Image Credit: Kitra Cahana/Getty Images

The Grammy nominations are in — and by now, we hope you’ve had time to do the following: Read the full list of major nominees, peruse Kyle Anderson’s take on the biggest snubs and surprises, and enjoy Scooter Braun’s Twitter tantrum.

But if all that’s not enough for you, we’ve cobbled together some interesting trends about this year’s crop of Grammy nominees — so even if you’re not a Grammys aficionado, you can pretend to be one around the office.

* The Best Album category this year is oddly rock-heavy With the notable exception of Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange, the Best Album category is dominated by rock acts. But whereas the category (until very recently) used to feature the likes of Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, and Robert Plant and Allison Krauss, it’s now honoring a newer crop of rockers.

Or, as one of my co-workers put it, “It’s like the Grammy voters have replaced their old fogies with young fogies.” The inclusion of The Black Keys’ El Camino and Jack White’s Blunderbuss feels especially odd, since both of those acts’ previous albums were substantially better than those efforts. (Though the White Stripes’ excellent 2004 release Elephant did get a nod that year.) Add in Mumford & Sons’s Babel and fun.’s Some Nights, and you’ve got a very dude-ish, very guitar-heavy category. READ FULL STORY »