This week saw Pope Benedict announcing that he is retiring from his position as the head of the Catholic church, making him the first pope to resign in some nearly 600 years to do so. Ever the helpful folks here at the Mixtape, we’ve come up with a short list of folks we consider good replacement candidates for Pope Benedict as he shuffles off the whatever is the Vatican equivalent of Shady Pines Nursing Home in a little segment we've dubbed:
Candidate Number One: Pope Rupaul. Who else better to shape the spiritual lives of the up-and-coming legendary Catholic children than Rupaul.
Candidate Number Two: Pope LL Cool J. Basically, we just want to guarantee that he can't host the Grammy Awards again.
Candidate Number Three: Pope Beyonce. If people act a fool, she'll put an excommunication on it.
Candidate Number Two: Pope Oprah aka Poperah. Hey, it's going to take a divine intervention to keep OWN afloat so this can only help.
And Candidate Number One? Pope Ke$ha. Just so "Die Young" can be played at every Easter service.
Continue reading as we take on the Grammy Awards, the State of the Union and so much more in an all-new Mixtape.
This week saw the Grammy Awards, inexplicably hosted by LL Cool J for a second year in a row. Seriously, is this part of his contract to be on that NCIS spin-off or something?
Anyway, the awards kicked off with a performance from Taylor Swift as she sang her hit single "Never Ever Getting Back Together."
Taylor SWIFT - 2013 Grammy Award Performance - We Are Never Getting Back Together from Kévin Parent on Vimeo.
Taylor Swift's Grammy performance was basically like if we here at the Mixtape hadCirque du Soleil to do an interpretive dance to entries from our 7th grade diary.
This being a Taylor Swift performance, it had to have some reference to an ex-boyfriend. Taylor Swift allegedly threw a jab at her ex-boyfriend Harry Styles of One Direction fame by doing a British accent during that already cringe-inducing spoken word part of "Never Ever Getting Back Together." On a scale of Nicki Minaj's British accent on "American Idol" to Gwyneth Paltrow in basically half of her movies in the 1990s, Taylor Swift's attempt was worst than Madonna's faux accent but better than Anne Hathaway's in "One Day."
Not to be outdone in the shade throwing department, Chris Brown decided to not stand up when Frank Ocean won a Grammy.
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| Look at Adele, side-eye in the deep.
Frank Ocean and Chris Brown had notoriously gotten into a scuffle a few weeks ago over a parking space so we weren't exactly expecting Chris Brown to jump up and start screaming, "THAT'S MY BOY" when Ocean trumped him. But sitting in your seat in a white suit that makes you look like a strung out Colonel Sanders probably wasn't the best public relations move. We also heard that he might not have stood up for fear of the Grammy security team tasering him and then throwing him out of the place faster than Lil Wayne from a basketball game.
Speaking of Ocean, he was part of the ever-increasing trend at the Grammys that we like to call:
Now hipsters have never met an up-tempo song they couldn’t pointlessly slow down into a dirge, apparently including their own tunes as Frank Ocean performed his song “Forrest Gump” and slowed down the already mid-tempo tune to a glacial pace.
We love Frank Ocean, we really do, but there is a reason we call him Frank Del Rey as just like Lana, the amount of hype around him and his ability to perform live seem hilariously at odds with each other.
Elsewhere, we had Jack White performing and having his back-up band dressed in Depression-era clothing, one of the trends we hate the most.
Nothing says hipster nonsense quite like paying a bunch of money to look like you’re destitute in the Dust Bowl.
Speaking of nonsense, Justin Timberlake made his return to the Grammy stage this year.
Justin Timberlake Ft. Jay-Z - Suit & Tie @ Grammy Awards 2013 (Performance) from TuDesordenTvV on Vimeo.
You know a song is tepid at best when Jay-Z starts doing his guest vocals from his seat in the audience. We just loved the constant hyping of Timberlake’s performance, like he was returning to pop lockin’ after an extensive battle with cancer or something. “Friends with Benefits” made us want to kill ourselves but we wouldn’t call it cancerous.
Justin Timberlake has continued his marketing blitz for his upcoming album by releasing the video for his song "Suit and Tie."
Apparently the bulk of Timberlake's comeback is going to be through an Instagram tint.
In other Grammy related news, the drummer of the Black Keys told some reporters that Justin Bieber doesn't deserve a Grammy because he's rich. Really? I mean, what soup kitchen is Gotye getting his meals at? What homeless shelter is Kelly Clarkson residing in?
Speaking of Clarkson, she gave what we thought was one of the best performance of the night.
The highlight of the night was probably the Bob Marley tribute that included Bruno Mars, Sting, Rihanna, Ziggy and Damian Marley.
We loved the glorious internal logic of the whole thing. Start with a Bruno Mars song that sounds like a Police tune then segue into a song from the Police and then end the tribute with a song by the person you're actually doing a tribute for. It's like six degrees of separation in musical form.
The Grammy awards closed with a performance from LL Cool J, a performance that even the Grammys weren't here for as they cut it off. That's what you get for not performing "I Need Love."
Hey Mixtapers, do you like dick jokes? Do you have a way with a misogyny? Well then you must have been the creative mind behind this Vermont Teddy Bear commercial.
Vermont Teddy Bear: Making Your Bullshit Relationship Bearable Once a Year.
This week saw President Obama delivering his state of the union address, something we would've watched live it hadn't been on against “Chopped: Champions” marathon on Food Network. Who cares about the state of our country when there are chefs competing to honor their dead uncle twice removed that taught them how to cook?!
But it’s safe for us to say that President Obama laid out a bunch of proposals, the Republicans hated said proposals and everybody went on their dysfunctional way. At least nobody yelled at the President this year so we’re making some sort of progress in terms of decorum.
Elsewhere, Florida Senator Marco Rubio came down with a bad case of thirst during the Republican response.
So many questions: why was the water so seemingly out of reach? What brand was it? Was it sitting on the chair Clint Eastwood was talking to during the Republican National Convention?
At least nobody compared you to Kenneth the Page from "30 Rock."
You know what both of these addresses needed? THE HARLEM SHAKE.
Faster than you can sing, "Hey sexy lady," a new viral sensation was born this week in the form of the Harlem Shake. Surprisingly, this has little to nothing to do with the actual dance the Harlem Shake, demonstrated below in glorious gif form by Bow Wow.
What this viral trend lacks in accuracy, it more than makes up in ridiculousness as now everybody is uploading their own variation. Below a Harlem Shake montage:
In other news, Steve Martin is becoming a dad for the first time at 67, proving he can still produce great things as he gets older as long as they aren’t related to “The Pink Panther.”
And we end this Mixtape with the joyous musical return of Postal Service.
And with that bid you a fond farewell. Check back next week as we preview the Oscars! Until then, remember:
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