Some fab moments

Presidential hopeful Barack Obama is on a roll, making yet another gain against Clinton -- Bill Clinton, that is. Obama beat the ex-prez (as well as older ex-prez Jimmy Carter) in the spoken word race for his audio book, “The Audacity of Hope.” He shouldn’t get too comfortable, though: His Democratic rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, won the same award in 1997 for her bestselling “It Takes a Village.”

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Some country fun: Vince Gill, accepting the trophy for country album for his four-CD set “These Days,” quipped to the ever-boastful Kanye West, “I just got an award from a Beatle.” . . . (pause, and with a smile): “Has that happened to you yet, Kanye?”

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Both sides now: Love or hate “Across the Universe,” you couldn’t help but be moved by the film’s Carol Woods and Timmy Mitchum as they sang the Beatles’ “Let It Be.” At the other end of the spectrum, the kid in us also loved the black-light-poster-come-to-life performance from Kanye West and Daft Punk.

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Wise choice: In a rare move, voters made a Solomon-like decision in the gospel performance category -- splitting the trophy between the Clark Sisters’ “Blessed & Highly Favored” and “Never Gonna Break My Faith” by Aretha Franklin and Mary J. Blige.

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Who’s the Man?: Bruce Springsteen’s three Grammys bring his career total to 18. No wonder he’s still the Boss.

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Missing man formation: While Ringo Starr joined Beatles producer George Martin and his son Giles in accepting a Grammy for “Love,” the compilation soundtrack for the Cirque du Soleil show, Paul McCartney was home in England to gear up for his chorus of “D-I-V-O-R-C-E” from Heather Mills. The two are headed to court this week to finalize the acrimonious dissolution of their marriage.

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Tina redux: Tina Turner’s performance of “What’s Love Got to Do With It?” is one of the few times the same artist has performed the same song on different Grammy shows -- she also sang it in 1985, when the song took honors as both record and song of the year.

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World gone awry?: In what world are the Beastie Boys in the same Grammy category as Joni Mitchell, Dave Koz and Spyro Gyra? That would be the world of best pop instrumental performance, which Mitchell won -- keeping the category safe from those brass monkey junkies. The world of pop instrumental album, on the other hand, went beastly.

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Family matters: Slayer took the metal honor for the song “Final Six.” Backstage, vocalist-bassist Tom Araya’s daughter, Ariel, was asked who her favorite artist is. “Rhianna,” she answered. Her favorite Slayer song? “Raining Blood.” Rhianna’s “Umbrella” could help with that.

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Double take: Forget Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger. How about Ringo Starr and Dave Stewart? The dual dark shades, close-cropped hair and beards had us wondering who was who.

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Licorice pizza?: Wolfgang Puck walked the red carpet serving edible record albums. You know, those round black things that music once came out of?

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Rock of ages: Time elapsed since George Washington died: 208 years. Combined age of featured Grammy rockers John Fogerty, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard: 209 years.

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Reptile rock: Grammy officials’ attempts to mount a 25th-anniversary salute to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” fizzled, but the milestone didn’t go unacknowledged. During a commercial, Geico tapped the title track as the soundtrack for a phalanx of moonwalking geckos. Relatively understated by Jackson standards.

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-- Times staff writers