Last night occasioned the 42nd running of the American Music Awards, the “of the people” awards show that Dick Clark launched in 1973 because ABC lost its rights to air the Grammys. In contrast to that sometimes-stuffy celebration of all things musical, the American Music Awards are all about the popular and the current(-ish). Nominees are limited to three per category, and the winners are given the honor of “favourite,” not “best”. Accordingly, this year’s winners included One Direction, the Simon Cowell-crafted British boy band , who nabbed the artist of the year award and two other trophies; Iggy Azalea, the statuesque Australian MC who cleaned up in the hip-hop categories and Katy Perry, whose stomping Dark Horse took home single of the year and who won trophies in the pop/rock and adult contemporary categories. (See? Pop’s not just for kids!)
The three-hour telecast, hosted by the dapper Miami-based entertainer Pitbull, went by at a fairly quick clip, although part of that might have been because of the synergy between the performances and the ads – Fergie and Imagine Dragons were among the artists who double-dipped between commercial placements and live run-throughs of their new singles. Here’s a biased look at the night’s five best and worst aspects.
FIVE HITS
1. Charli XCX
After two summers of being a pop icon in waiting, Charli XCX is finally getting the spotlight thanks to her lush love song Boom Clap – a young-love fantasia that brings to mind her sumptuous early single Stay Away. She’s been one of pop’s best live performers for years now, and her one-two punch of Boom Clap and Break the Rules (not to mention her feisty cameo on Iggy Azalea’s Fancy) allowed her to strut her stuff on an even bigger stage.
2. Mary J Blige
Earlier this year, the queen of hip-hop soul stealth-released a full-length album — the soundtrack for Think Like A Man Too had her collaborating with the likes of The-Dream and Rodney Jerkins, and it was a much better record than its lack of promotion let on. Jerkins subsequently decided to hook Blige up with the next generation on the new album The London Sessions, which features writing and production credits from Brits like Disclosure, Emeli Sandé and Naughty Boy; last night she performed the Sam Smith-penned Therapy, and while its subtleties were a bit lost in the TV mix, it was one of the night’s most compelling performances, thanks to Blige’s steely cool and undeniable pipes.
3. Lorde
The soundtrack for Mockingjay: Part 1, this weekend’s blockbuster offering based on the third Hunger Games novel, was put together by New Zealand’s biggest musical export since Split Enz, and she celebrated by performing her claustrophobic single Yellow Flicker Beat from that album. She opened the song while trapped in a box, and the effect worked; the “held against my will in an institution” conceit might be an old one when it comes to pop performances that try to imply cramped mental states, but the way she sold it, from her wild thrashing about to the way she whipped her hair while surrounded by zombified fellow patients, made it a triumph.
4. The return of boy bands
5 Seconds Of Summer could have probably dug deeper into the Potential Covers pile than the Romantics’ power-pop workhorse What I Like About You, and One Direction’s performance was oddly inert. But the crowd’s reaction to even a mention of either of these acts brought to mind the old days when pop stars could move mountains, or at least more than 100,000 records in a week. (One wonders what New Kids On The Block’s reformed bad-boy Donnie Wahlberg, who presented 1D with the Favorite Pop/Rock Album, had to say to 1D rapscallion Harry Styles backstage.)
5. Pitbull
This is going to be a big week for Mr Worldwide – his eighth studio album Globalization is out this week, and he’s the halftime performer on Thanksgiving Day’s Eagles-Cowboys tilt. He kicked off his media blitz in style, giving copious props to the Latino audience and helping things run relatively smoothly while being down-to-earth enough to laugh at the jokes written for him and acknowledge his teleprompter mishaps – a nice change from the pit of smarmy stuffiness that other awards-show MCs can sometimes fall into. He performed, too, and his bringing out the silk-voiced Ne-Yo for his upbeat Globalization track Time Of Our Lives was welcome on a night starved for R&B stars.
