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Wednesday, November 23, 2005

American Music: rewards and rip-offs 

Normally on Tuesday nights, I watch "Commander in Chief" and "Boston Legal", but the American Music Awards were on instead. The network was hyping Gwen Stefani as a performer, so I thought I'd tune in.

The opening of the show was unintentionally hilarious. Mariah Carey appeared, wearing her usual next to nothing. I noticed right away that not only was her dress cut all the way up to the hip, the rest of the right side of her costume was see through ala Britney Spears. Her entire right leg was exposed. Nothing new, right? Except when she was supposed to be walking across stage, the back of her dress started to flap, and you could see her ass! And then she had to sort of duck walk in her high heels to keep the front part of her dress from exposing her crotch! This was very nearly a wardrobe malfunction that would have made Janet Jackson's boob look mighty tame! I laughed my ass off. Later, when she was handed an award, she appeared in a boob-popping black dress and apologized for the previous outfit.

Unfortunately, after that, things started to go downhill. Lindsey Lohan made her live network singing debut. That girl needs to stick with acting! Hilary Duff isn't a much better singer either. And Gwen Stefani did appear on stage, but only as backup for someone I'd never heard of. She only sang ONE line! But I thought she looked more attractive fully dressed than Mariah Carey did nearly naked.

I very nearly turned it off until I found out Carlos Santana was going to perform. He was on stage with Los Lonely Boys. At last, some talent! The vocals fit perfectly with the music, and I LOVED the dual guitars! Fantastic! More than made up for the first crappy hour and a half of the show.

There were some other musical moments that I liked. Cindy Lauper and Sarah McLaughlin together were pretty good. I really enjoyed the Eurythmics reunion and Sheryl Crow's performance. I don't follow much country music and had never heard of Rascal Flats, but I enjoyed the song they performed. Tim McGraw was good too.

But I was not that impressed by any of the hip hop performances. A lot of the performers that I liked didn't win, and several of the ones who did win weren't even in attendance. A nice exception was Missy Elliott, who was in a cast and needed help getting up on the stage.

One segment I was looking forward to was the result of the viewers' pick for best artist, with choices from various genres. Green Day was a choice, as was Gwen Stefani. And the viewers voted for Kelly Clarkson?? Ack!

And the highlight of the night was supposed to be the Rolling Stones playing live from Salt Lake City. The timing was off, and they weren't even ready when the feed cut to them. They did two songs, but I just don't think their performance lived up to the hype. Glad I'm not gonna be paying a couple hundred bucks to see them.

Well, I guess with live TV catering to a mainstream audience, you takes your chances. Good thing I don't mind gambling most of the time.

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