, and then she took a shot before she ran up, and she didn't want to miss it, and, uh,  I, anyways, she was cute and said, thank you.

Thank you. And I'm a shitty crier. So I'm gonna end it here. Bye. And it was just very personable.  I love to hear their speeches. Um,  but I thought that like artists go in there knowing that they've won. Or is it just you go in there knowing you didn't win? Or do they not know? 

I have no idea. That's a great question. 

Maybe it's different at the Grammys because some people seem, like, surprised and, like, Jay Z which we'll get to, we can get to now I guess, but, like, Jay Z had this whole Little sassy ass speech for the Grammys. Mm hmm. Well, you know, I thought I might play it if you haven't heard it. Have you heard it? And for everybody else, I'll play a little part of it.

Play it. He won the award for, it was Dr. Dre's Impact Award, which is basically like, you know, making the most Positive change impact in the music industry and so Jay Z won this award and he gets up on stage and he shouts out obviously Dr. Dre and graciously accepts, but mind you, he's also already before like boycotted 

Jay Z has. 

The Grammys have, uh, you know, not really given hip hop its due for a very long time. I, uh, I was, I was just looking this up on my phone to get the facts right, but Russell Simmons and Leor Cohen led a boycott against the 31st Grammy Awards due to the decision not to broadcast the rep categories. And then I remember that this year,  old school rapper KRS One said he would, uh, not be attending the Grammys.

They wanted to do this, like, 30 years of hip hop thing where they're featuring, you know, different artists throughout the, the decades or whatever. And he  basically just refused to co He released a statement on why he wasn't coming because the Grammys don't care about hip hop. Yeah, so I think something like this was  probably like, I mean, and the Grammys are just inviting like if, if they're doing that sort of thing, like they know that somebody is going to get up there and say something like this.

So I'm glad that Jay Z did, but I don't even think he went far enough in my opinion, he was just sort of like,  barely here we can, we can listen to what he actually said.  

Yeah, I do agree with you though. It could have been a lot worse. It was said.  I mean a lot better than Kanye said it So  it's great to have a an award.

Um for such an icon  how far we've come with uh, will smith in them  Jazzy chef and the fresh prince winning their first grammy in 89 And boycotting because it wasn't televised and then  They went to like a hotel and watched the grammys. I didn't even understand what the  It wasn't a great boycott. In  98 I took a page out of their book.

I was nominated for Best Rap Album. And DMX had dropped two albums that year. They both were number one. Shout out to DMX. And he wasn't nominated at all. So I boycotted.  And I watched the Grammys.  I'm just saying, we just, we want y'all to get it right. We love y'all, we love y'all, we love y'all, we want y'all to get it right, at least get it close to right.

And obviously it's subjective, y'all don't gotta clap and everything. Obviously it's,  obviously it's subjective because, you know, it's music, and it's opinion based, but, you know, some things, you know, I don't wanna embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than everyone and never won an album in a year. 

So even by your own personal  Think about that. Most Grammys never won Album of the Year. That doesn't work.  You know, some of you,  some of you gonna go home tonight and feel like you've been robbed.  Some of you made it, Rob. 

Some of you don't belong in the category.  Um,  outside of that, outside of that, you know, we gotta keep showing up.  I wonder who exactly he was talking about when he was saying, uh, some of you don't even belong in the category.  

Yeah, I don't know if he's talking about this year or just in general.  I mean, I think I got turned off to the Grammys years ago.

I don't remember what. Year this was, but it was in the middle of a, like, I was like a kid. Jay-Z probably had just recently released, uh, the album that he's talking about. And, uh, there was one year where it was like Steely Dan won album of the year. I mean, steely Dan, I like them. They're like not relevant and they hadn't been relevant and 20 years at that point.

And it was like a.  Like a makeup call from the refs or something like that. And so I just, that showed me at a young age how award shows don't mean  a lot, but they also are a good opportunity to represent something to the general public and to an audience that isn't listening to hip hop to celebrate it in front of those people and be proud of what it is now.

