The Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance Vocal or Instrumental was an award presented at the 31st Grammy Awards in 1989 to honor quality hard rock/metal works (albums or songs). The Grammy Awards, an annual ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, are presented by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to "honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without regard to album sales or chart position."
The Academy recognized hard rock music artists for the first time in 1989 under the category Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance Vocal or Instrumental, combining two of the most popular music genres of the 1980s. Jethro Tull was given that award for the album Crest of a Knave, beating Metallica, who were expected to win with the album ...And Justice for All. This choice led to widespread criticism of the Academy, as journalists suggested that Jethro Tull's music did not belong in the hard rock or heavy metal genres. In response, the Academy created the categories Best Hard Rock Performance and Best Metal Performance, separating the genres. The incident is often considered an example of the Grammy Awards being out of touch with popular sentiment, and was even named the biggest upset in Grammy history by Entertainment Weekly.
From 2012, the combined Hard Rock/Metal category will return following a major overhaul of Grammy Awards categories. The separate Best Hard Rock Performance and Best Metal Performance categories will be merged into the slightly renamed Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance category.
Read more about Grammy Award For Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance Vocal Or Instrumental: Award, Controversy and Aftermath
Famous quotes containing the words award, hard, rock, metal, performance, vocal and/or instrumental:
“The award of a pure gold medal for poetry would flatter the recipient unduly: no poem ever attains such carat purity.”
—Robert Graves (1895–1985)
“It is as easy to deceive oneself and not be aware of it, as it is hard to deceive others without their being aware of it.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“When we were at school we were taught to sing the songs of the Europeans. How many of us were taught the songs of the Wanyamwezi or of the Wahehe? Many of us have learnt to dance the rumba, or the cha cha, to rock and roll and to twist and even to dance the waltz and foxtrot. But how many of us can dance, or have even heard of the gombe sugu, the mangala, nyang’umumi, kiduo, or lele mama?”
—Julius K. Nyerere (b. 1922)
“There were metal detectors on the staff-room doors and Hernandez usually had a drawer full of push-daggers, nunchuks, stun-guns, knucks, boot-knives, and whatever else the detectors had picked up. Like Friday morning at a South Miami high school.”
—William Gibson (b. 1948)
“The audience is the most revered member of the theater. Without an audience there is no theater. Every technique learned by the actor, every curtain, every flat on the stage, every careful analysis by the director, every coordinated scene, is for the enjoyment of the audience. They are our guests, our evaluators, and the last spoke in the wheel which can then begin to roll. They make the performance meaningful.”
—Viola Spolin (b. 1911)
“If I feel strongly, I say it. I know I can do more good by being vocal than by staying quiet. I’d have a whole lot more money if I lied, but I wouldn’t enjoy spending it.”
—Martina Navratilova (b. 1956)
“I guard this box, as I would the instrumental parts of my religion, to help my mind on to something better.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)