My husband Bill and I had a pretty tame New Year’s Eve. We sat at home, listened to music, and when it got close to midnight, watched the fireworks set off by Germans. I am usually ready for the holidays to be over by January 2 and this year is no exception. Had we been stateside for New Year’s, I’m sure I would have tried to stay up to watch Elton John’s performance on Dick Clark’s Rockin’ New Year’s Eve. As it was, we were mostly entertained by old Van Morrison albums.
Elton John sings “I’m Still Standing” on New Year’s Eve 2014.
Looks like Elton still has it. I would have liked to have seen this, but at least there’s YouTube.
I see Taylor Swift was also in attendance.
And so was Meghan Trainor, who’s “All About the Bass”.
Fergie was also at the party to sing “L.A. Love”. This music makes me feel ancient.
I hope everyone had a great New Year’s Eve celebration and a tranquil New Year’s Day. I am hoping for a lot of fun travel in 2015 and, perhaps, the discovery of some new music. I’ve had good luck with street musicians in Europe. Next week, I hope to have something more substantial to post. For now, I think I need to sit around and listen to more music.
This morning, I saw a YouTube video that totally inspired me to write about cringeworthy musical moments on classic TV…
Forgive me. I’m having issues coming up with a good topic today. When this happens, I often turn to YouTube for inspiration. The very first thing I found was a classic video from 1978.
Here’s William Shatner performing “Rocket Man” while smoking a cigarette and backed up with a disco version of Elton John’s and Bernie Taupin’s classic song.
Some people claim this video is unwatchable, but I find it strangely fascinating. I sit here and wonder what possessed someone to ask William Shatner to act out this song. On the other hand, it’s kind of hilarious, especially when he gets all boogiefied with his bow tie undone. Bizarre and definitely cringeworthy.
Never one to pass up an opportunity to be cringeworthy, Donny Osmond also makes this post when he sings this truly horrifying cover of “Johnny Be Good”. He’s changed up the lyrics, though, to honor the then nearly elected U.S. President, Ronald Reagan.
This is godawful. I notice that no one in the audience seems to get into this number. Is it just because they’re straight-laced Republicans? Or is it because this number is truly cringeworthy?
Marie Osmond does her best to rally the crowd, but it all kind of falls into a cheesy kind of hell. I like the guy sitting behind Reagan, who looks like he might need to pull the underwear out of the crack of his ass.
In 1975, the late country singer Charlie Rich showed up for the 1975 Country Music Association awards completely bombed out of his mind. Watch how he presents the Entertainer of the Year award…
I like how Glen Campbell introduces Charlie Rich while holding a lit cigarette. Everybody smoked in the 70s, didn’t they?
And because everybody smoked, Mr. Rich had a cigarette lighter with him, which he used to light John Denver’s winning ballot on fire. I’ve read that poor Charlie’s career suffered due to that little stunt. I also love the way Glen Campbell looks nervously at the camera… which immediately reminds me of this scene from 2005.
I remember watching this live in 2005 when Kanye West went off script…
Poor Mike Myers looks like he wants to just fall through the floor. Bless his heart. Totally cringeworthy, although I can understand why many people were fine with what Kanye West said.
Kanye West was also at the forefront of cringeworthy at the 2009 MTV awards, when he totally dissed poor Taylor Swift, who was just trying to graciously accept an award…
I’m not a Taylor Swift fan, but I thought she handled this fairly gracefully. If I were her, I’d be itching to kick Kanye in the cojones.
Here’s a relatively mild clip from the ACM awards from 2003. Vince Gill presents an award to Toby Keith…
If you recall, Toby’s name was referenced on a t-shirt worn by a certain Dixie Chick.
Maybe not as cringeworthy as Kanye’s antics, but I do like the way Vince and Reba banter back and forth.
And finally, here’s a clip from 1993 starring RuPaul and Milton Berle…
I don’t remember when this happened… but dayum! Definitely cringeworthy. I think RuPaul won that round, too.
I’m hoping to get out this weekend and find some fresh inspiration for my music posts. For now, I hope your weekend isn’t cringeworthy and you don’t spend it watching TV.
