The Brit Awards 2016: from A to Zzzzzz

You know, I was tempted to simply repost last year’s article, seeing as this year’s Brits line-up appears to be little more than a regurgitated hybrid of the past few years. I haven’t done that, however – I still respect you, even if the organisers of the Brits don’t.

Last year, I wrote what was effectively a chronological breakdown (in every sense of the word) of 2015’s audio-visual atrocity. I could easily have done that again, but it’s kinda self-defeating when you’re trying to criticise the rehashing of old ideas, so instead I’ve lovingly compiled the highlights (in no sense of the word whatsoever, in many cases) of this year’s ‘spectacular’ in the form of an A to Z, for no particular reason.

And yes, some of them are pretty tenuous, but work with me here…

A is for Adele, who probably does the most interesting thing of the entire evening by dropping an F-bomb approximately 85 minutes in after Major Tim Peake announces (from space and everything!) that she’s won yet another fucking award for her godawful caterwauling. That said, if you think she sounds bad on record, her speaking voice is something else entirely – in an alternate universe, she’d be running the caff in EastEnders or gaining meaningful employment as a human burglar alarm.

B is for Bieber. The first artist to simultaneously hold the number one, two and three spots in UK chart history, apparently, which is odd as it all sounds like number two to me. He rather predictably wins the International Male Award (which I’m sure had absolutely nothing to do with the fact he was in attendance) and gives a speech lifted straight from one of those bullshit pseudo-inspirational memes about life being a journey and how we’re all on our own individual journeys. That’s true – after hearing that, I went on my own individual journey to the bathroom to reacquaint myself with my dinner.

C is for Coldplay, who demonstrate the truly wretched state of mainstream British music by being named Best British Group. They also open the show with a performance so reserved that it may as well have a German beach towel slung across it. Chris Martin plays his battered old piano whilst rocking back and forth like someone who swats imaginary pigeons, the drummer looks like he was rudely awoken just seconds beforehand and the other two decide to alternate between playing their usual instruments and a set of additional drums, for no apparent reason. I would wager this is what the producers think passes for an explosive, on-point show opener these days and yet the end result is probably one of the most underwhelming, by-numbers performances yet at any Brit Awards ceremony, as Coldplay slip ever further into predictable self-parody. One question: do you think the other three members of Coldplay actually know they’re in Coldplay?

D is for Dec and Ant, also known as Ant and Dec. It’s their third (and thankfully final) year of hosting and this means we have to endure a whole evening of two excitable Geordie foreheads in designer suits harping on about “upping their game”. Not sure what their game was, exactly, or how they think they’ve upped it, but tonight they could have beamed in a hologram of any Ant and Dec hosting job from the past decade and no one would have noticed the difference.

E is for ecstacy, as in something which might make sitting in that audience even vaguely enjoyable.

F is for fire – and lots of it. That’s literally all I can remember about Justin Bieber’s performance. While he’s undoubtedly as popular as ever (maybe even more so), he’s really not doing anything that Justin Timberlake hasn’t already done a hell of a lot better.

G is for Gary Oldman, who comes on to accept the Icon Award for David Bowie. It’s clearly an emotional occasion and no one can blame one of our nation’s finest actors for wanting to pay tribute to one of our nation’s finest musical legends, but you can’t help feeling everyone in that arena is wondering how long Oldman’s speech is going to go on for…

H is for hairy, which could be used to describe Jack Garratt, winner of this year’s Critics Choice Award, who has a rather alarming hair and beard combo, giving him the appearance of a graphic design student who works part-time in Urban Outfitters. He sits there taking advice from last year’s winner, James Bay, who tells him to ‘keep doing what you’re doing’, by which I assume he means keep folding those jeans and hand in your coursework on time. On paper, he sounds like he should be an interesting proposition (“brilliantly talented multi-instrumentalist”) but in reality he sounds exactly as you’d expect someone who’s won both the Brits Critics Choice and BBC Sound of 2016 accolades to sound: relentlessly pedestrian.

I is for International Female, deservedly won by Bjork who has the honour of being the only winner of the night not to be present at the ceremony (I’m obviously not including Bowie here). Instead, she sends an acceptance video in which she appears to be wearing melted plastic over her face. Unlike Lady Gaga, Bjork’s kookiness never feels contrived. Treasure her.

J is for James Bay. This year’s George Ezra, I guess – he sounds like every over-ambitious busker on every city centre street corner and you’d probably struggle to name more than one song. The only real difference is that Bay looks a bit like Jack White, if he’d been styled by River Island and the Amish. He wins British Male Solo Artist and duly accepts his gong from Kylie before rotating on the spot, apparently unsure which direction to face (a common problem tonight, thanks to the circular stage in the centre of the arena). To his credit, he seems humble enough, but there’s no escaping the fact that his win is exactly what’s wrong with this year’s awards.

K is for K-hole, as in you’d probably need to be stuck in one to enjoy much of tonight’s ceremony.

L is for Lorde. The rumours about who would be taking part in tonight’s Bowie tribute hadn’t been promising – Noel Gallagher and Chris Martin (with whom Bowie had famously refused to work) were among the names touted. In the end, it was Lorde who stepped up to perform ‘Life On Mars’, accompanied by Bowie’s own backing band. A beautiful, subtle and, above all, fitting tribute.

M is for Mark Ronson, who still irritates the living shit out of me for reasons which have yet to become entirely clear.

N is for Nick Grimshaw, who comes on with Cheryl Whatever-Hernameis to present the award for British Breakthrough Act. It goes to the appallingly named Catfish and the Bottlemen (I’m sure there’s probably some ‘hilarious’ story behind it but frankly I don’t give a shit) but all I can think about is the fact Grimmy’s head appears to be at least four times the size of Cheryl’s. Feeling slightly disturbed.

