2013 Grammys – full list of winners

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Record Of The Year

  • Somebody That I Used to Know – Gotye Featuring Kimbra

Album Of The Year

  • Babel – Mumford & Sons

Song Of The Year

  • We Are Young – Jack Antonoff, Jeff Bhasker, Andrew Dost & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe)

Best New Artist

  • Fun.

Best Pop Solo Performance

  • Set Fire To The Rain [live] – Adele

Best Pop Duo/Group Performance

Somebody That I Used To Know – Gotye Featuring Kimbra

Best Pop Instrumental Album

  • Impressions – Chris Botti

Best Pop Vocal Album

  • Stronger – Kelly Clarkson

Best Dance Recording

  • Bangarang – Skrillex Featuring Sirah

Best Dance/Electronica Album

  • Bangarang – Skrillex

 

Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album

  • Kisses On The Bottom – Paul Mccartney

 

Best Rock Performance

  • Lonely Boy – The Black Keys

Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance

  • Love Bites (So Do I) – Halestorm

Best Rock Song

  • Lonely Boy – Dan Auerbach, Brian Burton & Patrick Carney, songwriters (the Black Keys)

Best Rock Album

  • El Camino – The Black Keys

Best Alternative Music Album

  • Making Mirrors – Gotye

 

Best R&B Performance

  • Climax – Usher

Best Traditional R&B Performance

  • Love On Top – Beyoncé

Best R&B Song

  • Adorn – Miguel Pimentel, songwriter (Miguel)

Best Urban Contemporary Album

  • Channel Orange – Frank Ocean

Best R&B Album

  • Black Radio – Robert Glasper Experiment

Best Rap Performance

  • … In Paris – Jay-z & Kanye West

Best Rap/Sung Collaboration

  • No Church In The Wild – Jay-z & Kanye West featuring Frank Ocean & The-dream

Best Rap Song

  • … In Paris – Shawn Carter, Mike Dean, Chauncey Hollis & Kanye West, Songwriters (W.A. Donaldson, songwriter) (Jay-Z & Kanye West)

Best Rap Album

  • Take Care – Drake

Best Country Solo Performance

  • Blown Away – Carrie Underwood

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Grammys 2013 – blow by blow

Katy-Perry-Grammys-2013-Pictures

The 55th annual Grammy Awards are here. Here are some of the highlights from this year’s awards out of Staples Center in Los Angeles.

Red carpet:

Black was the order of the day apparently. Kelly Rowland, Faith Hill and Tim McGraw, the guys from Maroon 5 and Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters were all keeping it tame in red. Someone who also took to wearing black was Jennifer Lopez, but she wasn’t keeping it too conservative. Last year Angelina Jolie showed a lot of leg at the Oscars and tonight it’s the chance of JLo, who looks amazing.

I think a lot of people were a bit taken aback when Beyonce arrived in her pants suit. She looks fantastic though. Can she do any wrong? Katy Perry and Rihanna brought some colour to the carpet. Katy was in a mint green dress while Rihanna was rocking royal red. Trust them to bring some life to the carpet ;)

The Awards:

Taylor Swift opens the show with “We’re never getting back together”. She took a stab at her apparent ex, Harry Stylez with a British accent. “I still love you and I’m like I’m opening the Grammys”.

Host, LL Cool J is back. He is blabbering on about origins of music and where some of our favourite artists hail from. B from Houston, Adele from the UK… Rih from Barbados. “The show is ours. All of ours. So are you ready for your show? Are you ready for your show? Let’s get back to the music,” your words LL.

Second performance up tonight is from Ed Sheeran and Elton John. They performed Sheeran’s Angels To Fly song. It was cool – just cool.

Pitbull and Jennifer opez are up to present the first award of the night for the Best Pop Solo Performance Award. Pitbull says to JLo, “You inspire the memo” before handing out the award to Adele for Set Fire to the Rain. “My good luck charm, Jlo. Thank you so much. I want to say thank you and big love to the other girls. See you later, have a wonderful night.”

Neil Patrick Harris introduces fun. I’ll be honest, I though their performance was also just okay. Nothing spectacular.

Bonnie Raitt and John Mayer welcome two of country music’s biggest stars to the stage Dierks Bentley and Miranda Lambert.

