BET Awards 2011: The Good, The Bad, The Unbiased

Another year, another BET awards show. Before I get into reviewing the BET awards I want to start by saying I think BET owes a spot of thanks not solely to its viewers but to Twitter as a whole because Twitter makes watching the BET Awards a totally different experience. It’s like a viewing party for those you can relate to.

Now you know my stance on certain genres of music and my history so let’s get into this. I have to say YC’s performance of Racks on Racks with Nelly as the feature was… horrible. The song is terrible. Nelly fell so far off that Humpty Dumpty is wearing shirts with his face on them. Poised for a comeback? Never but he will always be an icon in rap because of his sales and his undeniable influence.

Now I can tell you that BET has been on the verge of a reinvention to reestablish legitimacy for a while now and those steps were seen in this show. BET introduced performances by Mali Music and others, and though cut off by commercials, it was great to see BET go off the main path to highlight artists that deserve some global recognition. Hopefully, next show we will see artists such as Dom Kennedy, Aloe Blacc and Andrea Jones on the BET awards because BET is the perfect launching platform for up and coming black artists as MTV has been for other artists.

This years best performances definitely came from all around. Jill Scott’s performance had the entire crowd needing to take five minutes as she and Idris Elba heated up the screen. Alicia Keys, celebrating the 10 year anniversary of Songs in A Minor, gave a wonderful performance with appearances from Bruno Mars and Rick Ross. I never wondered what Alicia Keys would  sound like over a J.U.S.T.I.C.E. league produced beat but if her rendition of Aston Martin Music is a taste then I am going to need a seven course meal. Even Trey Songz gave an above average performance of Love Faces and brought out Kelly Rowland who continues to motivate crowds with the single from her soon to be released third album. Kelly must have known Beyonce wouldn’t be in the building because she gave a performance that had many women forgetting their significant others were in the building, room or state.

Patti Labelle was awarded the Lifetime Achievement award and treated to wonderful performances from Cee-Lo Green, Marsha Ambrosius and Ledisi, all of whom brought their style to Patti’s hits. Ledisi, gave a performance that was as soulful and touching. Marsha gave a rousing, ranging performance that reminds you why she was the go to female hook singer for hip-hop for so long. Cee-Lo Green brought his usual eccentric style to Patti’s classic 80s look that reminded us of the Patti we all loved then. Even Patti loved the parody of her style so much she couldn’t help but laugh. But the performance that really moved Patti, and you could see it on her face, was when Pastor Shirley Caesar came out and even had me tearing up a little with her powerful voice singing “You Are My Friend.”

Disclaimer, I love Patti Labelle. Not like people love shoes, summer days or picnic in the park. I mean like I grew up on Patti’s music. My aunt sang backup for Patti a couple of times and I didn’t speak to her for years for not telling me about it. I have every song in Patti’s catalog that was ever released on record, cassette, CD, cassingle, maxi, iTunes. So seeing her catalog represented by such diverse artists and represented so well moved me. I would have loved to see an anniversary tribute to the passing of Michael Jackson but it was three hours and a half.

Now I am going to say something everyone has been saying since the first ten minutes of the BET Awards: Kevin Hart was the best host the BET Awards have ever had. He spared nobody. Might have lost a few friends. He threw himself on the roast as well so as not to seem afraid to take punches (literally and figuratively.) He had great timing and you could tell he dropped a few jokes so as to save BET some money on censors. Simply put, great job BET.

But it wasn’t all roses. The Young Stars award serves no purpose what so ever and seems like more of a handjob to the tween audience, who probably aren’t watching BET to begin with, than a serious award and to award it to Willow and Jaden Smith seems like “We want a piece of the piece” than anything else. Additionally, there were three other points I would like to address.

