The recent Bo Burnham Netflix special has been declared ineligible for the 2022 Grammys, who are really on a roll with strange decisions this week.
As reported by Billboard, Inside (The Songs) is still going out on the preliminary ballot to Recording Academy members. It’s just in the category of Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media rather than Comedy Album. The decision was confirmed by Burnham’s record label, Republic.
The album contains the songs that Burnham performed in his acclaimed Netflix special, Inside. This is the thing: it’s a comedy special with very serious themes.
Burham recorded it alone in his home during the COVID-19 pandemic, with no crew or audience. It’s a claustrophobic and stressful piece, a reflection of the difficult times in which it was created. Burnham often seems like a person on the edge, his emotions threatening to overcome him. The deterioration of his mental health is a major thematic throughline.
But comedy has been drifting further and further away from our classic understanding of the term for years now. Think of Hannah Gadsby’s excellent and incendiary Netflix special Nanette; think of the rise of the TV dramedy; think of the biggest comedy series in the world right now, Ted Lasso, which is just as concerned with toxic masculinity and mental health as it is with funny one-liners.
That is all to say that the Grammys decision is highly perplexing. As Burnham’s album spent a huge 18 weeks at number one on the comedy chart, it defies sense. Added to this, most of the albums nominated in the comedy category in recent years have been soundtracks to TV or streaming specials.
Burnham would have been the sure-fire favourite to triumph in the comedy category; now it’s anyone guesses who will win. Given the dominance of his special, though, he should still be in with a strong chance of winning in the Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media anyway.
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And Burnham has already scooped three Primetime Emmy Awards for Inside so he’s probably not that fussed about the ever-diminishing Grammys.
It’s their second baffling decision to emerge this week. The music world was confused when it was announced that Kacey Musgraves’ new Star-Crossed album was in the pop category instead of country, the latter being the category where it had been submitted by Universal Music Group Nashville.
Musgraves has been one of the shining lights of modern country music and even if her latest record contains more flashes of pop, that shouldn’t alter her category.
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Check out ‘All Eyes On Me’ by Bo Burnham:
