Taylor Swfit, Chappell Roan Came to Party

The MTV Video Music Awards celebrated their 40th birthday — and for once, MTV aimed to do right by the legacy. This year’s show was full of clips of classic VMAs moments. Madonna and Britney making out, in 2003. Beyoncé announcing her pregnancy, in 2011. Michael Jackson appearing with new bride Lisa Marie Presley in 1994 to quip, “Just think — nobody thought this would last.” (It didn’t.) Madonna in full “Like a Virgin” bridal gear, humping the stage in 1985. Taylor Swift singing on the NYC subway in 2009.

And of course, MTV playing music in 2024. Just kidding — they couldn’t find any footage of that one.

But this was one of those years when the VMAs felt like a giant pop celebration, with superstar performances from stars like Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, Karol G, and host Megan Thee Stallion. As Megan said, “Tonight, VMAs stands for Voluptuous Megan Awards.”

Taylor was the big winner of the night, but like everyone else, she was in the mood to party. She won the show’s first and last awards for “Fortnite,” her collaboration with Post Malone. Yet to everyone’s surprise, Taylor did not use the occasion to announce a new album, or Reputation TV, or a new Broadway show (Female Rage: The Musical), or a new Cabinet position in the Harris-Walz (Taylor’s Version) Administration. She simply urged everyone to vote — a power move the day after she put her mack hand down with her expertly timed Kamala endorsement, bringing on the “Childless Cat Lady” era of electoral activism.

Taylor also got a priceless moment with Flavor Flav, when he handed the Best Collaboration award to her and Post Malone. He’s a longtime fan, yelling, “Swifties in the building — yeah, boyeeee!” It makes sense, since as she sings in his favorite tune, “Willow,” Flav always comes back stronger than a Nineties trend.

Chappell Roan worked her Midwest medieval princess theme all night, as she made her long-awaited VMAs debut. She wore armor and used a crossbow to shoot a flaming arrow into a castle as she did “Good Luck, Babe!” It would have been perfect to see a chainmail-clad Chappell grab that red-carpet paparazzo who told her to shut up and disembowel him onstage with her bare hands. Maybe next year?

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But Chappell had the night’s hands-down emotional highlight when she won Best New Artist and read her speech from her diary, thanking her queer fans while presenter Tinashe added supportive finger-snaps. It was a real tearjerker, especially when Chappell got to the closing lines: “For all the queer kids in the Midwest watching right now: I see you, I understand you, because I’m one of you. And don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t be exactly who you wanna be, bitch!”

Sabrina Carpenter did a sly alien-sex routine while singing her hits — but tragically left out “Lie to Girls,” one of the best songs she or anyone else has come up with all summer. Sabrina got a warm introduction from her great Eighties foremother Cyndi Lauper, a pioneer in the art of MTV fun-having. She also won Song of the Year for “Espresso,” receiving her trophy from Miranda Lambert. It was a poignant pass-the-torch moment from the country goddess who gave us all the proto-Sabrina motto “What doesn’t kill you only makes you blonder.”

One of the night’s coolest moments was one where nothing officially happened: Tinashe came out to present Best New Artist, treating herself to an extremely glam power strut down the runway — 15 solid seconds of Tinashe showing off her walk. It seemed like her way of saying, “I know, it’s insane that I’m not performing ‘Nasty’ tonight, right? How many people in this room can boast a hit that great in 2024? So here’s my spotlight moment. Observe how a star does it, people.” Tinashe served an admirable lesson in how to jack the camera and seize the moment, because that’s what the VMAs are all about: stars being stars.

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Also, you have to love how MTV quiiiiietly phased out the VMAs’ highest honor, the Global Icon Award, which I’m sure has nothing to do with the fact that last year they gave it to some guy named Sean “Diddy” Combs. Just a year ago, Diddy brought out his kids for the whole family-man heart-warming routine, complete with Mary J. Blige calling him “a brother and a friend.” Yeah, that aged well. So here’s guessing that’s one award we’ll never see again — the next time we hear about the Global Icon legacy will be the day Mase sees his name on a blimp.

Karol G showed everybody what true star power looks like with her all-over-the-room rendition of “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido.” Halsey did some excellent garage-rock, in an actual onstage garage, debuting the scathingly honest “Ego.” There were great performances from Glorilla, Benson Boone, and Rauw Alejandro, who was introduced by the model Alessandra Ambrosio. As for Lenny Kravitz, that man can show up any time he wants, wherever he likes, and do this thing, especially when he’s got Quavo by his side.

Tyla won the Best Afrobeat category and gave an excellent speech praising the reach and diversity of African music, while charmingly insisting that a not-entirely-willing Lil Nas X come over and carry her Moon Person for her, since it was too heavy, while she declared, “Thank you MTV, my team, God, everyone.”