1. Commercials: The average half hour TV show runs 23 to 26 minutes without commercials. This is 7 to 4 minutes of commercials per half hour, 14 to 8 per hour. The BET Awards had just under an hours worth of commercials. It should have fit into around 50 minutes anyway but it seemed there was an excessive amount for a three and a half hour awards show.
2. Censors: I am not an advocate of censorship in any form and often preach to my friends who often try to censor that they should remove themselves from whatever is offending them. So take this with a grain of salt if you will but I think BET’s censorship rules go a bit over board. Especially when, during Love Faces, they censored the words “touch all over you.” This is going a bit far by even the most draconian  standards and when they should have caught something they missed it. I am not new to this so I know the FCC requires a 7 second delay on all live broadcasts since the Janet Jackson-Nipple Gate so you need censors who are faster and more accurate because the performance of DJ Khaled, Drake and Lil’ Wayne for “I’m On One” had my mom thinking something was wrong with a) BETs feed, b) the cable and c) the TV until I pulled out my iPad and showed her what it really was.
3. More diverse performances and categories: I loved Jill Scott, Alicia Keys, Cee-Lo, Drake, Trey Songz, Kelly Rowland, Chris Brown, Busta Rhymes and everyone but Rick Ross getting up there THREE times was just not worth it. While I hate the fact that Kelly had to share a performance with Trey Songz I will admit that that format WORKS. It worked for Alicia Keys, Bruno Mars, Rick Ross. It worked for Jill Scott. I would have loved to see Mary Mary perform. I think BET has turned around the BET awards over the last decade but honestly, some awards we can do without. Sportsman and sportswoman of the year could be Athlete of the Year, I have already addressed the Young Stars Award and the Video Director of the Year Award is nice but where is the one for Film Director, Film/TV Producer, Writer, etc. It’s a 3 hour show that with some time management and better scheduling could highlight more diversity of African-American roles in film and entertainment.

Now, sorry to take you to the shed for a moment but to end it on a high note I would like to say thank you to BET for not promoting the foolishness that has become reality television outside of it’s advertisements for Toya’s show. There is a lot to say on the roles African-Americans portray in reality shows and the role they play in distorting the relationship we have with the world around us as the lesser evolved believe what they see and the highest evolved loathe these individuals because they feel that is what they have come to embody. To see BET take a step away from having Real Housewives, Basketball Wives and the ilk, as presenters and nominees really has me wanting to watch BET more. You know, once they have programming for people like me.

Now where do we go from here? Let’s make these categories matter. Having Lola Monroe in a category when BET has not had her on neither an episode of 106 & Park nor any of the three videos she has done lends more to wanting to give Nicki Minaj another statue than anything else. BET, you have the power to create competition for these categories which you pick the nominees and if you spend 5 minutes on Bloggerhouse, The Smoking Section, 2 Dope Boyz or any other hip-hop blog you could find there are artists out there like K’LA and Jean Grae who give Nicki Minaj some rather stiff competition. If you knew better, you’d do better. Partner up with these blogs and you can have a pretty diverse BET Hip-Hop Awards show. Especially since the whole hip-hop blogosphere would rather see BET succeed than fail despite what the general vibe may seem. We all grew up on Rap City and Uncut.

Now I may have heard criticism of coonery on behalf of those who have no appreciation for hip-hop, rap or R&B. Honestly, this was the most balanced BET Awards show in the past three years. No Gucci Mane, Waka Flocka, Roscoe Dash, Trouble or any of the usual snap, clap, trap rap music artists were in attendance. Cali Swag District was unusually reserved, showing up with Dougie Fresh. It was well put together and rather downplayed. I am a Buddhist and even I enjoyed the third hour of the awards show which was dedicated to Gospel, the Lifetime Achievement Award and the Humanitarian Award. I know most people are expecting me to throw stone at Steve Harvey but I rather enjoy living in my glass house.

