Wednesday night’s MTV Video Music Awards marked the show’s 40th anniversary, and much of the festivities strived for déjà vu by honoring memorable performances and moments from shows past. Montages of “V.M.A. flashbacks” like Michael Jackson heartily kissing Lisa Marie Presley, Madonna writhing through “Like a Virgin,” and Eminem storming the building with a regiment of bleached look-alikes peppered the telecast.
This year’s show paid homage to those events too, sometimes explicitly. Eminem, for instance, opened the show performing his latest single, “Houdini,” alongside an army costumed to look like him, with dark beards underneath blond wigs that referenced the old days. The host Megan Thee Stallion donned an outfit that nodded to the silky green top Britney Spears wore in 2001 to perform “I’m a Slave 4 U,” and sported a yellow boa constrictor to boot — though Megan’s genuine discomfort with the creature worked to comedic effect.
The V.M.A.s are forever looking to inaugurate new stars to take up the mantle of the classic music-video era icons. This year’s class, including Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan, Tyla and Rauw Alejandro stood out amid the throwback references. Katy Perry bridged the gap between eras, and Taylor Swift did what she does best at award shows — dance zealously to other artists and collect hardware. Here are the highlights.
Shawn Mendes returned to the stage with new music.
The last time Shawn Mendes was on the V.M.A. stage, it was 2021 and he was performing “Summer of Love” with Tainy. He’d last released an album, “Wonder,” in 2020 but later postponed a 2022 tour to focus on his mental health.
Wednesday Mendes returned to the stage to perform an acoustic and stripped-down new single, “Nobody Knows,” from his upcoming album “Shawn,” expected to release in October. Fans on social media speculated that the song contained a reference to his ex-girlfriend and fellow V.M.A. performer, Camila Cabello. In the song, Mendes sings, “When the bottle is open, anything can happen/flying too close to the sun”; Cabello’s Instagram bio reads, “long, thick black hair turned white from flying too close to the sun.” — SHIVANI GONZALEZ
Sabrina Carpenter just had fun leaning into the moon man aesthetic.
Sabrina Carpenter, who performed at the award show for the second year in a row, embraced all things space and extraterrestrial, seemingly a nod to the moon man trophies awarded to winners.
She was introduced by Cyndi Lauper, who won the award for best female video for “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” at the first V.M.A. 40 years ago. Underscoring that enduring truism, Lauper praised Carpenter’s use of the word “mother[expletive],” in her hit song “Please, Please, Please.” Carpenter performed it in a mash-up with “Taste” and “Espresso,” hits from her recent album “Short n’ Sweet.” Carpenter kissed an alien, danced with a moon man and led a group of astronauts through a choreographed dance in a set that was pure celestial play. And the inspiration seemingly paid off — later in the night, she took home her first moon man when “Espresso” won song of the year. — GONZALEZ
Katy Perry was at her campy, chart-topping best.
Katy Perry accepted her Video Vanguard award after running through a sterling medley of hits including “Teenage Dream,” “I Kissed a Girl,” and “Firework”— and she did it on her period, as she announced to the audience, still sweating. While introducing Perry, her husband Orlando Bloom remarked on her particular sense of humor, a cartoonish kind of camp that left an indelible mark across 21st-century pop music. (Her whipped cream bra, worn in the 2010 video for “California Gurls,” is a defining image of the era.) At her best, her singles were exuberant and unafraid to be silly (“Do you ever feel like a plastic bag?” — do you? Have you?), and her Vanguard performance was Perry at her best.
Opening with enough wire work to fill a martial arts movie, Perry moved powerfully through her highlights, while also sprinkling in newer singles — including “I’m His, He’s Mine” with Doechii, scheduled for release Friday — without ever letting the audience dwell on any of her missteps. Ahead of her upcoming album, Perry has taken a critical drubbing for appearing out of step with contemporary music. But she performed like her career depended on it Wednesday night, and in accepting the award, she pointedly reflected on her past, saying, “There are no decade-long accidents.” She acknowledged her early days, citing a “repossessed Jetta” and the “bygone places” like Myspace and the Warped Tour, that had given her a foothold in the industry. Then she plugged the Sept. 20 release date for her upcoming album, “143.” She had earned the moment. — ROSS SCARANO
Chappell Roan brought the fire — and warmed hearts.
In her first V.M.A. performance, Chappell Roan channeled medieval marauding, performing “Good Luck, Babe!” in full body armor alongside dancing knights and in front of a castle that seemed set ablaze.
That’s wasn’t the only fiery moment. On the red carpet before the show, Roan responded to a photographer who appeared to have told her to “shut up,” wedging an expletive in the directive as Roan was getting ready to pose for cameras. “You shut the [expletive] up,” she retorted.
Later, she accepted the award for best new artist wearing a chain mail dress and dedicated the honor to the drag artists who inspire her, “queer and trans people that fuel pop” and “the gays who dedicate my songs to the people who they love or hate.”
Roan, who hails from Willard, Missouri, ended the speech with a shout-out: “For all the queer kids watching right now in the Midwest, I see you, I understand you because I’m one of you. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t be exactly who you want to be,” punctuating it with a final expletive. — GONZALEZ
Tyla made a distinction.
No doubt the Video Music Awards had good intentions when the Afrobeats category was added in 2022, recognizing the global impact of African pop. Only one problem: Afrobeats isn’t synonymous with African pop. It’s the name of a particular beat from Nigeria, and it’s as specific a term as reggae or samba. That called for diplomacy from the category’s winner this year: Tyla, who had a worldwide hit with “Water.”
Tyla is from South Africa; the beat of “Water” is amapiano, a South African style, not Afrobeats. She savored the award, saying it showed “African music can be pop music, too.” But she went on to offer a gentle lesson. “This is just so special, but also bittersweet because I know there’s a tendency to group all African artists under Afrobeats,” she said. “It’s a thing. And even though Afrobeats has run things and has opened so many doors for us, African music is so diverse. It’s more than just Afrobeats. I come from South Africa, I represent Amapiano. I represent my culture.” She smiled through it, but her point was clear. — JON PARELES
LL Cool J is still hard as hell.
Hip-hop lovers may have worried that last year’s celebration of the genre’s 50th anniversary might be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to honor the greats. LL Cool J’s muscular set, featuring his Def Jam label mates Public Enemy, dispelled any such notion. LL Cool J made hit singles in three decades, including the mid-80s, when the genre was still considered a fad. Last week, released his latest album, “The Force,” — no dusty museum installation.
On Wednesday, he strutted through a medley that was confident, muscular, droll, proud, romantic and raunchy, while MTV had equipped the fans in the front rows with coordinated hats and signs fit for a political convention. — SCARANO
Taylor Swift set a V.M.A. record and reminded viewers to vote.
The chants of “Tay-lor” turned UBS Arena, where the V.M.A. were held, into a grand pep rally as Swift collected the award for Video of the Year alongside Post Malone, who was featured on “Fortnight.” She has now bested Beyoncé for most awarded solo artist, with 30, though Swift did not use her speech to note the occasion. (Beyoncé has 25 awards for her solo work; 30 in total.) Rather, she thanked her collaborators and gave a special shout-out to one in particular. “This video seems very sad when you watch it but it was actually the most fun video to make,” she said. “Something that I’ll always remember is that when I would finish a take and I would say cut, I’d always just hear someone cheering.” It was her boyfriend, Travis Kelce. “Everything this man touches turns to happiness and fun and magic.”
She wrapped her speech with a reminder to register to vote in the upcoming presidential election, coming a day after she endorsed Kamala Harris. — SCARANO
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