Eminem began the show with “Houdini,” using the same participation-trophy joke that comedian Sebastian Maniscalco used to begin the show five years ago. Sunrise, sunset. He did a clever callback to his classic 2000 VMAs performance of “The Real Slim Shady,” with an army of men in matching blonde wigs, except now wearing beards. Shawn Mendes sang “Nobody Knows” in a really dangerous-looking haze of smoke, while Camila Cabello did “Godspeed.”

Megan kept it all moving with her typical charisma and humor, paying tribute to Britney’s classic 2001 VMAs python dance by wearing the same costume, except with a not-so-real snake. Megan also brought down the house with her performance of “BOA,” “B.A.S.,” “Hiss,” and “Mamushi,” with a guest shot from Yuki Chiba.

Anitta came out to perform, but unfortunately, the powers that be evidently felt she wasn’t capable of holding the stage on her own, so they sent out some clown to keep interrupting her by shouting “Put your hands together” right over her vocals. Jeez, what a dumb idea — and like most dumb ideas, it involved DJ Khaled. But she got to truly shine for “Savage Funk” and “Alegria.”

There was a mighty weird performance that was billed as a Def Jam tribute, but was really just a LL Cool J greatest-hits medley with a brief cameo from Public Enemy. LL kicked ass, riding on his brand new masterpiece The Force. It might have made you wonder why this wasn’t a Video Vanguard tribute for Uncle L, but no — he already won that honor back in 1997. (He was great that night, too.) PE rose to the occasion with a ferocious “Bring the Noise.” Obviously the surviving Beastie Boys don’t perform without Adam Yauch. Tough luck for those of us Def Jam heads who got up our hopes for a moment of Original Concept, Slick Rick, or even Oran “Juice” Jones. (“You without me like cornflake without the milk!”) But somewhere, the late Nathaniel Hornblower must have been proud.

Katy Perry won this year’s Video Vanguard award, the first winner ever introduced not by another music star, but by her fiance Orlando Bloom. Katy’s got a load of MTV history — she’s also the first Video Vanguard winner who made her biggest red-carpet fashion splash parodying another Video Vanguard winner (Britney Spears) or two (Justin Timberlake), rocking their blue-denim getup from the 2001 VMAs; the first winner to have met a previous husband at the VMAs; the first winner to have hosted the VMAs (in 2017) in a show that ended with a career-disaster duet with another Video Vanguard winner (Nicki Minaj); the first winner whose uncle directed the movie that made Neil Young fall in love with Carrie Snodgress. But despite their long-ago bad blood, Taylor Swift was noticeably up on her feet and dancing to “Teenage Dream,” along with everyone else.

Whatever you think of “Woman’s World” — nobody’s idea of a quality Katy song — it was a chance to see this pop pioneer get her musical due. She did a medley of hits, going back to her “I Kissed a Girl” days, but pointedly skipping “Woman’s World.” Doechii joined for their new “I’m His, He’s Mine” duet. As Katy boasted, “I did this on the first day of my period!”

Perry gave a heartfelt speech — maybe the last time in history any award winner will ever thank MySpace. (And the Warped Tour! Oh, the 2007 realness.) “There are no decade-long accidents,” she said, taking on music-biz misogyny and ageism. “One of the biggest reasons I’m standing here right now is that I’ve learned how to block out all the noise that every single artist in this industry has to constantly fight against, especially women.”

Toward the end of the show, MTV did a hilarious roll call of minor-award category winners otherwise unmentioned during the show — Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande, Dua Lipa. Billie won the “Video for Good” prize for her Barbie song, six months to the day after she won an Oscar for it, and seven months after it won the Grammy for Song of the Year (i.e. Song of last year). Hell, this song has already gotten a Paul Weller cover version, and it’s just winning a VMA now?

We also got an odd Pepsi ad remaking the classic 2004 clip starring Britney, Beyoncé, and Pink as a trio of Roman gladiators doing “We Will Rock You,” except now it’s about Megan and the not-at-all-controversial NFL. It was especially funny coming right after Lisa rapped over the same song for her ever-delightful “Rockstar.”

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One of the night’s big sentimental highlights: ladies and gentlemen, Carson Daly! The TRL kingpin made an excellent appearance as a presenter, looking exactly the same as he did in his 1515 Broadway days. “It’s an honor to be here for the 40th anniversary of the VMAs,” Carson said. “For those of you who are a little too young to know who I am, I was the host of a show on MTV called Total Request Live, or TRL, a very long time ago. It was the best show, kids going crazy in Times Square. And every day after school, I was with your mother, so please tell her I said hi.”

But Carson’s too modest — he was so much more than that. He was a moderator presiding over a fervent national debate every afternoon about the philosophical meaning of pop music, in terms of “NSync suck, Korn rule, wooooo!” vs. “Fred Durst sucks, Britney rules, Backstreet’s back all right, wooooo!” Make no mistake, it’s a debate that rages on today — the names change, but the stakes remain as high as ever. And that’s what the VMAs are supposed to be all about. TRL and Carson, forever.