Dick Clark is remembered at the Grammys. LL says, “He is missed”. He then introduces Miguel and Wiz Khalifa. Miguel is singing his now Grammy winning song, Adorn alongside Wiz. The brother has pipes and Wiz is just kinda there. Miguel won for Best R&B Song. They’re now presenting the Best Country Solo performance award, which goes to Carrie Underwood. “Thank you. Country music has always been so good to me and I thank the good Lord. My family, my amazing perfect husband Mike. Glory to God, thank you so much.”

The Song of the Year Award is presented by Faith Hill and Tim McGraw. That award goes to Fun for their song We Are Young. “Um, I don’t know what I was thinking writing this song. This is in HD, everyone can see our faces and we are not very young. We have been doing this for twelve years. To our families, we love you guys. I want to thank Jay-Z, Taylor… everyone”.

Johnny Depp introduces Mumford & Sons, who perform their track “I will wait for you”. It’s the performance of the night so far.

Justin Timberlake

Ellen and Beyonce are up to introduce Justin Timberlake. Welcome back JT “He was born to make music”… The black and white effect is awesome. His band, The Tennesse Kids are there and Jay-Z’s verse wouldn’t be left out. Jigga emerges from the crowd and everyone goes wild.

Kelly Rowland and Nas are up to present the Best Urban Contemporary Album. The Grammy goes to Frank Ocean for his album, Channel Orange. “So I hear it’s a bit easier if I imagine you all naked. I want to say thank you to my mother, to everyone at Future Records. Island Def Jam and all of you guys. Thank you.”

Dave Grohl and Pauley Perrette are up to present the Best Rock Performance and the Grammy goes to Lonely Boy by the Black Keys. “We would like to thank our good friend, Brian Burton. Chad Blake. Everyone in Ohio, everybody in Tennesse.”

Alicia Keys and Maroon 5 collaboration is up. Their mashup of Tonight and Girl on Fire wasn’t what I hoped it would be. In my opinion it was too forced and maybe it’s because I’m not a Maroon 5 fan, but it just didn’t work for me. Alicia playing drums is super cool though.

Kaley Cuouco and Keith Urban are up to present Best Pop Vocal Album to Kelly Clarkson for Stronger.  “I got stuck to Miranda Lambert. I get nervous speaking in front of people. Fun. I’ve been covering you all summer. Miguel I don’t know who the hell you are but we need to sing together. I honestly didn’t think I was going to win.”

Rihanna and Micky Echo singing Stay. Lovely intimate performance by Rih Rih.

Ne-Yo and Carly Rae Jepsen are up to present Best Rap Sung Collaboration “I didn’t think I’d be the first one speaking but thank you,” Frank Ocean. I would like to thank the Swap Meet for his hat. Thank you God,” Jay-Z. What on earth was The Dream thinking though when he got dressed? Tjop!

Kat Dennings from 2 Broke Girls introduces Grammy winners, The Black Keys. They’re joined on stage by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band as they perform Lonely Boy. Cool performance. Kelly Clarkson honours pays tribute to Lifetime Achievement recipients Patti Page & Carole King before presenting the Best Country Album Award. The award goes to Zac Brown Band for their album, Uncaged.

Bob Marley tribue, Grammys 2013

The Bob Marley tribute is up featuring Sting, Bruno Mars, Rihanna and two of the Marley Brothers. Bruno Mars kicks off the tribute with Locked out of Heaven. Sting joins him and they slow it down with Walking on the Moon. Rihnna and Ziggy Marley are now on stage singing Could you be Loved. Hello Damian Marley. This is winning!

The Lumineers are on stage now singing their let’s get stoned and reminisce. I do love this song though.

Album of the Year nominee, Jack White takes to the Grammy stage to perform.

Katy Perry is up to present the award to the Best Newcomer Award. “I was never nominated in this category and I have my own eyelash line”. The award goes to Fun. “I didn’t think we were going to win this one. Frank Ocean, The Lumineers. Amazing. I’ve got to pee real badly, so I’m going to leave this up to these guys. Thank you so much. We’re so old.”

Hunter Hayes enjoys a short performance before introducing the lovely Carrie Underwood who is performing Blown Away.  She, just like Kelly Clarkson has pipes for days. There’s this weird graphics show happening on Carrie’s dress while she’s performing.

Prince presents the award for Record of the Year to Somebody that I used to Know. “Little bit lost for words to be receiving this award from this man standing behind us with a cane.”

