The 2011 VMAs: A history in the making

The 2011 MTV Video Music Awards seemed positively different in comparison to previous years.  Spectacular performances, tributes, and no official host at the award show had Twitter buzzing trending topics and tweets. The 2011 VMAs broke a record by raking up the biggest audience in MTV history, with 12.4 million viewers, according to an article on MTV’s online edition.

We have become used to watching the VMAs being hosted by familiar faces, but MTV decided to go without a host this year, which sparked some concerns. The show turned out more polished and had a more sophisticated aura without too many dirty jokes and random awkward nonsense taking over as it had in the past shows. This year’s VMAs turned out pretty well and the night had many interesting segments to focus on.

Lady Gaga, who is famous for creating headlines during public events, opened the show dressed as her male alter ego Jo Calderone. Although something more outrageous was expected from her, Lady Gaga settled for the male look throughout the show, without any wardrobe changes, and managed to steal the spotlight throughout the night.

The shocker of the award show went to Beyonce Knowles, who announced her pregnancy on the “black carpet,” and confirmed it by rubbing her belly while performing “Love on Top” from her latest album “4.”.

Although Chris Brown was banned from performing at previous shows, following his guilty assault chargers to former girlfriend and singer Rihanna, many people called his performance “epic.” Dressed in white, Brown and his dancers put on an energetic show while performing his hit singles “Yeah 3x” and “Beautiful People.” Brown also used songs from Nirvana and Wu-Tang Clan in his performance. With high tempo dance moves and a flying stunt above the crowd, Brown’s performance will go down as one of his best to date.

Lady Gaga introduced Britney Spears as the recipient of the Michael Jackson Vanguard Award and was followed by dancers who, dressed in Spears’ many infamous outfits, rocked the stage to some of her biggest hits. What was interesting about Spears’ acceptance speech was that she kept it simple and short focusing more on introducing Beyonce’s next performance rather than her own tribute. For an artist who has been in the industry for over a decade and has made a big impact in the pop music industry, it was rather baffling to see her cut her speech short to focus on introducing another artist. She was either nervous or not very thrilled over the award and tribute she received. Either way, it gave the audience something to talk about and, of course, tweet about.

This year’s VMAs definitely stood out with the changes MTV made. The show was interesting, had some great performances, and gave us much to tweet about. Perhaps now that MTV knows the show pulled in the highest viewership in the history of MTV, they will concentrate on bringing back the power of music videos on their network.