At the risk of sounding like a grumpy old man: How in the hell have these kids never even heard of Bonnie Raitt?
The legendary blues singer won her 14th Grammy at last night’s awards ceremony, not including her Lifetime Achievement Award from 2022. She’s a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and her 1989 album Nick of Time was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry and has been certified 5x platinum by the RIAA. And she was ranked on both Rolling Stone’s list of 100 Greatest Singers of All Time and 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.
Bonnie Raitt is a legend.
But apparently, a lot of people didn’t know who she was until the title track to her 2022 album Just Like That won a Grammy for Song of the Year at last night’s ceremony, beating out names like Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Adele, Harry Styles, and Lizzo.
The UK’s Daily Mail called Raitt an “unknown blues singer” when discussing the icon’s Grammy win.And fans of the other nominees (most of them much younger) took to Twitter to express their shock and confusion…while many admitted they don’t even know who Bonnie Raitt is.
Well there goes any hope I had for the younger generation…
For her part though, Bonnie was of course all class, giving an emotional speech about the song that was inspired by a news segment she saw about a woman who was going to meet the man who had been given her young son’s heart in an organ donation:
“I was so inspired for this song by the incredible story of the love and the grace and the generosity of someone that donates their beloved’s organs to help another person live.
And this story, it was so simple and so beautiful for these times.”
She also paid tribute to her friend and frequent collaborator, the late, great John Prine:
“People have been responding to the song partly because of how much I love and we all love John Prine. And that was the inspiration for the music, for this song and telling a story from the inside.”
