Billboard Music Awards 2013 / ABC television, Sunday night, May 19th
8:00 pm – I can’t decide if Bruno Mars wants to be Michael Jackson, Prince or The Time, but he winds up coming off more like The Osmond Brothers, soul-wise, something I’m virtually certain he couldn’t have intended.
8:09 pm – Shania Twain presents the Best Rap Artist to Nicki Minaj, who, I believe, just lost her job on American Idol, so maybe the Billboards Music Award serves as some kind of unemployment compensation. (Why is Shania Twain presenting a rap award? And where is Mutt Lange when we need him?)
8:15 pm – Selena Gomez seems to be going for an Indian sub-continent Bollywood vibe in her performance; apparently mixing up where Guadalajara, or even California, or even America, are on a globe.
8:19 pm – Country sibling trio The Band Perry (who I always think are Steve Perry of Journey’s kids until my friend Kyle Garabadian tells me they’re not) distinguish themselves as the first musical act of the night to (ostensibly) actually play musical instruments. (Maybe, maybe they’re playing instruments; everything sounds awfully perfect, no pun intended.) Lead singer Kimberly seems to be channeling Stevie Nicks, or perhaps she believes she is Stevie Nicks. I heavily suspect lip-synching, as, by the end of the song after a percussion finale, all three members of the band are huffing like a two-pack-a-day-unfiltered-Camels-addict on a smoke break out behind Steak & Shake, yet nobody has any trouble catching their breath to sing.
8:37 pm – I throw up my dinner during Chris Brown’s dance routine that masquerades as a song, and decide to go for a walk to clear my head, hoping I don’t miss Prince or Taylor Swift, the only two acts I really want to see.
9:08 pm – Singer/songwriter Kacey Musgraves seems to have beamed in her backing band from a Waycross honky-tonk in the 1970’s, and I find myself oddly yearning for Vicki Lawrence belting out “The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia.”
9:13-9:15 pm – The video montage to introduce Madonna’s Top Touring Artist Billboard Music Award is fully two minutes shorter than her acceptance speech (9:15-9:20 pm). Will I. Am has to help Madonna down the four steps on the stage to the microphone. You’re all waiting for an osteoporosis/broken hip joke here, but you’re not going to get one from me.
9:21 pm – Justin Bieber emerges for his big dance number from a pod EXACTLY like the one in Spinal Tap, except his opens at the correct time. Bieber is auto-tuned from here to the International Space Station and I can only wish he was that high.
9:31 pm – Adele’s 21 album, which was released in 2011(!), is one of five records up for top-selling album in 2013. Sad times for the music industry. Taylor Swift wins the award, and I’m gratified that Kanye West doesn’t grab it away from her.
9:34 pm – Pitbull & Christina Aguilera appear together, my cue to hit the kitchen and make myself a banana split.
9:41 pm – A commercial for ABC-TV’s “Dancing With The Stars” informs me that Korean pop-phenom Psy will be guesting on the Monday night finale. My sister is 67 years old. “Dancing With The Stars” is her favorite TV program. Enough said, insert your own South or North Korean joke here.
9:56 pm – Taylor Swift opening act & buddy Ed Sheeran comes on all acoustic guitar earnest & weepy and accomplishes the nearly impossible feat of actually almost making me wish for a Mumford & Sons appearance. (I stress “almost.”)
10:13 pm – David Guetta, a dance-music DJ and reputed French person, wins an award and – as an American from the West Side of Columbus, Ohio – I find myself as threatened as those Tea Party guys find President Obama’s presidency. As such, I am forced to turn off the Billboard Music Awards and pop in a DVD of News Radio that I got out of the Westerville Library. Thus ends my blog review of the 2013 Billboard Music Awards. (And I never even got to see Prince or Taylor Swift.) (But then again, I’ll just punch ‘em up tomorrow on YouTube. And isn’t that how computers have rendered TV obsolete?)
Ricki C. is a cranky 60-year old music guy who believes that rock & roll peaked somewhere around 1973 and hasn’t actually liked any songs recorded in the 21st century. (Except for The Strokes first album and a bunch of Jack White.) Feel free to check out his Growing Old With Rock & Roll blog at your leisure.)