2012 Grammy Guesses: Best Pop Vocal Album

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2012 Grammy Guesses: Best Pop Vocal Album

Music Editor
On Jan 25, 2012

The 54^th annual Grammy Awards air Sunday, February 12 at 8pm EST on CBS.

It never fails... each year, you think long and hard about your list of Grammy predictions, only to tune in Sunday to discover that, yeah, whoops, you weren't even close. Why? Because you and I can think rationally about music and the National Association of Recording Arts and Sciences cannot. (Imagine I'm saying all this like Colonel Landa in Inglourious Basterds.) So, in the spirit of attempting to think like the NARAS, I've divided this year's obligatory Grammy Prediction cycle into two separate categories—who WILL win, and who SHOULD win.

(Don't like any of the nominees? Of course you don't. It's why you should vote now in our first-annual ANTI-GRAMMY Awards.)

Today's Category:

Best Pop Vocal Album

The Nominees:

Adele - 21
Cee Lo Green - The Lady Killer
Lady Gaga - Born This Way
Bruno Mars - Doo-Wops & Hooligans
Rihanna - Loud

Will Win:

Adele. No other album last year, pop or otherwise, sold even close to as many copies or garnered as many rave reviews. Easy. No contest.

Should Win:

Uh, Adele—I don't even like the album and I think she deserves every award she's up for. Love Lady Gaga, but I don't think anyone genuinely believes that Born This Way was better than The Fame Monster... then again, I don't know one person who listens to Bruno Mars, and yet here he is. Shrug. Cee Lo is great too, but I don't think the rest of Lady Killer matched the crowd-pleasing appeal of "F—k You". As for Rihanna, well, she's released so many albums in the past few years, I can't even remember which one Loud is.