Grammy Awards nominate George Lopez’s comedy album before it is released?!

People have made a big to-do in recent days about how and why the Grammy rules could not allow Lady Gaga to get a nomination for Best New Artist because she already had received recognition by the academy in a different field before this year. But the Grammys were more than willing, it seems, to bend the rules for George Lopez. His new stand-up comedy CD, Tall, Dark & Chicano, hasn't even come out yet. It'll be released Dec. 15, 2009, on Comedy Central Records. That's what it says on the press release Comedy Central sent out, as well as, well, everywhere. You cannot get it on Amazon.com yet.

Lopezcd
Of course, the recording is based off of a live performance for HBO from earlier in the year. But still. That doesn't mean Lopez's "comedy album" came out between Oct. 1, 2008 and Aug. 31, 2009 — the official "Eligibilty Year" for the 52nd annual Grammys. Hmmm. Maybe they watched the HBO special and thought, that'll make a great album: Let's nominate it ahead of time?! The future is now, people.

UPDATED: Seeing that the Grammys also called upon Lopez to introduce the nominees for Song of the Year — and make a Tiger Woods joke in the process — perhaps there's even more to this than meets the eye? Here's a clip from last night's telecast on CBS:

UPDATED UPDATED: Sources tell me that Comedy Central, in fact, released a vinyl edition of George Lopez's special shortly after it debuted on HBO in August. Which would qualify. Barely. Vinyl???

With that, here are the official 52nd annual Grammy Awards nominations for Best Comedy Album:

Best Comedy Album 
(For comedy recordings, spoken or musical)

  • Back From The Dead
    Spinal Tap
    [The Label Industry/Artist2Market Distribution] 
  • A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift Of All!
    Stephen Colbert
    [Comedy Central Records] 
  • Internet Leaks
    "Weird Al" Yankovic
    [Volcano] 
  • My Weakness Is Strong
    Patton Oswalt
    [Degenerate/Warner Bros.] 
  • Suckin‚Äô It For The Holidays
    Kathy Griffin
    [Music With A Twist] 
  • Tall, Dark & Chicano
    George Lopez
    [Comedy Central Records] 

In other Grammy nomination news that involves comedians, The Lonely Island's "I'm On a Boat" originally seen and heard on Saturday Night Live as an SNL Digital Short with T-Pain, is up for best rap/sung collaboration. Steve Martin's "The Crow" is up for best Bluegrass album. Jonathan Winters is up for best spoken word album for "Jonathan Winters: A Very Special Time." And Jamie Foxx's "Blame It (On the Alcohol)" with T-Pain is up for best R&B duo or group with vocals, as well as best R&B song, and Foxx is up for best R&B album. You can see the full list of Grammy nominations here.

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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