LOS ANGELES — Longtime dance artist and voting Recording Academy member Kaskade had some strong words for his colleagues at the Grammy Awards tonight. He was among the nominees (and presenters), but appealed to the show organizers: bring the Best Dance Recording and Dance/Electronica Album honors to the primetime telecast, and not continue to sequester it to the pre-telecast ceremony.
“We’re selling more tickets than any other artists out there. And I feel like it’s our time to move into the primetime now. It’s a slow evolution,” he told reporters backstage at the Grammys. The Academy “has really embraced us… There’s a lot of us out there.”
So it’s time to for EDM artists to “move from Nokia to the big room.”
And while he feels that the 2013 awards have represented dance artists and dance music “better than ever,” Kaskade did address the disruptive inclusion of Al Walser among the Dance Recording nominees. Walser — little-known to U.S. listeners outside of Grammy365 social network users — nabbed a spot next to names like Skrillex and Calvin Harris due to his lobbying efforts directly to voters through the online program.
“The Grammys are putting in the necessary means that nothing like that ever happens again, that it really truly does reflect what’s happening, that it’s not somebody’s friend that squeaked by,” he said. “It felt very forced. No one was really aware of who [Walser] was and what was going on. It wasn’t a representation of what was actually happening with the music and our world. It was kind of out of left field.”
A representative from Walser’s camp was present in the press area and tried defending Walser as deserving of the nod.
“No one’s refuting that [Walser] works hard,” Kaskade countered, adding a little dig: “The space suit was a good touch.”
Kaskade, instead, encourages the listening habits of voters to influence their opinions. “They need to listen to the music. I’m a voting member myself. People who take it seriously should take the time out to listen to the music.”
The producer and DJ has the credentials to back up his thoughts, and will be adding to his catalog with a new album this year. He is in the “final stages” with the set and will release it in late spring or early summer, with a new tour starting next month.
This year marked his first nomination for a Grammy Award, even with seven albums behind him. He said now, at least, there’s a few EDM songs on the radio, even though dance music has been “picking up steam for 20 years.”
“We’re all in amazement that we’re here. Dance music was big a decade ago and didn’t have any [Grammy] categories.”