Grammymusicteacher.com is a site you will want to visit. Pay tribute to your teachers, make sure they get the praise too.

In memoriam segment is up. In 2012 greats like Dick Clark, Donna Summer, Robin Gibb, Frank Wilson, Hal David passed away. Sir Elton John, Zac Brown, Brittany Howard of Alabama Shakes, Mavis Staples, Mumford & Sons and others pay tribute to those lost in 2012 and also to the victims of the Sandy Hook tragedy, whose lives were lost too soon. They’re singing a Levon Helm track.

Juanes sings an Elton John number. He then welcomes Frank Ocean to the stage. There’s a great backdrop for the star, as he sings his song Forrest Gump.

Adele is up to present the Album of the Year. The award goes to Babel by Mumford & Sons. Lekker. “Adele is looking lovely tonight and so nice to get this from another British musician. Thank you very much.”

Countdown to the 2013 Grammys

Justin Timberlake Grammys Performance 2013We’ve got just a few days to go until the 55th Annual Grammy Awards take center stage – and no doubt #TheWorldIsListening. Music’s Biggest Night® will honour some of the biggest, the best and the most successful stars we’ve all come to love and adore. The ceremony is set to take place at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and trust you won’t want to miss this.

Get this, artists like Dierks Bentley and Miranda Lambert, The Black Keys, FUN., the Lumineers, Mumford & Sons, Rihanna, Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood, Jack White, as well as Elton John and current nominee Ed Sheeran will all be on stage come the 10th of Feb. While that list is WELL IMPRESSIVE, I’m looking forward to Justin Timberlake’s performance. The news about him performing at the Grammys was announced yesterday and this will be the first time we’ve seen the six-time Grammy winner perform in over four years. He’ll be putting on his (Tom Ford?) Suit & Tie and rocking the stage. Barring Beyonce’s Super Bowl performance on Sunday, this will easily be one of the most talked about and highly anticipated performances of the year.

The Grammys online:

@TheGRAMMYs on Twitter,

“The GRAMMYs” on Facebook,

Google +,

Instagram,

Pinterest,

Tumblr,

YouTube.

I’m going to be up, watching and blogging live on Monday morning (the usual deal). If you’re up with me, it’s on from 3am on Channel O, DStv channel 320. The repeat is on Vuzu (116) at 19:30.

Taylor Swift releases I Knew You Were Trouble

One of my favourite tracks of 2012 has to be I Knew You Were Trouble by Taylor Swift. I’ve always respected her talent and her craft, but I can’t say I’ve ever been the biggest Taylor fan. That until I heard Red, her latest album. It’s a solid offering, even if the star sings about (failed) relationships most of the time ;)

This track introduces us to a different side of the star. When you hear the intro you expect it to be another pop song… that until a little bit of dubstep kicks in and it is but awesome. It’s edgier and simply put, #winning. Have a listen and a watch above and for more on how the song and the dub came about, click here.

2013 Grammy nominees

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The 2013 Grammy nominees have been announced. Leading the pack is Mr. Frank Ocean and the Indie-rockers, Fun. Kelly Clarkson, Jay-Z and Kanye, and Mumford & Sons all scored nicely too. The one category I’m a bit surprised about is the New Artist category. I really would’ve thought that Carly Rae Jepsen would’ve been in there, not so much. She is nominated for her global smash hit, Call Me Maybe in the the Song of the Year category and a few others.

Also have to give props to the fantastic, the legendary, Bra Hugh Masekela, who has been nominated for a Grammy too. He has been nominated in the Best World Music category for his album, Jabulani. Proudly South African moment! Boom.

The awards are set to take place on the 10th of February in Los Angeles. Again, if anyone wants to send me, I’m more than willing to go. #TrueStory. Check out the full list below:

Record Of The Year

  • Lonely Boy – The Black Keys
  • Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You) – Kelly Clarkson
  • We Are Young – Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe
  • Somebody That I Used to Know – Gotye Featuring Kimbra
  • Thinkin Bout You – Frank Ocean
  • We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together – Taylor Swift

Album Of The Year

  • El Camino – The Black Keys
  • Some Nights – Fun.
  • Babel – Mumford & Sons
  • Channel Orange – Frank Ocean
  • Blunderbuss – Jack White

