Every year, the Grammys have light fumes of scandal around them—often involving voters’ very white, very male, and/or very mothballed taste in music—but this year, things went full inferno. Less than a week before the show, a discrimination complaint by ex-CEO Deborah Dugan accused the Recording Academy, which presents the show, of almost everything such a group can be accused of: money mismanagement, conflicts of interest, institutional dismissal of black and female artists, vote-fixing, and sexual misconduct including an allegation that former CEO Neil Portnow raped an artist.

The Academy categorically denied all claims and added a response that amounted to, “That’s some nice music you’ve got there—it would be a shame if something were to happen to its biggest night.” (No, really: “We regret that Music’s Biggest Night is being stolen [from the Academy] by Ms. Dugan’s actions.”) Once it was clear the show would go on, it was also clear that the Grammys—who have never met a scandal they can’t grin and ignore—would not officially address the issue during the show. But there was still that lingering doubt: Would an artist maybe do it anyway?

That question became moot mere hours before the ceremony, when Kobe Bryant died in a horrific helicopter crash. Kobe’s death is a much bigger deal than the Dugan lawsuit, which seems to have barely made a dent outside of the music industry. And the ceremony was held in the Staples Center, the Lakers’ home turf, where Kobe’s jerseys hang in the rafters. But the tragedy bolstered the ceremony’s tone of conciliatory unity and solidarity, while leaving ambiguous what exactly the Grammys are in solidarity with.

“It’s been a hell of a week! Damn!” said host Alicia Keys at the start of the show. “We feeling good? Yes! We are good.” She exhorted the celebrity crowd to turn to their neighbors and shake hands. The tone of pleasant escapism, while maybe suitable for last year’s effort to rebrand, was less so for stakes including actual alleged crime and actual literal death.

Billie’s Big, Conflicted Night

Billie Eilish swept the Big Four categories (Record/Song/Album of the Year and Best New Artist), the first person to do so since yacht-rocker Christopher Cross in 1981. It wasn’t surprising. In addition to an excellent, weird, already deeply influential debut, she has devoted fans among both industry types and listeners; the cries of “BILLIE!” during her show-end victories were the loudest I’ve heard for anyone at this show in years. Outside of all context, this might seem like evidence of the Grammys fixing their long-standing women problem by simply giving one woman all of the awards (even more than Adele). But nobody actually believes this, including Billie Eilish, who apparently mouthed “Please don’t be me” before winning Album of the Year.

Why so abashed about a Grammy Moment!? Is it her knowing that a win, much less a sweep, would immediately make her a target? (Her “I love all fandoms” speech, her insistence that Ariana Grande should have won instead, and the fact that stans did target her and probably still are, suggest so. The same thing happened to Cross nearly 40 years ago.) Or is it the simple fact that she is still in her teens and is in no way equipped to single-handedly set the tone about three Grammy scandals at once? Her final speech, for Record of the Year, was a short, rushed “thank you”: accepting the night’s victory, preparing to accept the world’s defeat.

Post-Genre Blues

The Grammys’ idea of breaking down genre barriers used to amount to those terminally uncool collaborations between people like Foo Fighters and deadmau5. Since then, pop music has grown increasingly post-genre, but in a messier, realer way. So when the Grammys wanted to throw Lil Nas X into a genre battle royale with Billy Ray Cyrus, BTS, and the yodeling kid, all they had to do was stage the existing remixes of “Old Town Road.”