Every year, the Grammys award the very best in music. Artists from a variety of genres receive recognition for years of hard work, are able to fulfill their wildest dreams, and go onstage at Madison Square Garden to thank all those who have supported their careers.

In years past, the Grammys simply awarded the so called “clean” pop, catered to a small subset of listeners. However, the Grammys aimed to change that this year by awarding the best music from a variety of genres.

With a return to New York after years in Los Angeles, the live performances allowed the Grammys to give a warm welcome to New York. Starting out with a foot firmly in the door, Kendrick Lamar began the show with a relevant and expertly delivered medley of songs from his critically acclaimed album DAMN.

Kendrick’s performance was followed up with Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee performing “Despacito” in their unique Latin-themed style, somehow managing to both have a ball onstage while maintaining precise vocals and exact choreography. Notably, the performance did not include guest artist Justin Bieber, but in doing so returned the song to its original Puerto Rican roots.

Unfortunately, not all of the performances were as spectacular. Following Kesha’s show stopping performance, there seemed to be a blank space which U2 (who are now as outdated as the record player phonographs from the trophies) could not quite fill. After being introduced by Camila Cabello, an immigrant who gave an emotional speech about fighting back against Trump’s DACA policy, Bono (the lead singer for U2) sang the thematically relevant “Get Out of Your Own Way”, yet gave a relatively stale and uninspiring performance.

In contrast to the varied and multi-genred live performances, the actual awards followed a predictable path the entire night. Instead of the drama-filled days of bad blood between Kanye West and other artists, Bruno Mars swept the major categories, from record of the year (“24K Magic”) to song of the year (“That’s What I Like”) to album of the year (24K Magic)

In terms of awarding formulaic, tried-and-true musicians instead of recognizing bold, groundbreaking artists, the Academy is still not out of the woods. Barring the tie for Best Bluegrass Album (The Infamous Stringdusters and Rhonda Vincent tying, beating Michael Cleveland, Bobby Osborne, and Noam Pikelny), nearly every category was won by the crowd-pleasing choice.