O is for One Direction, who, despite technically not really existing at the moment, manage to win the British Artist Video of the Year Award. Two boys in suits who look like they’ve drawn crude beards on their faces in felt tip accept the award. It’s good that they’ve given the work experience kids something to do.

P is for Pam Hogg, who designed this year’s statue and thankfully succeeded in ensuring she didn’t repeat Tracey Emin’s mistake of making 2015’s trophy look like an ornament in your gran’s downstairs toilet.  

Q is for: “Quick, Adele’s about to swear, press the mute button... oh, never mind.”

R is for Rebekah Brooks. Oh no, wait, sorry – it’s Jess Glynne. If I’m honest, she’s not been on my radar at all and I’m pretty sure I’m not in her key demographic. That aside, she has one of the least pleasant-sounding voices I’ve heard since Sam Smith. Still, if the music career doesn’t work out in the long-term then she could probably make a pretty reasonable living recording those warning klaxons used when bin wagons are reversing.

S is for Simon Le Bon, this year’s token Veteran Pop Star Who Looks Like He Doesn’t Really Know Why He’s Here. Good of him to take time out of his undoubtedly hectic schedule to be here tonight.

T is for Tame Impala, who scoop the International Group Award. Pleasant surprises (or indeed ANY surprises) at the Brits are few and far between, but this is definitely one of them.

U is for underwhelming, which is exactly what British music SHOULDN’T be, right? Maybe the bigwigs at the Brits missed the memo?

V is for varying degrees of mediocrity. Fifty shades of Bay, if you like.

W is for white, as in: “Wow, the Brits seem overwhelmingly white tonight – I wonder why they chose to overlook the many innovative black artists who made fantastic music over the past year in favour of yet more homogenised River Island balladry from skinny, long-haired, hat-wearing white boys with guitars or miserable, watered-down blue-eyed soul from whining white women who’ve been ploughing the same stale creative furrow for the best part of a decade?”

X is for xylophone jazz-wobble tech-hop, a genre woefully under-represented at this year’s Brits, to the point where there were no xylophone jazz-wobble tech-hop artists nominated at all. I’m writing a very strongly worded letter to my MP as we speak.

Y is for years and years. Not the awful pop three-piece of the same name, but the amount of time I feel is passing with each excruciating second of Adele’s closing performance. I note she’s playing it safe by not wearing a cape.

Z is for Zzzzzzzzzzz. Wake me up when LEVELZ are nominated for Best British Album, okay?

The stars look very different today: a tribute to David Bowie

Like many people, I woke up to the news. In fact, I was literally woken up by the news. My radio alarm clock crackled into life in time for the 7.30am bulletin. I was sure I’d misheard them. I sat bolt upright, paused for a few seconds and then reached for my phone. I’d received a text message 40 minutes earlier from a very dear friend. It read simply: “Bowie is dead!”

I’d heard correctly, of course.

I immediately felt compelled to write something about David Bowie, his music and why the world was now suddenly a much poorer place without him in it, but of course I had to go to work (real life can be both a gift and curse sometimes), so I’ve spent much of the day trying to work out exactly what I wanted to say. Goodbye productivity.

Here goes…

How does one sum up someone like Bowie? To refer to him as a singer and songwriter, or even a musician, is to do him a great disservice. He was an artist in the truest and purest sense of the word. Sure, his career hasn’t been without its questionable choices (Tin Machine and that duet with Jagger are obvious examples) but, ultimately, he has never made music just for the money (although he made plenty) or to appeal to the widest possible audience (even though his music often did) – he did it because he genuinely felt a need to express himself creatively, often captivating and confounding in equal measure.

Never one to rest on his laurels, Bowie has been through almost as many incarnations and personas as The Fall get through bassists. It’s a well-worn cliché to say this, but you genuinely never knew what he was going to do next – and even when he returned with a completely new musical direction, it was still unmistakeably Bowie. Crucially, it never felt false or forced; it just felt like Bowie being Bowie.

For me, what really made Bowie stand out was that he was truly individual in everything he did – a genuine one-off. No one else has come close to matching the innovativeness and sheer eclecticism of his rich canon of work. Seriously, when was the last time you heard anyone described as ‘the next Bowie’? Come to think of it, when did you EVER hear anyone described as that? It’s really no exaggeration to say that we will never see his like again.

Unlike many of his contemporaries, Bowie refused to fall into the comfort zone of becoming a ‘heritage act’, instead continuing to push forward and make music on his own terms right until the very end, as clearly evidenced on astounding final album ‘Blackstar’. Released just two days before his untimely death, the album now takes on a whole new poignancy when you realise that its creator recorded it knowing he was on borrowed time (producer Tony Visconti described it as Bowie’s ‘parting gift’, which is both heart-breaking and heart-warming at the same time).

While many in his situation might have been tempted to give up, Bowie instead turned in his most creative and intriguing work to date, blending space-jazz, frenetic broken beats, post-apocalyptic funk and even techno-tinged rhythms. ‘Blackstar’ and its equally lauded predecessor ‘The Next Day’ (his first album in a decade) revealed a reinvigorated Bowie clearly still bursting at the seams with ideas – it seems so cruel and unfair for him to be taken from us at a time when he was not only producing his finest work in decades, but most likely still had so much more to offer, if he’d only had more time on this earth.

Like Lemmy, Bowie was someone we probably all took for granted – we assumed he would always be here and now we’re going to have to adjust to a world without him.

Goodbye Spaceboy and thank you for the music. Safe journey home.