Song Of The Year

  • The A Team – Ed Sheeran, songwriter (Ed Sheeran)
  • Adorn – Miguel Pimentel, songwriter (Miguel)
  • Call Me Maybe – Tavish Crowe, Carly Rae Jepsen & Josh Ramsay, songwriters (Carly Rae Jepsen)
  • Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You) – Jörgen Elofsson, David Gamson, Greg Kurstin & Ali Tamposi, songwriters (Kelly Clarkson)
  • We Are Young – Jack Antonoff, Jeff Bhasker, Andrew Dost & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe)

Best New Artist

  • Alabama Shakes
  • Fun.
  • Hunter Hayes
  • The Lumineers
  • Frank Ocean

Pop Field

Best Pop Solo Performance

  • Set Fire To The Rain [live] – Adele
  • Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You) – Kelly Clarkson
  • Call Me Maybe – Carly Rae Jepsen
  • Wide Awake – Katy Perry
  • Where Have You Been – Rihanna

Best Pop Duo/Group Performance

  • Shake It Out – Florence & the Machine
  • We Are Young – Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe
  • Somebody That I Used To Know – Gotye Featuring Kimbra
  • Sexy And I Know It – Lmfao
  • Payphone – Maroon 5 & Wiz Khalifa

Best Pop Instrumental Album

  • 24/7 – Gerald Albright & Norman Brown
  • Impressions – Chris Botti
  • Four Hands & A Heart Volume One – Larry Carlton
  • Live At The Blue Note Tokyo – Dave Koz
  • Rumbadoodle – Arun Shenoy

Best Pop Vocal Album

  • Stronger – Kelly Clarkson
  • Ceremonials – Florence & the Machine
  • Some Nights – Fun.
  • Overexposed – Maroon 5
  • The Truth About Love – Pink

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Watch Taylor Swift’s AMA performance… trouble, trouble, trouble

People, don’t y’all be judging me too much now, but Taylor Swift’s new track, I Knew You Were Trouble is one of my favourite tracks at the moment. It’s taken off her album, RED, which is but winning. She sold over 1.2 million copies of the album in her first week and I can understand why. It’s a really strong offering, even if it’s about her apparent passed relationships etc.

Back to the song, the star took on more of an edgy approach to her performances at the weekend when she performed the song at the American Music Awards. Have a listen and watch the song above. LOVE THE DUB, Taylor.

2012 American Music Awards winner’s list

The annual American Music Awards wrapped up a few hours ago. I caught the last bit of the show with Psy’s awesome Gangnam Style performance. I also saw Stevie Wonder’s tribute to the late Dick Clark. Nice to see the beautiful Carrie Underwood walking away with yet another award. Did anyone else watch the show? If so, who did you enjoy seeing perform?

Check out the full list of winners below:
Artist of the Year: Justin Bieber

Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist: Justin Bieber

Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist: Katy Perry

Favorite Pop/Rock Band/Duo/Group: Maroon 5

Favorite Pop/Rock Album: Believe, Justin Bieber

Favorite Country Female Artist: Taylor Swift

Favorite Country Male Artist: Luke Bryan

Favorite Country Band/Duo/Group: Lady Antebellum

Favorite Country Album: Blown Away, Carrie Underwood

Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Artist: Nicki Minaj

Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Album: Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded, Nicki Minaj

Favorite Alternative Rock Music Artist: Linkin Park

Favorite Electronic Dance Music Artist: David Guetta

Favorite Soul/R&B Male Artist: Usher

Favorite Soul/R&B Female Artist: Beyoncé

Favorite Soul/R&B Album: Talk That Talk, Rihanna

Favorite Adult Contemporary Artist: Adele

Favorite Latin Artist: Shakira

Favorite Adult Contemporary Inspirational Artist: tobyMac

New Artist of the Year: Carly Rae Jepsen

2012 MTV EMA winners

Check out the list of winners from this year’s MTV EMAs. I wasn’t able to watch the show because my DStv signal bombed at around 16:20 (first world problems).

So if any of you watched the show, hollerback with highlights etc.