Via Creative CommonsThe Thursday elimination show is now one of the weirdest on television.
Because the popularity rankings are now the most important part of the show (and I’m not sure why), they sped through the eliminations. Yes, I said eliminations. They did two of them. I find it a bit unfair to do two eliminations, which unless I simply wasn’t paying attention on Wednesday, were unannounced. And it shows a major flaw when they do double eliminations.
What makes the X Factor different from American Idol (and I don’t watch The Voice, so I have no idea what they do) is that rather than eliminating by true popular (or non-popular) vote, they take the two least vote getters and have them sing off. The mentors get to choose who they’d like to eliminate. I think it works well generally.
But instead, since they had to eliminate two acts, they allowed the popular vote to completely eliminate the first act. The act that received the least amount of votes just went home at the start of the show without a chance to sing (or rap) for their lives. Yet, the acts that finished second and third least popular were able to sing for their lives and the mentors chose who stayed on the show. Lyric 145, while I wasn’t a huge fan, you got did and did hard. It was completely unfair.
By the way, I predicted that Lyric 145 may have hurt themselves because of what I perceived as rudeness from Lyric Da Queen on Wednesday. I’m still not sure what happened on Wednesday, but they were unfairly treated on Thursday.
So what happened?
After Lyric 145 were rudely sent home, there were two more acts that needed to be put up to get chopped down. When it was announced that Cece Fray was safe, she couldn’t believe it and was in the middle of laughing and crying. Demi was so happy for her.
In the midst of all this, Taylor Swift performed State Of Grace. I know this is the new single, but I so badly wanted to hear We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together for the one-millionth time.
(By the way, I’m still waiting for someone to blend Outkast’s Ms. Jackson with Swift’s song so when Taylor sings, “We! Are never, ever, getting back, together,” Andre 3000 can then come in with, “Never ever, ever ever?” That would be golden.)
The elimination came down to Paige, Jennel, and Fifth Harmony. I think they just did that to screw with Simon. There was no way Fifth Harmony was going home. Both performances were bland, but Jennel’s was much more bland. She performed The Reason and tried to add some showy vocals, but it didn’t work. And then Paige performed Paradise which didn’t set the world on fire either.
But there was a difference in performances. Jennel looked really scared and beaten while Paige had some stage presence and always gives off a look of a diva in dispair. I think voters will get tired of that look down the line, but it works for her now. She cares and cares a lot.
Who went home?
Out of the two, I think America got it right. Jennel needs some seasoning. Her vocals are really good and better than Paige’s, but she’s missing something. Paige stayed and Jennel went home.
There was an odd ending to the elimination though. I think Simon was just pulling rank, but after LA and Britney chose Jennel for their elimination pick, it was Simon’s turn. If he was to vote out Jennel, Demi wouldn’t have to say anything. But if he chose Paige, Demi would have to pick. He threw a stubborn fit and didn’t want to give out his selection before Demi. And as it turned out, there was no need for Demi to have said anything because Demi chose Paige to go home and Simon then chose Jennel. So he did it just to make Demi have to play bad guy with one of the acts that she’s been mentoring all season? Dick move, Cowell, dick move.
What was the voting order?
1. Tate Stevens
2. Carly Rose Sonenclar
3. Vino Alan
4. Emblem3 (+2)
5. CeCe Frey (+7)
6. Fifth Harmony (-1)
7. Diamond White (-3)
8. Beatrice Miller (+2)
9. Arin Ray (+2)
10. Paige Thomas
What does it all mean?
The top three stayed exactly the same. People love them some old dudes. And Carly Rose’s voice is connecting with fans even though it doesn’t seem her personality is, but maybe that is connecting too. CeCe Fray makes the huge jump which has to be the pity vote because I thought she was terrible again on Wednesday. And Diamond White takes the biggest fall, which means Britney may have to stop putting her out there to do what is pretty much the same song over and over again.
Seacrest out! Whoops. Mario Lopez out! Or, how about this one? Khloe Kardashian Odom out!
