Taylor Swift brings peppy end to lackluster VMAs
Alicia Keys belts out her new song. Photo: Getty Images
The VMAs felt short this year and I am not complaining.
I don’t know if it was the move to a cavernous arena in Los Angeles, an off-night (so I’m told) for host Kevin Hart, a lackluster crop of nominees or what, but I’ve watched every VMA show since MTV played videos and this one will be forgotten as soon as I finish typing this post.
You can check out my other posts to see what you might have missed during the show, but for a final wrap-up, Alicia Keys, another member of the Who Needs Hair Club, performed her new song “Girl on Fire” for the first time. Keys stood behind an electric piano, a clopping beat pushing the song along as she sang its big, anthemic chorus – though was surprisingly off-key through patches of the tune.
Taking over for Lady Gaga in the spotlight-hogging department, Nicki Minaj popped out to provide a mid-song rap, while Olympic gymnast Gabby Douglas was also called out onstage by Keys (why not the rest of the girls, who were just there to introduce the performance with Douglas?).
Since these awards are meaningless, it only matters for the sake of curiosity that Rihanna’s “We Found Love” won the big award of the night, video of the year (fellow nominee, and seatmate, Katy Perry blew Rihanna a kiss as she headed onstage).
Loading ...The mercifully brief show wrapped with Taylor Swift performing her latest ex-boyfriend screed, the super-catchy “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.” Swift isn’t well-regarded as a live singer, but she handled the lead on the shout-along fist-pumper with spunk and seemed to enjoy herself as she even crowd-surfed at song’s end.
So the 2012 VMAs are in the books. Did you have a favorite performance? Take our poll or let me know in the comments below.
And check out our gallery from tonight’s show.
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9 comments Add your comment
Da Mick
September 7th, 2012
12:19 am
I didn’t know that Taylor Swift wasn’t well-regarded as a live singer — I thought it was just me, because, with all the fuss over her these past few years, I could never figure out if they were hearing/seeing the same thing I was. The world keeps getting ever stranger….
Brian
September 7th, 2012
12:31 am
Anyone who thinks Taylor Swift can’t sing live is either dumb or deaf and has no idea what they’re talking about. Just a bunch of haters. She had one bad live performance and suddenly she can’t sing live. Every singer who performs live will have a bad performance once in a while. It doesn’t mean they can’t sing live.
Setra
September 7th, 2012
12:33 am
I enjoyed this year’s show. I loved that Rihanna opened and I also appreciated her apparel, I think it has improved since last I saw her on the VMA stage. I was also happy that she won the Video of the Year award for “We Found Love.” Taylor Swift’s performance was super fun and energetic. This year’s award show will give me and my Dish coworkers a lot to talk about tomorrow. I’m glad I recorded it on my Hopper, because when I played it back I was able to start watching on my living room TV and continue watching on any TV in my house, right where I left off. I loved the convenience of being able to go from room to room to watch, with little interruption.
jay
September 7th, 2012
12:43 am
didn’t even know the VMA’s were on
bob
September 7th, 2012
12:58 am
You’re exactly right Brian. The haters are jealous of her fast rise, consistent hits, and that she overshadowed other artist that they like. They constantly harp on the content of her songs without recognizing that over half of all songs are about failed relationships. You never read about good news in the paper, only the bad news. Songs are no different. Pain sells, especially emotional pain.
Big Loss
September 7th, 2012
7:10 am
MTV, formerly known as “Music Television”, is having music awards, why? I guess the relevance of the winners is reflective of how cutting edge this was. Like luke-arm congealed grits with artificial bacon-flavored bits. Did they have an award for worse knocked-up desperate teen mom? Biggest waxed guido-ussy?
I remember when MTv was cool, cutting-edge, and fun.
The Ghost of Whitney
September 7th, 2012
9:46 am
Was I given a shout out?
Sid Vicious
September 10th, 2012
9:48 am
Did Megadeth win best Metal Video for “Wake Up Dead”?
Nothing else going on?
September 10th, 2012
10:57 am
In a city the size of Atlanta with such a diverse and thriving local and national music scene, you couldn’t find anything else to write about over the past weekend besides SIX blog posts on the VMAs? Seriously, what a waste of space, and what an egregious disservice to Atlanta’s musicians and music fans. This is shameful, and lazy journalism (self censoring a more descriptive term).