Bruce Springsteen's "Girls in Their Summer Clothes" from his Magic album is up for Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance and Best Rock Song.

I'm also rooting for Death Cab for Cuties' album "No Stairs" as Best Alternative Music Album. I got to hang out with Chris Walla at the DNC when we did a CNN show together and I really like him.

There's a lot of awards in the country, rap, jazz, latin, gospel and r&b categories. And a few for zydeco, reggae, classical and blues. In the best spoken word category (that President Obama won last year) Al Gore is up for Inconvenient Truth. Also in the category: Stephen Colbert for "I am America (and so are you.)"

One other category to note: Best Long Form Music Video -- Tom Petty's "Running Down a Dream" and the Who's "Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who" are included.

Who's performing? U2, Kid Rock, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Kenny Chesney, Coldplay, Adele, Jennifer Hudson, Jonas Brothers, Lil Wayne, Paul McCartney (with special guest drummer Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters), Katy Perry, Radiohead, T.I. and Justin Timberlake, Carrie Underwood, and Jay-Z, T.I. and Kanye and Estelle West.

Also: Sugarland; Taylor Swift and Miley Cyrus; Terence Blanchard, Neil Diamond, Smokey Robinson, Robin Thicke, Allen Toussaint and Stevie Wonder. There will be a tribute to Bo Diddley featuring Buddy Guy, B.B. King, John Mayer and Keith Urban.

Jay-Z, Lil Wayne, T.I. and Kanye West will perform their hit single "Swagga Like Us."

There's going to be a tribute to the Four Tops, by original group member Duke Fakir and Jamie Foxx and NeYo. Here's an interesting tidbit(pdf): the after-party, catered by Wolfgang Puck, will "pay homage" to the 40th anniversary of the Woodstock festival with a 1960s flower power theme.

Not by a tv? It will be streaming at Grammy.com, as will the pre-telecast ceremony.

109 categories in all. What's not to watch? Updates to come in a hour once the show begins here. Hope you'll join in -- if you're on the East Coast, try to keep the winner spoilers to a minimum but do tout us to any great performances or other memorable or terrible moments.

Update: 7:21 pm: I missed U2 but I'm not a huge fan of their's anyway. Lame opening monologue. Whitney Houston is back, first presenter, she looks great. best R&B award goes to, who else, Jennifer Hudson. Al Green, Justin Timberlake and Keith Urban were ok. I was wondering what was up with the slow Coldplay song, thinking this is why they've never grabbed me when Chris Martin jumped to life. Much better performance now. 60 minutes interviewed him earlier tonight, he seemed quite likable. He said their modus operandi is enthusiasm -- he isn't the most talented at singing or writing so its enthusias that counts.

Keith Urban is presenting, he's so good looking. Glad they gave him a part other than playing guitar with no mike for Al Greene.

One other note: the first two commercials were for an anti-aging cream and a heart attack drug. Do they not know who the audience is?

Back soon, Carrie Underwood singing does nothing for me.

Update 9:00pm. I'm surprised how good Paul McCartney is -- maybe it's his song choice but he's singing like he did in 1964 again and he doesn't look much different. That's it for me.