During the GRAMMYs 2022 on Sunday night, R&B Duo, Silk Sonic, bagged one of the biggest prizes for Song of The Year with their hit, ‘Leave The Door Open’. The collaborative project between Anderson Paak and Bruno Mars has topped the category ahead of rivals ABBA, Olivia Rodrigo, Justin Bieber, Doja Cat and SZA, and Jon Batiste.
After making a sweeping win on all the other categories including Song Of The Year, Best R&B Performance and Best R&B Song at the prestigious ceremony, both music titans took the stage at the close of the night to accept the well deserved Record Of The Year prize. On stage, Anderson Paak made a teasing joke, “we are really trying our hardest to remain humble at this point” as the crowd raptures into an applause. Alongside Paak, Mars also casually lit and smoked a cigarette on stage. “Drinks are on Silk Sonic tonight! We are getting drunk”, boldly declared Paak as the duo burst into a grateful euphoria in front of the fans and audiences around.
The duo also opened the show with an electrifying performance of their song “777” in front of a brightly lit and flashy, dynamic stage to get the party started at the MGM Grand Garden Arena.
In an ever-evolving music scene, the art of forging genius collaborations and maintaining true artistry is most necessary for musicians to thrive. Since sharing the stage back in 2017 when Anderson Paak opened for Bruno Mars on the European leg of the latter’s 24K Magic World Tour, who would have known that the world would be gifted with an incredible musical collaboration that is now set to make history. What started out as a joke while the duo were having a late-night jam session, turned into a musical supergroup. In an interview with Zane Lowe, Mars shared that this collaboration came around organically and right from the start, their compatibility in fusing their musical talent morphed into the intent of seriously making music. “We kept coming up with music. It felt like why you fall in love with music in the first place. And jamming with your buddy”… There’s no plan, just working out the parts and trying to excite each other… that’s why this wouldn’t happen if it didn’t make sense and it didn’t feel natural and organic. This was a series of events that led us to ‘Man, why don’t we just do it?’
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, when many artists looked towards working remotely, Paak and Mars were hard at work in the studio to collaborate in person. Paak shared with Zane Lowe, “When you get in and you can jam with someone and other artists that could hold it down and you’re bouncing, that’s different. That’s the difference and you’re really creating a groove from scratch. You guys are trying to figure out what’s going to work.”
In 2021, they officially announced their band name, Silk Sonic, and then went on to release their magnificent debut single “Leave The Door Open” on 5th March 2021. Within less than a month, the hit song reached a culmination of 250 million streams and 90 million official video views on YouTube.
Leading up to the GRAMMYs this year, which was originally scheduled for late January before its postponement to March 14, both Paak and Mars had an interesting social campaign on Twitter. They make a prank of breaking up “to get the Recording Academy’s attention” with the hashtag #LetSilkSonicThrive. In a series of exchanges, both of them made a “petition” to the Recording Academy, and eventually announced their reunion on the grand stage to perform for the ceremony.
With their signature R&B infused finesse and their unique ability to create such captivating melodies, the duo has become renowned for their metamorphic capabilities to expertly craft sonic adventures (no pun intended). On their own, both Mars and Paak are legendary musicians. The former also won his own Album of the Year at the GRAMMYs in 2019 and performed at the Super Bowl Halftime Show, while Paak first broke through in 2016 with his debut album ‘Malibu‘.
With this GRAMMYs sweep, Silk Sonic have undoubtedly earned their reputation for exuding incommensurable talent and will continue to take listeners on a feel good, funky journey.