NEW YORK — There was little doubt who should take home the album of the year Grammy in 1984. That was Michael Jackson with a little record called “Thriller.” He won, of course, but the Recording Academy hasn’t always been seen to make the right call over its 60 years. And you don’t have to point to just Milli Vanilli to find some surprising decisions. Here are some others.
Star crossed
The winner of album of the year honor in 1981 wasn’t Barbra Streisand, Billy Joel, Frank Sinatra or Pink Floyd. The winner was soft rocker Christopher Cross, whose self-titled album contained the hit “Sailing.” Streisand’s album “Guilty” gave us “Woman in Love,” the Joel record “Glass Houses” yielded “You May Be Right” ”Don’t Ask Me Why” and “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me,” the Sinatra album “Trilogy: Past, Present, Future” contained his classic version of “New York, New York” and the double-LP “The Wall” is considered by Rolling Stone magazine to be among the top 100 greatest albums of all time. Cross actually won four Grammys that year and called it “a dream come true.” It was head-scratcher for many others.
Beatles beaten?
Glen Campbell’s “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” won album of the year honors in 1969 and its title single was a huge hit for the country icon. The record beat out Jose Feliciano’s acoustic covers in “Felicano!” and Richard Harris’ “A Tramp Shining” (which had the massive hit “MacArthur Park”) but it also bested two rather fine projects: Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bookends” — with the songs “America” and “Mrs. Robinson” — and the Beatles’ “Magical Mystery Tour,” with the songs “I Am the Walrus,” “Penny Lane,” “All You Need Is Love” and “Strawberry Fields Forever.” Rolling Stone named “Bookends” in its list of 500 greatest albums of all time and “Magical Mystery Tour” eventually went on to sell over six million copies in America alone.
Beaten again?
No disrespect to Blood, Sweat & Tears, but it takes a pretty good album to beat both the Fab Four and the Man in Black in the same year. Sure, the jazz-rock band’s self-titled album had the classic tune “Spinning Wheel,” but was “Blood, Sweat & Tears” really a better album than “Crosby, Stills and Nash,” “Johnny Cash at San Quentin,” “The Age of Aquarius” or “Abbey Road”? In 1970, it apparently was. That’s despite the Cash album having “A Boy Named Sue,” The 5th Dimension’s album having “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In,” the Crosby, Stills & Nash album being their well-regarded debut, and the Beatles’ LP containing “Come Together,” ”Something” and “Here Comes the Sun.”