FIVE FLOPS
1. Imagine Dragons
Every generation gets the Puddle Of Mudd it deserves, and these hoary Nevadans fit that bill for the 2010s. Their nu-metal petulance and grinding-gears songs, topped off by a watered-down-enough-to-seem-cynical bite of Arcade Fire’s group-hug exuberance, might be one of the worst things about music right now, and that’s saying a lot.
2. Iggy Azalea
Much has been written about Iggy Azalea, the Australian-born MC whose declaration that “first things first, [she’s] the realest” on her massive summer hit Fancy was one of this year’s hottest topics of pop debate. Her imported-from-the-South drawl, the arguments over her lyrics’ authorship ... maybe not all of that would have been moot if she had sailed through her performances on Sunday night, but there would have been an “at least this” to point to in order to semi-settle the debates.
But watching her pair of performances felt like watching someone who was trying to steady herself on a tightrope in a particularly blustery wind; it didn’t help that TI felt moved to ham-handedly come to her defense, or that Beg For It the second half of her first performance, can’t hold a candle to Fancy, pop-song wise. And the much-ballyhooed duet of Booty, her ass-saluting Jennifer Lopez collaboration that has so far not really caught fire in the US despite the prevalence of booty in its attendant video, was an inevitable letdown, although Lopez’s dancing at the end at least closed out the show on a semi-triumphant note.
3. Taylor Swift’s infomercial
America’s best-selling pop star’s performance of her new single Blank Space – which played off the video’s conceit of Swift using her fame and fortune to torture her ex-paramours – was cute enough, and her Dick Clark Lifetime Achievement Award acceptance, during which she continued her anti-Spotify crusade by shouting out “the fans who went out and bought over a million copies of my last three albums … [who are] saying you believe in the same thing I believe in – that music is valuable and that music should be consumed in albums and albums should be consumed as art and appreciated,” was fine, if a bit too wide-eyed for someone who’s been dominating awards shows for nearly a decade now.
But the video package that preceded her receipt of that brand new honorific was so over-the-top that it was hard to not wonder if 1989 was actually a part of a self-doxxing that would precede her eventual running for higher office, or starting up a religion. Look! There’s Taylor Swift being famous and relatable. Look! There’s Taylor inviting fans to her house. Look! There’s Taylor surprising a fan at home. When combined with her opening the telecast and mugging to the camera constantly while the directors’ go-to girl for reaction shots, it became a bit much. Sure, she’s saving the music business’s bacon right now, but its problems stem at least in part from an overreliance on superstars at the expense of anyone else.
4. Why so serious?
Why did One Direction, whose charm is at its brightest when they’re goofing around onstage to smartly apportioned pop songs, choose to sing the mournful Night Changes while standing stock-still? Why did Sam Smith’s I’m Not The Only One bring to mind John Mayer’s Waiting For the World to Change, and not in a good way? Why did Nicki Minaj attempt to summon the ghost of the Linkin Park project Fort Minor with her somber, Skylar Grey-assisted breakup single Bed Of Lies? It’s understandable that artists want to be seen as serious, but there has to be a mix between “artistry” and “making interesting television.”
Ariana Grande’s smooth-jazz reworkings of her two hugest hits from 2014 (Problem and Break Free) worked slightly better than the aforementioned performances, if only because the former’s sax skronk lends itself to a much gentler reworking. But in a climate where events like the American Music Awards might be the biggest opportunity to let the public know that albums are available for purchase if not now, then eventually, the songs need to hit big – and unfortunately most of the night’s more somber choices didn’t have the oomph of Blige’s performance.
5. MAGIC!
Rude, the formerly inescapable hit by the Canadian reggae-lite outfit MAGIC!, reared its head, and the overall effect was not dissimilar to that of a text from a sorta-dim, but enjoyable in the moment summer fling whose presence was better suited to the year’s hotter months. Why did the American Music Awards producers have to be so rude when Meghan Trainor, whose All About That Bass is just as annoying but at least relatively current, sat in the audience?
