What You Didn't See On TV At The 2018 Grammys

James Corden hosted the Grammys for the second consecutive year, and the 2018 Grammys ceremony was a whopping 3.5 hours long. As a result, Corden admitted he learned that he had to keep everything moving.

"I'm gonna try and do it all a bit quicker, 'cause, you know, it doesn't need to be longer, does it?" he told E! News ahead of the show. "You've got to leave your ego at the door really and you just can't make it all about you ... it's not about who's hosting the Grammys, it's who's performing."

Kesha's powerful Time's Up-themed performance of "Praying" with Camila Cabello, Cyndi Lauper, Bebe Rexha, and Andra Day was cathartic for the singer, largely in part because of her ongoing legal battle with producer Dr. Luke, who she accused of raping and abusing her. As a result, she was extremely emotional about performing the track live.

She explained on Twitter ahead of the show, "When I wrote 'Praying' with Ben Abraham and Ryan Lewis, I just felt as if I had gotten a huge weight off of my shoulders. It felt like an emotional raw victory for myself, one step closer to healing. I never could have known what would've happened these past few years." She added, "I just want to say that I needed this song in a very real way, I'm so proud and nervous and overwhelmed to be performing it at the Grammys ... and if you need it I hope this song finds you."

Avenged Sevenfold were nominated for their its first Grammy for "The Stage," but chose not to attend the ceremony. Frontman M. Shadows told Trunk Nation, "F**k 'em," explaining that because the band is currently on tour, it would cost $150,000 for flights and hotels for the band members their wives to travel from South Dakota to New York to attend the ceremony and then to Oklahoma for the next gig.

 "And then they go and pull the rock song of the year award from TV and put us in some side venue no one gives a f**k about? F**k that waste of time and money," he said, adding that rock music gets "no respect" from the Grammys. "I mean, how marginalized has rock become when rock song of the year can't get two minutes?"

Katy Perry, who's been nominated for 13 Grammys but never won a single trophy, wasn't nominated at all for Witness. Perhaps feeling prophetic about having sour grapes this year, she told The New York Times in summer 2017, "All the awards shows are fake and all the awards that I've won are fake." She said the awards don't represent music audiences. "They're constructs."

Billboard editorial director Jason Lipshutz disagrees, telling the New York Daily News, "It's the ultimate honor, especially because it's voted on by peers. In the same way that an artist still strives to be No. 1 on the Hot 100 or have a No. 1 album, artists and managers and labels care a lot about the Grammys."

Taylor Swift's Reputation was shut out of the 2018 Grammy race, though she was nominated for her duet with Zayn Malik, "I Don't Wanna Live Forever," and "Better Man," which she wrote for Little Big Town. Some have suggested she may have self-sabotaged her standing with the awards show community.

A source told The Sun in November 2017, "A lot of the [Grammy] jury members have worked with Katy [Perry], Calvin [Harris] and Kanye [West], so when Taylor has tried to humiliate them ... She may pay for that when it comes to winning awards ... Taylor has to understand that the industry is small, and moves like ­sabotaging Katy's album hurt people behind the scenes who work hard to make an album happen. How Taylor thinks the industry is going to give its full support to her after she's tried to damage so many people is mad."

Swift neither showed up for the Grammy's nor took any awards home for her writing or performances.

People reported that even though SZA lost all of her nominations, she was still the first to get up and cheer for the artists who won, including Kendrick Lamar and Alessia Cara. No sore losers here!

Pink toted her daughter, Willow Sage Hart, around the show and introduced her to Rihanna backstage, writing on Instagram, "My daughter lives for this woman. So do I." Pink also reportedly gave huge hugs to several others at the show, including the sign language interpreter with whom she performed "Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken."

Also adorable? E! News reported that Pink's husband Carey Hart was overheard talking about his wife during the show and saying, "It's her night." Aw!

DJ Khaled's 1-year-old son, Asahd, played peekaboo with Ryan Seacrest on the red carpet. Yes, it was everything.

Of course you saw the Fire and Fury audition sketch, but People, Entertainment Tonight, and E! News all reported that Hillary Clinton's cameo in the recorded bit got standing ovations and the loudest applause break of the night. 

People also reported that when host Corden faked out about former President Barack Obama presenting an award, the entire live audience was gasping and audibly disappointed.

When called out for the lack of female winners at the 2018 Grammys — the only televised win for a female artist was Alessia Cara's best new artist trophy — Recording Academy President Neil Portnow told Entertainment Tonight, "It has to begin with ... women who have the creativity in their hearts and souls, who want to be musicians, who want to be engineers, producers, and want to be part of the industry on the executive level. [They need] to step up, because I think they would be welcome."

He added, "I don't have personal experience of those kinds of brick walls that you face, but I think it's upon us — us as an industry — to make the welcome mat very obvious, breeding opportunities for all people who want to be creative and paying it forward and creating that next generation of artists." He also noted that Swift, who's previously won 10 Grammys, was "kind of off cycle [this year] ... Hopefully we'll see her next year."

Grammy Awards Executive Producer Ken Ehrlich sidestepped a question about Lorde's absence from the stage. "It's not for me to talk about. I produce the TV show ... I don't know if it was a mistake. These shows are a matter of choices. We have a box and it gets full. She had a great album. There's no way we can really deal with everybody." 

Sure, but this show was almost four hours long. You couldn't throw "Green Light" a bone?