Okay, I promise...this
will be the final diary entry this week. I know I've done a lot of
them this week, but I had a lot of things on my mind. But
fortunately, things are getting back to some degree of normalcy, and
all is starting to feel good.
So, I thought that for
this edition of the Thursday Diary, I would be a little bit snarky.
A little bit sarcastic. And, maybe for good measure, a little bit of
lamenting over how times have changed...and not necessarily in a good
way.
August
29, 2013
I
remember at one time I really used to love watching the MTV Video
Music Awards. And, for that matter, the Grammy Awards, the MuchMusic
Video Awards, or any other award having to do with music.
Throughout
my entire life, I've always been surrounded by music, and I couldn't
imagine my life without it. Why wouldn't I want to watch some of the
biggest celebrations in the music industry?
I
honestly don't remember what my very first Grammy Awards ceremony
was. I think it must have been around 1989 or 1990. Coincidentally,
I thought 1989 was a decent year in music and would often listen to
Top 40 radio around the third grade, so it kind of fits with the
timeline.
I
think that I started watching the MTV Video Music Awards right around
the same time...maybe I was a couple of years older. Although we
didn't get MTV here in Canada, the MTV Video Music Awards would often
be either simulcast on MuchMusic, or it would air about a week later.
To me, the MTV Video Music Awards were the quintessential awards
show to watch to not only celebrate the best of the best in music
video, but to see singers and bands reveal themselves to their fans
in more ways than ever before.
And,
certainly there were some awesome moments over the show's twenty-nine
year history. The late Whitney Houston helped break down colour
barriers on MTV, and when the third annual MTV Video Music Awards
aired on September 5, 1986, the world saw Whitney demonstrate her
vocal talents in this performance.
Or
how about three years after that when on September 6, 1989, Paula
Abdul showed the world that there actually was a time before she
became American Idol's “nice judge”? Watch it below.
And,
since today would have been his fifty-fifth birthday, how about a
spotlight on Michael Jackson, whose performance at the 1995 MTV Video
Music Awards was fifteen minutes in length and was voted as the Best
VMA Pop Performance in the show's history? Watch it below if you
have the time to do so. It's phenomenal.
So,
where am I going with this?
Well,
in the case of Whitney Houston, Paula Abdul, and Michael
Jackson...they really didn't need a whole bunch of gimmicks and fancy
bells and whistles to showcase the immense talent they had. Mind
you, two of them have since passed away, and the third one is
currently designing jewelry for Avon campaigns. But back in their
heyday, they were considered the crème of the crop. The sauce on
the steak. The ice in your slushie. They actually had the talent to
back up their accolades.
I'm
not necessarily saying that the music artists of today aren't like
that. I'm sure that there are a lot of people out there who could
wow us with their talents alone and come up with VMA performances
that could rival, or even surpass those of Houston, Abdul, or
Jackson.
So,
imagine my surprise when I tuned into the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards
which aired this past Sunday, and this was the clip that had
everybody talking.
I
know that by now, it's old news. But you know what? I feel a need
to comment on this performance because it's just so all over the
place.
Okay,
Miley Cyrus. I get what you were trying to do here. You want to
break free from your father's “achy breaky hold” on you, and
start up your own career. You don't want to be associated with the
squeaky clean “Hannah Montana” image anymore. I get that.
You're nearly twenty-one, you have your own ideas as to where you
want your career to go, and you must be happy to have a huge hit with
your latest single “We Can't Stop”. But, you know what? I have
to point my finger at you...and when I say finger, I don't mean the
foam finger that you were...well, you know what, I don't even know
what you were doing with that thing.
The
problem with Miley Cyrus' performance is that if she was expecting
for people to take her seriously...well, it kind of backfired in a
big way. Everyone I know who saw the performance was fairly
disgusted. One even commented that Miley did things with Robin
Thicke that Robin Thicke's own wife hadn't done with him.
Ouch.
Miley,
let's talk. The thing about that performance is that when it comes
to what you were trying to do, I sort of get where you're coming
from. You want to carve your own identity and you want your own
independence. You just went about it the wrong way, in my opinion.
Instead of getting respect, though, you're the punchline for late
night talk show hosts this week.
Of
course, these are just my own thoughts. You can feel free to agree
or disagree with me if you so choose. But the truth is that this
performance has so many points of view that there really is no
clear-cut answer. The facts of the story appear as blurred lines
running into each other, open for interpretation.
(Get
it? Blurred lines?)
Anyway,
regardless of what your stance is, it's gotten people talking about
it. Certainly the story was enough for me to comment on it myself.
