The Grammys, Round 1 : Analysis: Grammys finally notice rock, but the cutting edge is with hip-hop and rap.

How ironic.

After years of being accused of failing to recognize that rock ‘n’ roll was the most creative area of pop music, the Grammy voters have come up with an all-rock finals in the key best-album competition.

The problem is that the rock sweep comes in a year in which much of the creative pulse has shifted to the vital, fast-moving, street-rooted world of hip-hop and rap.

The omission of rap artists is particularly troubling in the best single record competition, where Neneh Cherry’s “Buffalo Stance,” Soul II Soul’s “Keep On Movin’ ” and Tone Loc’s “Wild Thing” were more far more imaginative records. They kept with the best instincts of pop during 1989 more than such dreary, mainline selections as Bette Midler’s “Wind Beneath My Wings” or Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”

Though these vital artists deserve to be represented in the two most prestigious Grammy categories, you’ll have to turn to the secondary categories--new artist, rap and R&B--to; find them.

Thus, the great Grammy debate continues.

For years, the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences was accused of being out of touch with the rock artists who were stretching the boundaries of pop with their musical explorations and thematic commentaries.

Rather than recognize the contributions of such figures as Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones and Sly Stone, the Academy membership in the ‘50s, ‘60s and ‘70s consistently supported traditional, easy-listening artists.

Thanks to Academy membership drives and attrition in recent years, progress has been made in saluting rock artists. The selection of U2’s “The Joshua Tree” as the best album of 1987 was widely viewed as the result of an influx of younger voters and more progressive thinking among Academy members.

But the “rock” versus “mainstream” debate was never meant to be as provincial as simply rock versus mainstream. Rather, it was a call for voters to stop judging music in a sociological vacuum--to instead look for challenging and experimental forces, regardless of musical genre, rather than simply comfortable and conservative best sellers.

Paul Simon is certainly not a hard-core rock artist, but the rock community cheered when his “Graceland” was named best album of 1986. Like “The Joshua Tree,” it was a work filled with daring, imagination and heart.

But last year’s Grammy competition showed just how tenuous the advances of the late ‘80s were. The progressive wing of the Academy celebrated when Tracy Chapman’s debut album and her “Fast Car” single--both exquisitely crafted, folk-flavored tales about society’s underclass--were nominated for best album and best single, respectively.

Shockingly, she was shut out. She lost to George Michael’s slickly honed “Faith” album and, more embarrassing in terms of Grammy prestige, to Bobby McFerrin’s cute but flyweight “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.”

The good news this year is that the awards can’t repeat that embarrassment in the best album category. There’s no disaster lurking among the nominees. But there is reason to worry in the best record category, where some of the nominees are even worse than the McFerrin entry.

Best Album: The all-rock finals aren’t the glorious victory for rock that it might seem at first look. It’s chiefly a sweep for a specific wing of rock: respected, best-selling rock veterans.

That leaves unrepresented younger and more experimental acts--such as the Replacements, Guns N’ Roses and the Pixies, to cite three of many--as well as respected veterans who did excellent work in 1989 but didn’t end up with best sellers. The latter field was led by Neil Young’s “Freedom” and Lou Reed’s “New York,” two of the year’s half-dozen best albums according to most year-end critics polls.

Still, the nominations set up an interesting race. The Traveling Wilburys’ “Volume One” was a comfortable, reassuring album that showed that some highly lauded pop veterans (Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, George Harrison, the late Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne) can pool their talents (and consumer constituencies) and come up with a hit album. It was a work that was almost impossible to dislike, but it hardly represented an artistic leap.

Indeed, three of the group’s members--Dylan, Orbison and Petty--made more compelling solo albums during the last 12 months than the Wilburys’ entry. Petty’s “Full Moon Fever” had a particularly strong appeal, though it lacked the anthem-like fire of his best moments with the Heartbreakers. Bonnie Raitt’s “Nick of Time” was an overdue commercial breakthrough, but the album--as tasteful as it is--seems overmatched here.

That leaves a showdown, artistically, between Don Henley’s “The End of the Innocence” and the Fine Young Cannibals’ “The Raw & the Cooked.” As we’ve seen on Eagles albums and his solo collections, the name Henley is about as strong a guarantee of excellence as there is in pop music. And this album, too, has some superb moments as he looks at social issues and personal relationships with intensity and bite. Yet the album, sometimes hobbled by heavy-handed observation, lacks the consistency and grace of his best past work.

The Cannibals, the English trio led by singer Roland Gift, released a stirring mix of contemporary dance rhythms and soulful vocals that virtually defined soul ‘n’ rock in 1989. The album could have used more thematic punch--a point that left it behind Young’s “Freedom” and Reed’s “New York” on my own list of the year’s best albums. Still, it defined the musical currents of ’89 more sharply and convincingly than its rival nominees.

The choice here: “The Raw & the Cooked.”

Record of the year: The worst-case scenario is a Midler or a Joel victory. “Wind Beneath My Wings” is hopelessly leaden melodrama, while “We Didn’t Start the Fire” is shallow and irritating. Either record on a jukebox should be enough to empty a room.

Mike + the Mechanics’ “The Living Years” is a far better mainstream entry--a reflection about a father’s death with a sometimes convincing trace of emotion. Yet the record would be more effective with a more intimate and personal, as opposed to lavish, arrangement.

That leaves another match-up between Henley and the Cannibals, and this time the verdict should go to Henley. “She Drives Me Crazy” is a classy, invigorating exercise, but “The End of the Innocence” is a far more moving and timeless work--a song that reflects on values and ideals in a bittersweet way that makes it serve as a sort of benediction for the ‘80s. Sample line:

Who knows how long this will last

Now, we’ve come so far, so fast

But somewhere back there in the dust

That same small town in each of us.

The choice here: “The End of the Innocence.”