Dearest Daft Punk,
Domo arigato, Mr. Robotos!
Oops, that’s Japanese. And you’re French.
But still I hope it translates that I wish to sincerely thank you gentlemen (you are guys, right?) - Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter or whoever was inside your robot suits - for your attendance at the Grammy Awards last Sunday, only your second television appearance, though you’ve been around since the 1990s.
While other musicians strutted Armani and Dior designs, you apparently donned Hasbro - winter-white costumes from the Storm Trooper couture collection, complete with face-concealing space helmets.
Congratulations on all your winnings: Album of the Year, Best Dance/Electronica Album and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical for Random Access Memories, as well as Best Pop Duo/Group Performance and Record of the Year for “Get Lucky,” your collaboration with Paul Williams, Nile Rodgers and Pharrell Williams.
Speaking of Pharrell, please help him with his statement-making headgear next time. That ridiculous tall brown hat made him look like Twinkie the Kid. Or maybe the Arby’s logo. Tweeted the fast-food company: “Hey @Pharrell, can we have our hat back? #GRAMMYs.” The big hat was such a big deal, it already has its own Twitter handle (@Pharrellhat) with some 18,000 followers and quite an attitude: “i’m def more fashionable than Madonna’s grill,” it tweeted.
Speaking of Madonna, she also drew fast-food comparisons with folks saying her white pants suit and hat resembled the late Colonel Sanders (considering she was helping to lead a mass wedding of 33 couples, the occasion called for something more, shall we say, “fabulous!”). Earlier, arriving in a dark pants suit and hat with a white shirt, she appeared to be channeling another food icon - the old Quaker Oats dude.
Other old dudes who performed: the living two-fourths of The Beatles, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Merle Haggard and Blake Shelton. Shelton’s technically not all that old. But he contributed on “Okie From Muskogee,” which just aged him 45 years.
With so many geezers, er, giants in attendance, Daft Punk, your presence seemed all the more fresh and futuristic. While you too were joined by legends Nile Rodgers and Stevie Wonder, the result was fierce and funky. Way better than songstress Sara Bareilles and superstar Carole King on dueling pianos hammering out an extended version of “Brave,” better known as “oh, wait, so you mean that screechy Microsoft jingle I usually fast-forward through is an actual song, like on the radio?”
You never tried too hard. You never attempted any superfluous acrobatics (no that wasn’t a comment on Pink’s perfect trapeze act, but rather Taylor Swift’s pointless hair whipping at the piano and Beyonce’s Flashdance- esque chair dance with wet hair).
Finally, Daft Punk, I commend you for delivering the most perfect Grammy acceptance speeches ever given.
You didn’t say anything!
Love, Jennifer Don’t punk me.
Email: [email protected] Spin Cycle is a weekly smirk at pop culture.
Style, Pages 45 on 02/02/2014