The B.E.T Awards 2010

Last night the B.E.T Awards aired, and as usual, the show only had a few moments of glory. I did not see the whole show, but rather only the performances. So here is my take on them:

Drake & Young Jeezy- I like Drake. His songs are catchy and he usually comes off very passionate about what he raps and sings. His performance was simple; no hype men and no over-the-top pyrotechnics. It was just him, his band, and the visuals on the screens behind him. I can say I liked his performance. This was mostly because you could feel how much he was enjoying the moment. I am no fan of Young Jeezy so I may be biased, however I really do think he added nothing to the performance and his presence was pointless.

Alicia Keys- Yes Alicia Keys is a wonderful singer, but I have never been a fan of her performances. I have watched every B.E.T Award show and I am never impressed with her . For a person who sings ballads, I know not to expect much, however, her performances fall flat and at last night's show it was no different. I also did not see the point in her performing a medley of her past hits. she has a new album out, why take us back? In the process of taking us through her hits, she also reminded us through a video montage, of which of them reached number one on the billboard charts. Something I also thought was unnecessary and a waste of camera time.

Eminem, B.O.B. & Keyshia Cole- These three performed B.O.B's song 'Airplanes', which has become a favorite of mine. However, Keyshia Cole sang what was originally Haley Williams' (Lead singer of Paramore) part, because I assume she couldn't be there herself. As strong a voice as Keyshia has, I often think she lacks vocal control. She always crosses that line between strong and powerful, and yelling and clumsy. If Haley couldn't be there in person, they should have just played her vocals in the background. I honestly think she was the low point of the performance. B.O.B however brought the passion you hear on the song, to the stage, which was great. Another high part of the performance was Eminem's appearance, one in which you could hear the audience was glad for. Not only did he sing his verse to the song 'Airplanes' but then sang his own song, 'Not Afraid'. As with B.O.B, he brought his passion, which was enough to have the audience singing along and bobbing their heads.

Dirty Money- This group comprises simply of Diddy and who I consider to be his back up singers. I believe this is just another another money making endeavor and he could care less about the talent of those two young ladies. I know pyrotechnics can make a performance more exciting, but his performance had too much and the dancers and his 'backup singers' got lost in it. Also, when I saw the amount of fireworks I thought of the 4th of July. I do not like the song and for a song which in itself is weak, the performance was too over the top.


Ludacris, “All I Do Is Win Remix”- I liked the beginning of his performance with the women and the violins, after that it became like any other hip hop performance. Busta Rhymes,DJ Khaled, Diddy and others came out to perform 'All I do is Win'. Nothing much to say about it other than it really had an impact on the crowd, but none on me. One part of the performance that had me truly baffled was Busta Rhymes' verse. For most of it he sounded like a rambling fool, where nothing could be understood.


Nicky Minaj- She appeared three times during the show, each time wearing a different outfit and wig. I really do not get what her appeal is. Her over the top antics can be considered entertaining to some, but what i could not understand was why she was lip syncing. She is a rapper and it was not as if she were dancing and doing anything strenuous that could have warranted lip syncing. Overall I believe, that for a person who so many people were looking forward to seeing, she gave an half assed performance.

Lastly....

Chris Brown- Chris Brown made his return to the stage to pay tribute to Michael Jackson. The first part of the tribute was purely dancing. While his skills are impressive, I really did not see why twitter was a-buzz about how "spectacular" his performance was. The performance was good yes, but we all knew that he could dance and he's been copying Michael Jackson since he came out, so I do not see the need for all of this chatter. Chris got his chance to show off his limited but usually satisfactory vocals to sing 'Man in the mirror', but broke down crying. People think its because of how much he respected MJ and probably how honored he was to have been asked to do it. However, I think its because he probably felt like he was vindicated and that due to the response from the crowd, he had been forgiven for what took place last year. Regardless of the reason, I felt he had another moment to shine and he let it slip away. But from what I can see from people's reactions, he's probably headed in the right direction to having a buzz worthy career again. For me however, it will take more than dancing and waterworks to care about his music again.