And maybe in some grand scheme of things, Miley set out to achieve
exactly that...create a moment that would get people talking no
matter how positive or negative a reaction she got. After all,
controversy sells and it keeps your name in print. And, apparently
thanks to that performance, I now know what it means to “twerk”.
(Never
thought I would be writing the word “twerk” in this blog.)
I
just wish that Miley would realize that she didn't have to go down
that route to be a respected musical artist. She was doing a good
enough job already. I actually admit to liking “The Climb”, and
“Party in the U.S.A.” was a fairly decent pop hit in the summer
of 2009.
But,
you know...Miley's certainly not going to be the last artist to be
controversial at the MTV Video Music Awards. She most certainly
wasn't the first!
It
seems to be synonymous with the MTV Video Music Awards, you know?
For as long as I can remember, that awards show was the place to go
if you wanted to stand out, and perform outrageous routines in
outrageous costumes, and do generally outrageous things that would
make the six o'clock news the following day.
For
instance, nobody remembers September 11, 1987, when Peter Gabriel set
a record for most MTV Video Music Awards won on a single night with
ten for his “Sledgehammer” video. But, I bet everyone remembers
what happened two years later when Andrew Dice Clay earned himself a
lifetime ban from the network for reading off some rather vulgar
poems. I don't have that clip, but it kind of went like this (some language may be NSFW, so be warned).
Come
to think of it, many people would consider 1989 a real turning point
for the awards show. It had so many controversial moments aside from
the Dice Clay scandal. It was the awards show that saw Izzy Stradlin
and Vince Neil get into a physical altercation during the show! And,
again, it wouldn't be the first time that this happened. Bret
Michaels and C.C. DeVille got into a famous battle royale at the 1991
MTV Video Music Awards. RuPaul and Milton Berle (what an odd
combination) did a little verbal sparring two years later at the same
awards ceremony. Van Halen had the shortest reunion in history when
just minutes after the band's original line-up took to the stage
briefly at the 1996 VMA's, David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen came to
blows.
And,
who could forget the Kanye West/Taylor Swift debacle after Beyonce
supposedly had the best video of all time, and Kanye decided to use
Taylor's acceptance speech time to tell the world exactly why.
Well,
Beyonce proved to be a class act by giving up her time to let Taylor
Swift finish her speech, Taylor Swift's latest album “Red” has
been considered a crossover success, and Kanye West is trapped in the
Kardashian family with a child they named “North West”.
Yeah...karma
has a funny way of showing its face, doesn't it?
And
just going on a performance level, Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke
weren't the only ones to have a rather...um...raunchy performance.
You might think that the September 6, 1990 performance of Madonna's
“Vogue” was quite tame in comparison to Miley's, but watch the
performance a little closer. You'll see some bust grabbing, skirt
peering, and other taboo acts within it. Of course, all of the
dancers were in Victorian-era garb, so nothing was really revealed.
Again, quite tame.
Then
we had Prince one year later, whose outfit during his September 5,
1991 performance lead very little to the imagination – well, at
least the back part of the costume anyway. But, let's be honest.
This is Prince we're talking about here – a man who's written some
of the raunchiest songs over the last thirty years. We've come to
expect things like this from him.
And
on September 6, 2001, the world learned that Britney Spears was up
for shock value when her performance of “I'm A Slave 4 U”
featured some special guests – in the form of a gigantic Burmese
python and a tiger in a cage. The performance was called out by PETA
who claimed that the animals were being mistreated, but it was just a
blip on the controversy level for Britney Spears. Besides, in 2003,
she kissed Madonna and in 2007, she had her meltdown which lead to a
rather lukewarm performance of “Gimme More”.
Come
to think of it, I seem to recall Britney's performance getting
panned, and people making fun of her. But considering the fact that
she had a nervous breakdown where she shaved her head and lost her
mind, I thought it was brave of her to perform on the awards show.
She clearly wasn't ready to take the stage on that day, but I give
her credit for trying. And it seems as though the pain (albeit
self-inflicted) she was enduring six years ago has been left in the
past, as Britney's experiencing a comeback of sorts.
Perhaps
Miley Cyrus will learn something from this experience. Perhaps not.
The thing is that what's done is done. It will forever be a footnote
in the history of the MTV Video Music Awards. My hope though is that
one day there will come a time in which the MTV Video Music Awards
aren't about how much controversy you can raise, but how much musical
talent you really have.
But
as I type this, I fear that there are artists out there who have seen
Miley's performance, and who want to one-up her in the shocking
behaviour department.
Yeah...the
2014 awards show should be interesting.
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