It has been, for a while, the number one genre in America. It passed rock and roll a while ago. Hip hop is king and queen and it has been and it will remain that way for probably a lot of the rest of our lives until it gets replaced by, um,  I don't know, uh, what's gonna, you know, stick in its place, but, uh, maybe reggaeton. 

It looks, it looks kind of like that. Like, I don't know what word to attach to it. That's why I was kind of waffling around, but you see what Bad Bunny is doing.  And you see people who are like, you know, white suburbanites who don't speak Spanish bumping Bad Bunny. That's usually a pretty good sign that something is getting big.

Yeah. And, uh,  yeah, so I agree with what Jay Z said.  Um, I think that.  It's like the natural bias of the people who are giving out the awards, which I don't know who those people are, but I would wager it's not  a bunch of hip hop listeners. It's usually like people with money, older white people.  Uh, so yeah, that's fair.

I don't know how much the boycotts have worked, which Jay Z sort of touched on. Um, . Yeah.  You know, uh,  Beyonce definitely should have an album of the year by now. That's very surprising to me that she doesn't.  And, uh, Taylor Swift has four.  Yeah. She holds album of the year record, just four for Grammy, four, four albums of the year.

Yeah. For Taylor Swift. Um.  Taylor Swift is a phenomenon.  Uh. Truly.  Beyonce is also a phenomenon.  I don't know, sometimes there's too many  phenomenons, but it seems that they pick the the white person when that's the case if there's a decision to be made and so I just find that deeply disappointing  and I don't really  feel like getting up on a Beyond this speech getting up on a soapbox about changing things because I don't think the Grammys fucking matter If I win a Grammy, I will go accept it, you know, one day, and that'll be awesome, and I'll put that right on top of my mantle in my fireplace or whatever,  but if I, if I don't win a Grammy, I'm not gonna die with any regrets about that. 

Yeah, yeah. It's so interesting because the way it's propped up.  In pop culture  and, you know, so religiously covered all of the award shows, you know, that's, that's huge. Of course, the pop culture stations and like the e news of the world and people and whatever we're going to like right now, we're going to talk about it and cover it because it's this huge coming together, like the biggest crossover episode in music and in, you know, acting and the other cases and such.

But yeah, it's, yeah. It's interesting, because even the people that haven't won Grammys yet is surprising to me. They had Joni Mitchell come visit, visit. She did a performance, she's like over 80, almost died from an aneurysm, like,  and  I think she had never performed at the Grammys before, up until, um, this last one.

Wow.  Which 

is wild. Did the Grammys get started after the  60s or something? Were they around back giving Grammys to  people playing like big band swing music or something still?  

Just whistling into, uh, little like hollowed out sticks. Uh, no, I think this was the 65th.  Grammys. Let me triple check.  It was the 66th.

So  

interesting. Um, this, this edition of the Grammys was, yeah, this edition, something else I'll say about them is the Grammys are a, um,  they're, they're like, they exist to make money, their organization that is there to make money. And they do so by gathering people and kind of like piggybacking on their fame and success and ability.

And, uh, you know, they're just musical talent in general. So I remember one time I was, uh, I was a student at USC or it was like shortly after I'd graduated where the Grammy museum is here in LA. It might not be here anymore or whatever, but, um, sounds cool. They were like, Hey, we're going to have, uh, a vampire weekend concert and tickets are only 20 and it's like a student.

Discount thing or whatever. And so I was like, awesome. So me and a group of friends went to the Grammy museum to see Vampire Weekend perform. And the whole thing was about two hours long and, uh,  the entire thing was a presentation about the Grammys and the Grammy museum, Grammys this and Grammys that, Vampire Weekend showed up and played three songs and then it was over. 

Yeah. So that turned me off even more. It was like, it was like a fucking timeshare, like trying to like a sales pitch. It really, what it sounds like rubbed me the wrong way. Yeah. So that I have a lot of reasons why I don't like the Grammys in general. Uh, but you know, it's just, you know. They took, they took, uh, 20 from college students and then  

three songs.

Tried to sell them something. Like, what? Come on. Yeah.  Another person who, this shocked me, Miley Cyrus won her first Grammy. Well, she won, what, how many? She won two Grammys, but that was her first time winning a Grammy, which is amazing. We love to see that. I'm a big Miley fan. Um. Yeah, I think 

she's great. 