To say love gospel and have no appreciation for hip-hop and rap is to deny the children of gospel and jazz. The history of hip-hop and rap stems from a combination of the two with rock as the youth needed a way to express what they feel and what they believe. Gospel music and hip-hop are expressions of the soul when in the purest forms and while one may not be your cup of tea, failure to acknowledge the legitimacy of the other is short sighted, narrow minded and often the opinion of people who have grown up with no appreciation for the world around them but solely for the world they reside in.

My uncle is the music director at his church where they have live gospel music weekly. He tours with jazz, soul, R&B artists on a regular basis. He has done production work for artists from Layla Hathaway, Rasaan Patterson and MIMs. He has done production work for artists all across the board from various genres of music and from various walks of life. When I asked him why he worked with such a diverse talent base he answered me simply, “We are all children of God and he doesn’t make any mistakes. If I am to believe that then I am to understand that because someone is different it does not make them wrong because they are doing what they feel suits them. If they are not hurting anyone then who am I to intervene in his plan unless called to. There has be be a balance between up and down, left and right or black and white. That doesn’t make one good or bad. It doesn’t make one right or wrong. What it does it is serves to make things complete.”

It’s those words that resonate with me with every BET Awards but this year it seemed liked everyone came together on one accord. BET finally has worked out the kinks of years gone by with this years awards ceremony and more to the point it was great to see everyone in the building having a great time. My twitter stream was live and we were all not as vile as years pasts. So they got something right this year. And if you are curious why I didn’t mention Beyonce’s performance its because it sucked.

“What? There ain’t no more to it.” – Notorious B.I.G.

P.S. BET GOOD LOOKING OUT WITH THE GIL SCOTT HERON TRIBUTE. WE HAD PITCHFORKS READY. YOU ABATED US.

Another Mess I See from BET

By: Tyrone Farley

So I think that is ok to say that I am tired of the embarrassment from some of the ‘members’ of the African American community. One of those embarrassments would be the ever-so-hood BET Awards which like to give themselves the credit for giving the black community a ‘voice’… my question is what voice is this?

June 26, 2011 aired another horrible representation of what the black community stands for. I’m sorry people, I don’t stand for all the non-sense that was displayed and at this moment I find it very difficult to even put this into words. Rappers on stage without their shirts on cursing and jumping around the stages like monkeys in distress. Black Culture is not about this line of music and at a point in time when BET was worth watching was not about displaying this. Contrary to popular belief there is certain class to being black in America and that not all of us listen to “Gangsta” music or even rap for the most part.  So to show our great support for this ‘thriving’ community, TV Network BET decides to dedicate an awards show to demonstrate to the public why they call us “Niggas.” BET Award shows support every negative stereotype that exists in our community and I’m tired of it.  BET (Black Entertainment Television) does not capture my demographic of entertainment nor does it in anyway capture the majority, it should then be called SBET for Some Black Entertainment Television, because one the minority watches the current network, thank God for the OWN network, which seems to demonstrate the class we as a people we once displayed.

BET has been the support of My Black is Beautiful and now a new segment giving honor to black women.  Showing all the positives of our community in one breathe and taking it back every year annually by honoring those that help bring out race down to the pits.

Then we can go into the host of mistakes made that night by the production staff, can anyone tell me the number of times your TV messed up and the delay was so bad that you almost didn’t want to watch the catastrophe? Now BET has the leading news network, CNN, talking about their horrible incident (if that’s what we should call it) in records to the mystery teleprompter screw-up that targeted Chris Brown.  I believe this was purposely done and was wrong in so many ways, which is the reason at the end of the awards show you see an example of Damage Control.  This Damage Control process consisted of putting Chris Brown back on the stage to apologize and recognized him again for the same pointless award.

Celo Green then gets on the stage to humiliate Patti Labelle dressed in drag. Mr. Green has completely taken the words out of my mouth with that “performance.”

I look forward to the day when the BET Awards show will go back to perfecting and doing PR for the black community rather than decreasing our value as black people in America with the pointless performance by people that stand for nothing positive in their music or personal lives.

Please wake up people and help me change the definition of what it means to be Black.