Grammy Showdown: 2012

Kevin Mazur/Ian Gavan/C Flanigan/Michael Stewart/Getty Images

Can Adele pull off a clean sweep? Will Kanye West win solo or with big bro Jay-Z? Our all-star panel – and a Las Vegas oddsmaker – break it down.

Panel of Experts: Adam Lambert, Common, Mark Hoppus of Blink-182, producer-DJ Avicii and Kelly Clarkson

Album of the Year

21 Adele

Wasting Light Foo Fighters

Born This Way Lady Gaga

Doo-Wop & Hooligans Bruno Mars

Loud Rihanna

The Experts Say

Mark Hoppus Adele's album was inescapable this year. Housewives, hipsters and people who normally listen to hip-hop all love it.

Common I can put Adele's album on and listen to the whole thing. But Lady Gaga may pull off an upset.

Avicii Bruno Mars had a shitload of hits on Doo-Wops & Hooligans, and he's so talented. His melodies really get to me.

Vegas Odds Favor

Adele 1-2

Who Should Win: Adele

After owning the charts for more than a year, Adele's hit-stacked LP is all but guaranteed to take the prize.

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Song Stories

“Tonight's the Night”

The Shirelles | 1960

The lead cut and title track from this girl group's debut album, "Tonight's the Night" was written by 19-year-old bandmember Shirley Owens, who sings lead, and producer Luther Dixon. The band from Passaic, New Jersey met in high school, first calling themselves the Pequellos. The song's frank thoughts about sexual and emotional surrender was racy for the time, but that didn't stop the Chiffons from cutting a similar version immediately after the original came out. "We were the first female group to write some of our own material," band member Beverly Lee recalls. "We did have some say-so in our writing."

More Song Stories entries »

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