She's like. Her evolution. Yeah. Wow.  She's lined herself up to be like the next like. Pat Benatar or, um,  rock chick, you know, totally  alt diva tattooed punk rock vibes. I'm really, I I'm into it. We saw Miley Cyrus together at Austin City Limits Music Festival a few years back.  Was I standing with you for that?

Yeah. And she covered, uh, she covered my go to karaoke song, which is Heart of Glass by Blondie. Yeah, and she killed it. It was really, really good. 

Yeah, whenever she sings, it's true. Her voice just belongs with, with those artists like that. She covers a lot of, you know, kind of the raspier, uh, but punky. Yeah, I, I love her.

It was funny to see, um,  two things. First of all, is she went around and thanked like everybody in her life, like everyone does. But then said twice, like, did I forget anyone? Like, no, I don't think I forgot anybody. So the interweb, internet went wild about that because she didn't mention her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus.

And I like didn't know this, but they're estranged like they are not,  uh, they don't talk, which is just sad because so for my age, like Hannah Montana was around the same time as like Lizzie McGuire's like our,  our Disney shows of our time or whatever, yeah, which is totally different, obviously era of Miley Cyrus, but her dad played her dad in the show.

So like, yeah, you know, yeah. We're used to seeing that and stuff. Achy breaky heart, but.  

Wasn't he the, he's on, uh, Old,  damn it, I'm blanking on the exact name.  Yes. Old Town Road. Thank you, that's what I wanted to say and it just felt wrong. Yeah.  I know what you mean. He's probably very, uh. You know, what's the word I'm looking for?

Like a dance mom kind of vibes for Riley to get to where she's at and for him to still be like seeking out features on, um,  you know, new songs.  

I don't know. Lil Nas X too. Yeah. Wait, what's that? Am I. Yeah, Lil Nas X. Geekin yeah. Well, it could also be the fact that his new girlfriend, uh, I guess, so he and Tish Cyrus, uh, Miley's mom, obviously the recent, kind of recently, like in the last year or two, maybe last year, like got a divorce, and he's now dating, uh, one of Miley's old cast mates of Hannah Montana, who at the time when they were filming, she was 14 years old. 

So that's when they met.  I mean, he was married then. Yeah,  so that could be part of it. 

That feels predatory. 

It does. It doesn't feel right. But I don't want to make it all about, you know, that for Miley. Cause Miley deserved this two Grammys and her speech was funny. After she said, did I forget anyone? No, but I may have forgotten underwear and then runs off and that was the end of her acceptance speech. 

Yeah. And then she gave a really great performance. I mean, her body is like  goals. She's beautiful.  And, uh, she, like, called out the crowd in the middle, like, in a playfully kind of way. It was like, don't act like you guys don't know this song or something. Yeah. And, uh, yeah. I could just tell it was a,  you know what, no one better to tell me about, uh, crowds at concerts than, than you, a musician here.

What, what's the general LA crowd like?  

Uh, very, very bad. Very,  too cool for school, lazy. It's, it's like the worst, the worst place to play a concert in the entire United States,  you have to hold people's hand and make them have fun.  That isn't even a good analogy you have to like waterboard them in a puddle of fun  Hold their freaking head in the bathtub until they like start actually having fun.

It's difficult Other places are excited to you know, have fun and be there. LA is not so much  That yeah place.  

There's always a bubble up front that kind of like a A semicircle rather in a crowd 

happens everywhere to be fair to sort of like, Hey, I need all y'all to come up close to the stage. Yeah, you know, at until you're at a certain level, uh, people need to be encouraged, which is true everywhere.

But just la is, um, You know, and there's, there's fun, good people who come to concerts in LA, uh, as well. It's just that the majority,  every town has kind of a personality when it comes to crowds. They're like people. And LA's personality is, um,  you know, a little aloof.  

Austin is a little aloof, but in a, cause they smoke too much weed or.

Mushrooms or whatever kind of 

vibe. And there's L. A. people there. Because they all moved there.  

