TELL 'EM WHY YOU MAD: Tha Lady Blogga on Black Embarrassment Television

I am not a watcher of BET for various reasons. But due to the untimely passing of Michael Jackson, the BET Awards were supposed to be a celebration of Michael Jackson. So I decided to put those reasons to the left and watch in his honor.

Well…

Let me start with the Red Carpet Pre-Show. During the Red Carpet Show, it was just a debauchery of performances for the no talent artists we rip-apart daily. Let’s start with the grammar and overall hosting presentation of Rocsi a.k.a. Wrecksi, Terrance and Toccara. I think that if you are going to host a show, there should be mandatory protocol that needs to be followed. First of all, you need to speak proper English. Tocarra was a total embarrassment when speaking to the guests on the red carpet. So was Terrance. He referred to Illinois as “Illinoise” and did it with such confidence. Wrecksi was her usual ghetto self and she was “shouting out” and “hollering” at people every chance she got. All of which would be acceptable if they were on the set of 106 and Park (aka 106 & Playground). But as the nation was tuning in, CNN was covering and just the fact that it was supposed to be an awards show, these red carpet hosts should have stepped their game up.

The red carpet performances were like one big amateur night at the Apollo. Actually, I would have appreciated the talent of the folks at the Apollo much better. On the Red Carpet stage were the talentless acts Pleasure P, Jeremih, Beyonce clone Latoya Locket, New Boys (Whoop?), Day 26 (Whaaaaat?) and another group of instructional dance singers/rappers that I don’t even remember. Once Day 26 won the “Best Group” award over “The Roots”, my capacity for remembering any of this nonsense was out the window.

The show was supposed to be a tribute to Michael Jackson (at least that’s the hype BET went into it with). Jamie Foxx was on his usual BS. He cracked his usual jokes and changes into a new Michael Jackson outfit between acts. I can’t say that I liked it but given the situation, people needed to laugh. While listening to some people sing his MJ songs, I only hoped that he would walk out on the stage and tear it up. But he wasn’t going to. It was awful. Listening to their performances only saddened me and made me miss him more. I know they only had three days to prepare but they could’ve done a better job. I mean, I didn’t expect anything more. This is BET for goodness sake.

The whole beginning of the show was about Michael Jackson. The opening act was all about New Edition. While they had all the Jackson 5 dance moves down, their singing was washed up completely. Bobby Brown even played the role as Tito, he gained like an extra 150lbs and looked awful on stage. He went as far as to do the lip licking thing in the camera… TACKY!! Ne-Yo (who came to the show with an extra from “Candy Girls” and claimed her as his girlfriend…*side eye*) came out and sang “Lady in My Life” and THANK GOD!!! Finally some quality sound. Ciara sang “Heal the World”. And she really shouldn’t have. She did the song no justice. I can’t understand why they didn’t let these artists stay within their range and sing up-tempo songs. The ballads they tried to accomplish were just… Uggghhh.

As the show progressed, we forgot about Michael and had to endure other stuff. I guess because this was such a closely watched event, Jay-Z felt it necessary to make an appearance singing “Death of Auto-Tune”. I am almost positive he wouldn’t have bothered otherwise. While the song is beginning to strike me as lame, his stage performance was not the usual. He finally got a haircut and he was actually unusually energetic. I’ve seen Jay in concert a few times so I am used to his usual dead stick performance.

I mean, I wasn’t surprised at the sloppiness and unprofessional put together show. I especially loved the bad timing of the censor button pusher, who censored the “bad word” after it was already said… And I think he just gave up after awhile because Eddie LeVert managed to say “shit” with no problem. Speaking of LeVert, it was great to hear the O’Jay’s. Real music sounds good and I hope the new breed of whiners and crooners had their notepads out.

There were many things just wrong with this awards show. I could have listed many other singers to have put together meaningful tributes to Michael. I am annoyed that Chris Brown was not a part of the show. Rumor has it that he was not included because of his recent rift with Rihanna. Well there were plenty of alleged woman beaters on the stage last night so that can’t be the reason. Aaron Hall, Bobby Brown, Don Cornelius… And these are all respectable men??

Let’s not forget the ridiculous run of the advertisements for the “Frankie and Neffe” and “Tiny and Toya” shows that made me want to vomit. Who is going to watch that garbage?! Who cares about washed up celebrity relatives? I know I don’t.

The BET Awards show just confirmed what I already knew. That channel needs to be canceled from my cable package immediately. I thought they would have stepped up and actually made themselves look good. Instead, it was a mockery of our culture and music and I am thoroughly embarrassed. I have never known Michael Jackson to be a “friend” to BET. I guess because he’s black and they are a black network, it only seemed right. If Michael Jackson were alive, guaranteed, he would not have been watching that bullshit last night.