Monday, August 29, 2011

I can't believe I watched the (almost) whole thing

Call me crazy, but I decided to watch the telecast of last night's Video Music Awards. I watched mainly in hopes that The Black Keys would win best rock video for "Howlin' for You" (they didn't), but also out of morbid curiosity for what passes as "music" these days.

Let's just say that I'm pretty happy with my decision to stay away from most popular music. I watched most of the show on mute, so I really only have the visual to go off in most cases.

I watched the pre-show (muting during the "musical" performance by some band I've never heard of and never hope to again). The pre-show for these types of things are fun, especially seeing what kind of costumes outfits people show up in. Nicki Minaj and Katy Perry did not disappoint, although both delivered a jumbled mess of WTF???

One thing that really, really annoyed me in the pre-show was the declaration of Foster the People as the indie rock "poster children." While I'm not one of those people who hates whatever is "mainstream," when your first release reaches into the top ten overall Billboard songs chart, you've lost the right to be indie rock posterboys.

Anyways, onto the show itself. Lady Gaga opened doing her best Bob Dylan (I guess trying to copy Madonna didn't work out for her, so she went for the next best thing?) Honestly, I had the TV on mute here, all I know is that she appeared to be giving some sort of monologue (which I later found out was about...dating Lady Gaga) then started singing one of her songs.

The rock video award went out pretty early in the night, which I was pretty thankful for. Unfortunately, it went to the Foo Fighters, who I have nothing against, I just love The Black Keys too much; better than Foster the People, I guess.



I watched about half the show from there on. Muted performances included; Chris Brown flying (why do we still care about this gf-beater?), Britney Spears song playing behind her "Lifetime Achievement Award" (she's 29...WTF?), all of Jessie J and a few others things I wasn't even paying attention to.

The only show of actual talent during the show was Adele, who I will admit to absolutely loving. I'm not too crazy about her new album compared to her debut, but it's still lightyears better than most of what's out there. It's also refreshing to see a pop star who's not over-reliant on costumes, boobage or bright lights and pretty colors.

Anything I really know about the awards show came later: apparently Beyonce is pregnant, Jay-Z didn't clap for Chris Brown (good for him - Jay-Z that is) and Tyler, the Creator is strangely humble...who knew.

Much as I usually hate myself for it during and soon after, I'm starting to appreciate exposing myself to these things, if only to see when (or if) actual talent gets recognized!

By the way, one thing I love seeing is the musicians and performers lash out at MTV for their lack of actual music programming. The first was Adam Levine (who really isn't in much of a place to say anything), who said yesterday, "the VMA's. one day a year when MTV pretends to still care about music. I'm drawing a line in the sand. f*** you VMA's."

Even better was Bon Iver, who had this to say, "I don't mean to criticize. Anyone. Actually. Except for MTV. You might have had a very large opportunity to be stabilize (sic) your self as a global presence of culture and art about 15 years ago and you f***ed the dog. Sorry."

So true, both of them. The best reaction to the VMAs overall, however, was summed up in 7 short seconds.


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