Grammy's Top 2009 Nominees: Lil Wayne, Coldplay, Radiohead, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss and More
Grammy predictions are a delicate art fragile constructions, built on a buckling framework of name recognition, critical consensus and pure blind luck.
And, of course, they usually fall apart.
Grammy's Best New Artist choices over the years have regularly been lobbed in from left field (A Taste of Honey, Starland Vocal Band and Milli Vanilli have all taken this one home, beating Elvis Costello, Boston and the Indigo Girls respectively). Few could have expected Eric Clapton's sleepy, unplugged version of “Layla" to upend Nirvana's “Smells Like Teen Spirit" for Best Rock Song in 1992. And you can probably count on one hand the number of people who picked Jethro Tull for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance in their 1989 Grammy office pool.
This year's Grammy Award ceremony once again promises plenty of opportunities for would-be experts to embarrass themselves. Are Grammy voters ready to embrace Lil Wayne? Can the Jonas Brothers shake their Disney pedigree and win Best New Artist? Can Gnarls Barkley take home hardware for an album it seems nobody heard? The true answers to these and all of this year's Grammy riddles will be unlocked when the awards are handed out on February 8 in L.A.
But first, we assembled an A-list panel to help us read the tea leaves and tap this year's likely winners. They're singers, rappers, producers and Grammy nominees. So before you wade into your Grammy pool, see what our experts had to say about this year's big rock, alternative and rap races.
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