BEST FEMALE – Taylor Swift

BEST SONG – Carly Rae Jepsen – “Call Me Maybe”

BEST MALE – Justin Bieber

BEST LIVE – Taylor Swift

BEST LOOK – Taylor Swift

GLOBAL ICON – Whitney Houston

BEST VIDEO – PSY – “Gangnam Style”

BEST WORLDWIDE ACT – Han Geng (Asia Pacific)

BIGGEST FANS – One Direction

BEST WORLD STAGE – Justin Bieber

BEST PUSH – Carly Rae Jepsen

BEST ALTERNATIVE – Lana Del Rey

BEST ELECTRONIC – David Guetta

BEST HIP HOP – Nicki Minaj

BEST NEW- One Direction

BEST POP – Justin Bieber

BEST ROCK- Linkin Park

2012 Billboard Music Award winners list

Top Artist:

Adele

Top New Artist:

Wiz Khalifa

Top Male Artist:

Lil Wayne

Top Female Artist:

Adele

Top Duo/Group:

LMFAO

Top Billboard 200 Artist:

Adele

Top Hot 100 Artist:

Adele

Top Digital Songs Artist:

Adele

Top Radio Songs Artist:

Adele

Top Touring Artist:

U2

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2012 Billboard Music Awards

02:00- The Billboard Music Awards are live. The show opens with party rockers, LMFAO and a medley of some of their biggest hits including the Shuffle song (Party Rock Anthem), Sorry for Party Rocking and I’m Sexy and I Know It.

02:05- Modern Family‘s Ty Burrell and Julie Bowen are the hosts for the award. I love these two. The showed their “cred” by showing us their hip-hop video. Julie makes a superb video ho ;) Ty has it down… yo. They then went into a country track with a series of Billboard beeps

02:10- Julianne Hough presents the Social Artist of the Year. The award goes to Justin Bieber. “Thank you. First of all I just want to say how much of a blessing it has been. The past three or four years growing up in front of everyone. The Internet is where it started for me and I want to thank all my fans. Thank you so much to my mom, my dad and to God. Thank you so much, fans I love you, everybody”.

02:19- A short tribute to Robin Gibb, who lost his battle to cancer earlier.

02:20- Katy Perry gets the Spotlight Award, which was presented by Lisa Marie Presley. In addition to thanking her record label EMI for their ongoing support, Perry said, “The people that have the power, so I want to say thank you to the glittering and gorgeous fans out there. Thank you my ‘Kitty Kats’. I want to say one last thing. The real rockstar here is my grandmother. She’s 91 and she’s from Las Vegas, I can’t wait to go and do shots with you after this.”

02:24- Kelly Clarkson debuts her new song “Dark Side”. She’s looking gorgeous in her red dress.

02:32- The Wanted take to the stage. They’re performing their track Chasing the Sun.

02:38- Miley Cyrus presents the Best New Artist Award to Wiz Khalifa. He scored four top ten hits on Billboard last year. Here’s what he had to say, “I got to thank God first. God is amazing. I also want to thank my mom first, my dad, everyone who lets me do this. I’m up here shaking man. Atlantic for letting me do what I do. All the DJs. My beautiful fiancé because she’s my world. Everyone for supporting me. Thank y’all”.

02:44- Brandy introduces “her boy” Chris Brown. He is lip syncing and very badly if you ask me, but his dance moves make up for it I guess.

02:49. Natasha Bedingfield is up to show homage to the late great Donna Summer. The tribute was very short and in my opinion lame. They cut to a “coming up” clip. I know this is live TV and time is short, but wow they could’ve done a lot more to honour the Queen of Disco.

02:55- Time to look back at 22-year-old Taylor Swift’s very successful year (well and career). She is Billboard’s Woman of the Year. On accepting the award from Zooey Deschanel “That was so nice. The first time I ever saw my song on the Billboard chart I was 16. That seems like forever ago. Thank you to everyone. I’m so humbled by this. Thank you for Chris Chrisopherson and Zooey Deschanel for coming out. Thank you to the fans.”

03:00- The Far East Movement introduce the legend that is Usher. He’s performing his new track Scream.

03:12- Jason Derulo is up now Hot 100. He presents the Billboard Hot 100 Song of the Year to LMFAO for their song “Party Rocker Anthem”. On their win the twosome said, “This is amazing. This is a dream come true. We want to thank Ian Fletcher our manager. Q, Sky Blue baby. Jimmy. Will.i.am, the DJs. Dance music is back baby”. What would the awards be if the two didn’t thank each other, “I want to say thank you to you man. I love you man. And the fans. If you believe in yourself no matter what they say. You can do what you love.”

