Arcade Fire

Arcade Fire’s Grammy tastes like Marie Antoinette’s cake

I do not buy it. Something about it just did not feel right. Arcade Fire had just finished their visual-overload version of the revved up rocker “Month of May,” complete with helmet cam-ing BMX-ers and an unsettling strobe light attack. The camera showed them back stage. Barbara Streisand stumbled over their name as she announced that The Suburbs had won the Grammy for Album of the Year. Clearly, she’d never heard of Arcade Fire before.

When they retook the stage to accept their award, their equipment was still set up. After a quick thank you to his home of Montreal, Win Butler and the rest of his ensemble rushed to their instruments for another spastically lit jam, this time “Ready to Start.” Indeed, they were ready to start the celebration. Ready for the coronation. All ready for the glaringly rehearsed gimmick that iced the cake of their indie-to-mainstream conquest.

A gimmick was just what it was, no different from Drake and Rhianna’s porno rave around the tribal fire, Crypt Keeper Mic Jagger’s skeletal tribute or any of the other decidedly flat attempts at bombast from this year’s lackluster music celebration.

Infinitely more clever than I, esteemed music writer Christopher R. Weingarten immediately took to his Twitter, calling Arcade Fire’s moment, “the sound of 100 think pieces about what ‘indie’ means.” But I’m not concerned with what “indie” means. The term transcended the definition “independent music” long ago. I’m not concerned with what the award means for Arcade Fire’s Durham-based Merge Records. Though The Suburbs was its 1st record to reach the top of Billboard’s top 200 albums list, it was the fourth time it had launched one into the top ten. Merge has been much more than an “independent label” for a while now.

What nags at me right now is that The Suburbs is by far Arcade Fire’s worst outing. It lacks the explosive, youthful enthusiasm of the generation-defining Funeral. It lacks the courage of the jarringly creepy and bravely political Neon Bible. The band’s most awarded and best-selling statement is just a marginally rousing retread of suburban angst that was long before mined clean by the Weezers and Green Days of the world.

Today, you will read of the historic nature of Arcade Fire’s victory. But for me, it was one without meaning. I’m not blown away by the fact that a band that played Madison Square Garden and had Terry Gilliam direct the webcast actually won Album of the Year. Arcade Fire was the obvious choice for the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, a straw grab for credibility after filling its nominations with placating fluff like Katy Perry and Lady Antebellum.

As Arcade Fire hurried back to their instruments, I was left with the same empty feeling with which the Grammys always leave me. It was just another stunt that felt neither profound nor daring. It was just another calculated move to keep people watching, not a genuine accolade for artistic achievement.

The Suburbs Is not a great record, and it wasn’t the best from the last year. It’s just another undeserving winner of what has become a thoroughly meaningless award. Continue to celebrate if you want, but for me, there’s nothing to applaud.