2006 VMA Recap

On Thursday, MTV had its much anticipated 2006 Video Music Awards. And I must say that I came away with a feeling of mixed emotions… Everyone knows that the VMAs aren’t your typical awards show. Some of the most shocking music moments have happened on this show… Michael Jackson & Lisa Marie Presley’s revolting and obviously fake kiss seen round the world… Prince in his assless pants… Diana Ross cupping Lil’ Kim’s pasty covered boob… Madonna, Christina & Britney’s makeout session… Those are the kinds of shocking moments that we’ve come to expect. But without anything happening this year, the VMAs left a lot to be desired and little to talk about at the water cooler at work.

Let’s start off with the host, Jack Black… Now, he’s funny in his own quirky way. But he just did not shine as the host of this show. I can honestly say I didn’t laugh out loud once. Not even close. And didn’t he just host the Nickelodeon awards?

This year they tried to find a way to get presenters to the stage faster with out pulling an Oscar (having people do their acceptance speeches from their seats). So, they had mini bleachers connected to the stage. In theory this was a good idea, but I can’t count how many times we accidentally saw the staging crew shuffling the nominees for each category in and out of those seats.

Now, this is the Video Music Awards, but I’ve always felt that the viewers and sometimes the decision committee lose sight of this. Many times artists win awards because it was the song that made the video. You can have an okay video for a great song and still win an award. (which totally defeats the purpose of having a separate award show for just videos)

But the awards did bring some interesting moments during the night. I was already yelling “That’s a hot mess!” at the TV at the beginning of the show. The category: Best Dance Video. Nominees that I thought should have won over the winner: Shakira for “Hips Don’t Lie” and Sean Paul for “Temperature”. And who, you ask, was the winner? The Pussycat Dolls for “Buttons”! Right, like I said, a hot mess. Even Snoop Dogg didn’t look too excited when they won. They’re not even a real music group for goodness sake! (And don’t they change members like Menudo or something?) As if that wasn’t enough, one of the dolls was reading the acceptance speech from an absent member from her two-way.

I was cracking up when the award for best pop video was given out. My girl Pink won for “Stupid Girl” which is a hilarious video that directly pokes fun at Jessica Simpson and Paris Hilton. Ironically, the presenters of this award were none other than Nick Lachey and Nicole Richie.

H-town was definitely represented at the awards. Beyonce, featuring Slim Thug and Bun B, won best R&B video for “Check Up On It”. And to my surprise, Chamillionaire’s “Ridin” beat out Kanye West’s Gold Digger for best male rap video. One of the other two big upsets of the night also involved Kanye. Gold Digger was beat out for best hip hop video by the Black Eyed Peas for “My Humps”! More power to The Peas!

But everyone knows that any MTV award show isn’t about the awards. It’s about the performances. And those were definitely not lacking that night. There was just one great performance after another… Justin Timberlake and Timbaland kicked it off by bringing “Sexy Back”. (And I must say that his live performance sounded better than the version he did in the studio.)

Going along with the toned down theme of the show, Christina Aguilera performed a beautiful ballad instead of her current body poppin’ hit “Ain’t No Other Man”, which kind of surprised me. But, I’m always happy to see a pure vocal performance from X-tina because that girl can sang! The night also included great performances from Beyonce, T.I., and even some vintage Busta Rymes (Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See) and Missy Elliot (The Rain - Supa Dupa Fly) during the tribute to video director Hype Williams. Everyone’s vocals were definitely on point! But I must say that the coolest performance was by OK Go (click here to view the performance).

So, the performances were hot and the show production was not. And that’s how the 2006 VMAs went down.