03:15- Ty Burrell has been inoculated for “Bieber Fever“. That’s right it’s time for Bieber to perform his track ‘Boyfriend’. The sound is crap, he sounded crap… The performance was cool. His performance was followed by Carly Rae Jepson, also out of Canada.

03:30- The virtual versions of Ty and Julie went on a tour of Vegas. They visited Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant, the spa, Caesar’s Palace, The Venetian, the Four Seasons and other places in the city. Fun times and Sophia Vegara’s viritual double made an appearance too.

03:31- Wiz Khalifa presents the award for Top Duo or Group. Before presenting the award, he wanted to thank the Beastie Boys. LMFAO wins this one too. “

Yeah. I love this. I love everybody here. I love everyone who loves music man. It’s like you think of what you want. We used to dream about this moment. We had an Easter egg trophy and we were like thank you for this. I just really want to thank the Party Rock crew. You guys are all amazing. Sky Blue, be be you. We Love you.”

03:35- Carrie Underwood is up on stage now to perform her track Blown Away. Looking regal and beautiful in red, like her fellow American Idol friend Kelly Clarkson.

03:43- Gladys Knight is up to present the Male of the Year. The award goes to Lil Wayne. He couldn’t be there apparently so she accepted on his behalf. Swizz Beatz welcomes to the stage Linkin Park. It has been a while since we’ve seen the rockers on a stage like this. Their new album drops soon and I predict it’s going to be a winner. There are rumours doing the rounds that they’ll be in SA in the not too distant future, let’s wait and see.

03:55-Eric Bennett and Monica present the award for Best R&B to Chris Brown. Bennett obviously had to use the platform to promote his new album. Is that the only way people will actually know about it? Nobody cares dude, so sit down! Brown was stoked and grateful to all in Team Breezy. His speech was then followed by a performance by the lovely Katy Perry

04:05- Whoopi Goldberg is hear. “Like so many people around the world, I adored Whitney Houston”. She remembers meeting Whitney at the Nelson Mandela tribute concert in London. John Legend and Jordin Sparks are up to sing for Whitney. He’s leading the tribute with a beautiful rendition of “The Greatest Love of All”. Fantastic. Jordin Sparks is now singing “I will always love you”. Superb performance from Jordin, really fantastic!

Whoopi passes on the award to Bobbi Kristina and the rest of the Whitney family. “This is truly an honour. We thank you for honouring Whitney. We thank you Billboard, Jordin, John. Tonight the one person who should be accepting this award is the one Whitney loved most. Her daughter Bobbi.”

Bobbi Kristina said, “I just really want to say thank you to everyone who supported us through it all. Not just through the hard but the good too. I’m just blessed to have been in such an incredible woman’s life. I thank you all so much”.

04:21- Cee Lo Green is up now. There’s a soldier dancing around with his crouches. His leg has been amputated but damn that isn’t stopping him from breaking it down. They’re performing “Fight for your right to party” in honour of Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys fame. Now this is what I’m talking about. Does it take two amazingly talented fallen stars to pass on in order to have performances like this?

04:27- Taio Cruz presents the award to the Battle of the Bands winner. He’s wearing his sunglasses indoors, what a chop. Anyway. I don’t know who Patent Pending is, but they’re rocking the stage.

04:36- Gavin Degraw introduces my girl Nelly Furtado, who is performing her new track “Big Hoops (Bigger the Better). It’s love. I love her and the native Indian American influence! I’m happy now!

04:46- Alicia Keys up. She says, “I am here tonight to say thank you Stevie. Thank you for bringing us joy. Thank you for bringing us so much soul. I’m here tonight to honour Stevie Wonder with the Icon of the Year award.”

The icon takes to the stage to perform alongside Alicia. He says, “Didn’t she sound incredible? Alicia Keys. Alicia love, lets keep it real. My birthday was last Sunday. I want you to give me a birthday gift. I want you to sing me Empire State of Mind a Capella,” which she does.

He then accepts the award. “I wanted to say to all of you. Alicia, everyone in the audience. Every single person this award belongs to you and to the Almighty God. We’re in a place where we have to commit ourselves to one thing and that is to love. Love will always prevail over hate and peace over war. We have approximately 7 billion people around the world and I would like you to put your best life forward. We can change the world by being as one. Please”