Grammys: Daft Punk, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Dominate; Lorde Surprises
At a Grammy ceremony that will be forever known for a marriage ceremony with 33 couples presided over by Queen Latifah with Madonna singing, a dance music duo that does not speak dominated the awards with four wins.
Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, named best new artist, had the same number of wins. Lorde became the youngest artist to win in a general category besides best new artist when "Royals" was named song of the year.
Daft Punk won album and record of the year honors for the album Random Access Memories and the single "Get Lucky" featuring Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers. It is the first general category win for a dance-oriented album since the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack won album of the year for 1978.
Daft Punk also won pop duo or group performance,
dance/electronica album and engineered album, non-classical. Pharrell
Williams, who shared in the wins, was also named producer of the year,
non-classical.
"The time that went into this was like a Steely Dan record," mastering engineer Bob Ludwig said
backstage. He became involved with project through guitarist Nile
Rodgers, whose work together dates back the guitarist's work with Chic
and "Let's Dance" with David Bowie. "The point of view was this record has to be perfect. There was no stone unturned, no dollar unspent."
Daft Punk was the cornerstone of one of the "Grammy
moment" performances, doing a seamless medley of "Get Lucky," Chic's
"Freak Out" and Wonder's "Another Star" with Williams, Rodgers and
Stevie Wonder; it was one of the more successful groupings in the show's
history.