Yeah, I just imagine too, take that and then you're at the Grammys and it's the,  the Grammys audience is your audience. But, then again, if I saw Taylor Swift standing up and cheering her little booty off and singing the song like the most supportive one in the entire audience  That'd be kind of cool.

But at the same time,  I go back and forth, honestly. First of all, I think mostly the way Taylor is, she's heavily highlighted and well, already, I mean, like, I almost didn't even want to talk about her on this episode because like, there's always something going on or like something being reported about Taylor.

Right.  Yeah, you know, um, but you just can't remove her from  the pop culture scene and obviously the Grammys too. But she is, at least from what we get to see on TV, the most supportive  audience member out there. I think that's cool.  

I, I, it's hard. It was hard for me to tell early on. I like Taylor Swift. Uh, it was hard for me to tell if she was, if it was like an act or something, because she knows that they're going to, like, if, if somebody's keeping track of how many times that they cut to Taylor Swift as an audience reacting, reaction shot in any sort of media at all.

She's gotta be setting records right now, , because it's like the NFL, the Grammys and she's always like dancing and into it and, uh. You know, I think that's cool. I think that like, you can't really fake that. And that she's probably just like a psycho, uh, in a good way. One of those people who's like, you know, at the kind of empty show, who's  up at the front, like spinning around and dancing and scaring the rest of the people there.

Probably her,  

but she's also the best. That's the best person. They start the party. Yeah. I, and I feel like, I mean, when you're in the, in the spotlight for as much as she is,  you kind of get to the point where.  I mean, even before her, this is true, but I guess doubly so, like, you're damned if you do, damned if you don't, you know, there's the haters are like, so fake, like, she's making it about her, but  I don't really think so.

I mean, she got, uh,  one of the few,  one of the few, one of the critiques being when she won, um, album of the year for the fourth time beating records, which is crazy. Um, Celine Dion had handed it out and. In it, she kind of, like most everybody, like, hugs the presenter or something. Right. But she doesn't really seem to acknowledge, uh, Celine Dion that much.

Yeah. Um, when she accepted it.  And the internet went crazy. It was like, that's so disrespectful. And, you know, Celine Dion was a surprise appearance for another reason too, because she has what's stiff person syndrome. 

Um. Silliest name for a disease of all time. 

Yeah.  Yeah, it makes it so unserious,  

and I'm giggling.

It sounds made up, I'm sure it's like terrible, I don't know what it is, but the name is gotta go.  

I agree, like we're, I don't know, 

maybe even I'd rather it be unpronounceable than be like a weird, like, you know. It sounds like something you would find in like, the Victorian era, you know, the vapors.

Diseased 

person syndrome. 

She has a case of the hysterics, so I prescribe her two months of bed rest, you know, like that kind of vibe.  That's 

exactly right! Yeah, I think they should just go with the scientific name, uh. Yeah.  But. It's my knowledge of this was actually from a Grey's Anatomy episode. Um, but I did some real research, too,  which was just I typed it into Google.

And according to Yale Medicine, it's an autoimmune disease. It's rare that where basically your nerves attack your muscle  nerves, I suppose, attacks your muscles, really. So that at any sort of stimuli, whether it's stress or like.  It could even be something like a shock, just something that shocks your system, um, then it causes you to like have these really, really painful, um,  kind of like convulsions of your muscle spasms, or you get really stiff, and it sounds horrible.

That sounds like 

a nightmare.  

So then I, after reading that, it's like, I don't think  She could be hugged, maybe? I don't know, but,  yeah, it's, you also, she's Celine Dion, like, give her, give her extra love, and then, of course, the photo comes out of the two hugging, but, um, I think everything's fine there, I'm sure. 

Uh. Yeah. The internet just set her ablaze for that.  It's like, how disgusting and disgraceful, accepting a,  the Grammy without acknowledging, like, rarr, rarr, rarr, rarr, rarr. Uh. 

Yeah. People people are always gonna talk. 

She also was probably nervous because she Announced her new album after well the previous I guess award as some award She then added on at the end made a surprise announcement That her next album the tortured poets department will be released April 19th  It was funny seeing the looks on the artist's faces that the camera just panned to after she announced it.

Probably like, great, there goes the awards again for another  year. 

Like, thank you. Yeah.  I mean, Adele did everyone a favor and just like stopped releasing music and started doing residencies in Vegas.  

Wait, that's so true. She's like, I don't want you to hate me anymore.  

It's like, where do you go from there?

You are  in outer space and everyone else is like rolling around in the dirt.  God bless Adele.  

She's the best. Wow. Yeah. She's really had, I don't, I can't even think of one negative piece of  like coverage that I've ever read on her 

ever.  Yeah, I don't know. 

One last moment of the, of her getting one of her awards, one of her four.

This was actually for Album of the Year because, uh, she had been seen, like she came with Lana Del Rey. They did a song together on the Midnight's album. Travis Kelsey is like getting ready for, I don't know, this like big, like game or 

something. I don't know. Oh yeah, I think that she's have a game on Sunday.

Yeah, 

I think he's, maybe he's lying about it. She should, she should text and ask him what's really going on, but  Yeah, no, he couldn't be there because of the Super Bowl. Uh, so she came with Lana Del Rey and But she like told Lana to come up with her  To accept this award to stand on stage with her, Taylor Swift did, but like Lana Del Rey's own album was also up for that Award to and you could tell she felt like weird about it and she's already like this kind of to herself like yeah, emo gal and like grabbed her by the hand and took her up to the stage and I'm sure it was good intentions, but it was just like  a little bit of secondhand awkwardness, uh.

Yeah, it can kind of come off as, like, condescending,  you know?  

What if you were Lana? How would you feel in that situation?  You were like, sort of, I mean, she was fully on a song, but it's the song, it's called Snow on the Beach, where people made a whole running joke because you could maybe, for like, five seconds of like, the four minute song, hear Lana's voice, like, harmonizing with Taylor, like, 

lightly. 

Uh, yeah. I would not, I would react the same sort of way. I don't think I would love it. I get where she's coming from, Taylor Swift trying to be nice or whatever, but, uh, I just, you know,  people who are like, forcing fun on people, it's, it kind of gives me that kind of vibe, and,  you know. Forrest, fun isn't, isn't actually fun.

No, 

turns out.  Yeah, I would agree. I felt the weirdness.  Um, I'll include the, this New York Times article has a list of all of the winners from the Grammys, uh, that you can check out. I was gonna just, like, read them to you verbatim, but I don't think that's very interesting. I don't really listen to Phoebe Bridgers, but she's the one who took away the most. 

Wow.  She's great.  

I need to start. I know I'll like her. I've definitely heard some songs, but I'm not like a,  a stan, you know? Mm hmm. 

She's a really, really good songwriter. That Very angsty, very sad, on a sad day. I'm like a sad winter's day here in February. It's good Phoebe Bridger's time.  

I have my own sad playlist that I've made for when I want to lean into my sad emotions. 

Cool. Good. Gotta have an outlet.  Besides Elmo.  

Fallback.  Spare 

Elmo. Well, your producer's gotta hit it here. I'll let you continue the rest of the episode. Um, from here on out. That's it.  Oh, that's it? Uh, well, thanks for having me on. Once again, it was fun talking with you about stuff that I actually know a little bit about.

Like music and the world. The world of musicians. So, have me back on. Anytime to talk about, uh, musical stuff. I'm happy to be your, uh, you know, musical correspondent as well as producer and, uh, sibling.  

Great. I'm glad you'll, uh, stay on the sibling role as well. That's good to know. 

Yeah. I just signed another.

We inked another deal, the terms of which are not disclosed, because Maddie is not a publicly traded company, but let's just say I'm being taken care of. 

Yeah, for sure. On that note, get the f out.  

Okay, we'll probably never have an IPO if she acts like that. Alright, later, 

y'all. Thanks for coming.  Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode. This was a fun one. I hope you guys enjoyed. And if you did, with love, love, love, and very much appreciate a follow on Instagram at Easily Entertained Pod and, uh, give this bad baby a subscribe on wherever you're listening to it.

Um, we will be working on video too that will be uploaded to our YouTube channel. Keep it, uh, keep it cool, keep it classy, keep it, uh,  keep it chill.